On November 10, the Environmental Policy Initiative (EPAIU) of the International Renaissance Foundation held its final conference.
The overall goal of the Initiative, which was launched in 2019 with the support of Sweden, was to improve the quality and inclusiveness of the process of developing and implementing environmental policies in Ukraine. From the very beginning, we focused on making the environment a mainstream topic wherever possible and appropriate – in the public environment, politics, local government, education, or reforms.
To achieve this goal, we have been directing resources to the development of civil society organizations working in the environmental field – institutionally capable, with good governance, accountable and recognized in the environmental community. And in this, we have been supported at all stages by Sweden, a flagship country in terms of environmental friendliness.
Why did we start this Initiative and what have we achieved in the five years of work? How did Sweden help us in this? How did we manage to promote the topic of environmental protection even despite the war and the pandemic? And most importantly, how did our country change thanks to the work of those we supported? We discussed all this and more at the final conference.
The conference itself was devoted not only to the results of the EPAIU Initiative, but also to broader issues, such as the challenges of the great war for the environment and those who protect it, European integration and relevant reforms, recovery planning with a focus on sustainable and “green” solutions, etc. These are the topics that define the priorities of environmental organizations in Ukraine today: bringing Russia to justice for crimes against the environment and ecocide, bringing Ukrainian environmental legislation closer to European standards, and promoting sustainable solutions in recovery.
The Initiative’s partners, who received extensive institutional support in 2019, are also engaged in this work. At that time, we selected those organizations that we believed were capable of contributing to reforms in Ukraine, the implementation of the relevant provisions of the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement and the fulfillment of other international agreements of Ukraine through the implementation of environmental policies. Sweden shares our approach to realizing the great goal of the Initiative through the support of civil society.
“In order to increase the demand for sustainable solutions, it is very important to support the efforts of civil society organizations, youth and businesses. You are making an important contribution to the changes that are necessary for Ukraine’s accession to the EU, in particular to the green transition and sustainable development,” said John Runeson, First Secretary of the Embassy of Sweden in Ukraine.
However, when we drafted the Initiative in 2018, we could not have foreseen either the pandemic or a full-scale war. Nor could we have foreseen that 2022 would be a turning point for the country’s European integration track and accelerate the reform process, including in the field of environmental protection. However, at the very beginning we realized that we had to stimulate the acquisition of as much knowledge and resources as possible by the selected organizations so that they would be able to respond to the demands of time in different circumstances. Have we succeeded? Absolutely.
“Now it is absolutely clear how to use the results you have achieved. The level of competence and involvement required by this historic moment is unprecedented. And the process of gaining EU membership requires high-quality public participation, in particular in environmental issues, as one of the central topics of the country’s development.
And it creates a demand for your activities. It has never been as pronounced as it is now. So you are entering a big game, but I hope that our Initiative has empowered you. And as you grow older, you will be able to apply the skills you have acquired, set an example for others and “pull them up”. Because strong civic participation requires strong, multi-voiced coalitions that cannot be ignored,” said Oleksandr Sushko, Executive Director of the International Renaissance Foundation, addressing the Initiative’s grantees.
In addition to direct financial support to organizations, the Initiative held educational events, strategic sessions, and trainings, and found experts for individual consultations with grantee organizations. In five years of work, we have held five major annual conferences, supported 22 separate research and advocacy projects, and developed two online courses.
More than 10 draft laws were developed with the participation of our grantees. The institutional cohort was also involved in the development of regional and local strategies and strategic documents of national importance. But this is not all.
The results of the Initiative’s work were shared at the conference by its leader Tetyana Kukharenko, manager of the Democracy and Good Governance Program at the International Renaissance Foundation.
Tetyana noted that a total of 40 civil society organizations have completed the EPAIU training program, which we also encouraged to network and facilitated the development of new partnerships.
“More than 50 training events were joint – that is, they were platforms where both institutional and small grantees of the Initiative could meet. And not only to listen to trainers or invited experts, but also to learn more about each other’s work, share experiences and find partners,” says Tetiana Kukharenko.
Who are the “small” grantees? In addition to large institutional grants, 27 other organizations from the east and south of the country received small grants for environmental projects between 2021 and 2023, including air quality monitoring, an eco-activism school, research on the impact of the war on the environment in Mariupol, an upcycling workshop, development of a methodology for measuring soil damage from the war, use of a GIS tool to record environmental damage, and other initiatives. Unlike the institutional cohort, which mostly consisted of organizations directly involved in the environment, small grantees had a broader thematic profile and were concerned with the development of their communities in general.
“It was a specific challenge for us. Initially, our main focus was on organizations that were powerful enough to receive large institutional grants, implement large projects, and were well known. But at a certain stage, we realized that we had to focus on regional organizations as well,” said Oleksiy Orlovsky, Director of the Democracy and Good Governance Program.
A separate panel at the final conference was devoted to discussing these projects and the changes that have taken place in the organizations over the period of small grants implementation. We believe that an important achievement of this area of the Initiative’s work is that we have helped small organizations that are primarily engaged in solving local problems in their communities to integrate the environmental component into their work and to get to know each other and more experienced organizations.
The importance of this achievement was also emphasized by Oleksandr Sushko, who noted that “strong civic participation requires strong, multi-voiced coalitions that cannot be ignored.”
At the conference, we also presented two major studies commissioned by the Initiative. The first is “Analysis of the Level of Involvement and Role of Ukrainian Civil Society Institutions in the Formation of Environmental Policy and Programs”, which was conducted online by Svitlana Matus, an expert on environmental policy, and Halyna Levina, an expert in environmental law.
The analytical report demonstrates a snapshot of the activity of environmental civil society institutions, including EPAIU institutional grantees, in the processes of environmental policy-making within the existing legal framework in 2019-2022.
The second study was conducted by the monitoring agency E.B.I. to analyze the presence of environmental issues in the public information space of Ukraine during the year of large-scale war. Its results are also available here.
Despite the fact that the EPAIU Initiative is formally coming to an end, the International Renaissance Foundation does not stop working on the environment. We realize that the demand for sustainable and environmentally friendly solutions is only growing. Our responsibility for what the Armed Forces of Ukraine protect – the future of the country, the future of the civilized world – is also growing.
We will tell you more about the research presented at the conference and the results of the Initiative in the following materials. In the meantime, you can watch the recording of the broadcast in Ukrainian and English.
The conference was held within the framework of the Environmental Policy and Advocacy Initiative for Ukraine (EPAIU), implemented by the International Renaissance Foundation with the support of Sweden.
