Experience in working with communities, participation in grant projects, and the creation of university-based advisory hubs were among the issues discussed by participants at the annual meeting of the USAID AGRO Program and partner higher education institutions.
Nataliia KAPINOS, Associate Professor of the Department of Geodesy and Land Management at Sumy National Agrarian University, took part in the intense two-day project. The moderators were Serhii KUBAKH, Land Reform Officer of USAID AGRO, and Kateryna RIEZNIKOVA, Spatial Planning and GIS Manager of USAID AGRO. Government officials, parliamentarians, and representatives of the public sector also joined the dialogue, including Oleksandr HAIDU, Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Agrarian and Land Policy, Olena SHULIAK, Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Organization of State Power, Local Self-Government, Regional Development and Urban Planning, and Denys BASHLYK, Deputy Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food of Ukraine for Digital Development, Digital Transformation and Digitalization.
The partner universities presented their own cases of assisting communities in implementing the world`s best land management practices.
The educators visited Bucha. During the occupation of the city by russian troops, 861 private houses, 122 apartment buildings, and 875 outbuildings were damaged. Currently, Bucha is being rebuilt, and the participants had the opportunity to learn about community recovery projects.
The program included a meeting with the rector of the Kyiv School of Economics. Tymofii BRIK shared his experience working with communities and participating in grants.
Nataliia kapinos is convinced that what she heard and saw will help universities become even more effective spatial planning advisory hubs for communities to accelerate Ukraine`s recovery. For Sumy NAU, this aspect is a priority in its work. Cooperation with communities is one of the points of the development strategy. The educational institution has repeatedly become the centre of international projects aimed at helping and supporting communities, mainly in the agricultural sector. For example, in the autumn of 2023, a project to train experts in assessing the condition of soils damaged by hostilities was implemented on the basis of SNAU (https://soil-expert.snau.edu.ua). In addition, the Sumy Business School was recently opened at the Faculty of Economics and Management, which has become a centre for training and project development for the restoration of Ukraine (more details at https://snau.edu.ua/biznes-shkola-innovacijnij-pidrozdil-sumskogo-nau/).
