By KYIV. March 4 (Interfax-Ukraine) – Ukraine needs an analogue of the defense Ramstein to synchronize and coordinate efforts to clear the country’s territory, given the scale of pollution, First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy Yulia Svyrydenko said during a meeting with Member of the Parliament of Canada Heather McPherson.
According to the press service of the Ministry of Economy, with the resources available to Ukraine, demining will last 70 years, the First Deputy Prime Minister noted.
The ministry recalled that the government has already created an Interdepartmental Working Group on Humanitarian Demining, headed by Svyrydenko, which is working on a set of issues for organizing humanitarian demining in a short time.
“It is important for us to verify the available data on contaminated territories, to understand the priority of work, and the area of territories requiring priority clearance. Based on this information and taking into account the current capabilities of operators, we will plan actions. It is important to correctly orient agricultural producers, because the passage of the season will depend on this,” Svyrydenko said.
The meeting was attended by the heads of regions where the problem of pollution of the territories is most urgent, in particular, Mykolaiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Zaporizhia, Chernihiv, Cherkasy, etc.
In turn, the Kyiv School of Economics (KSE) held a conference on the issue of demining and announced plans to create an accelerator for demining companies, as well as conducting research to speed up this process, said Tymofiy Mylovanov, adviser to the head of the President’s Office and President of KSE.
“Some 30% of Ukrainian land is at risk of mines. Experts say that mine clearance will take decades. We are all not happy with this. Therefore, at the Kyiv School of Economics, we will make accelerators for mine clearance,” Mylovanov wrote on Facebook.
Milovanov urged to share these ideas so that as many people as possible can join the development.
Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said in February that within the $17 billion rapid recovery program in 2023, mine clearance is one of the five priorities, and the need for funding in this area is estimated at $0.4 billion.
