A meeting of the Coordination Center for the Transformation of Coal Regions of Ukraine was held on July 6 with the participation of Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal.

The event was attended by the Federal Government Commissioner for Structural Change in the Ukrainian Coal-Mining Region Stanislaw Tillich. From the Ukrainian side, there were present Minister of Communities and Territories Development Oleksii Chernyshov, Minister of Energy Herman Halushchenko, representatives of the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources.

According to the Prime Minister, an important condition for a gradual green transition is the implementation of a policy of fair transformation of coal regions while creating new opportunities for members of coal communities and employees of coal enterprises.

"We are planning to start with the development and implementation of pilot projects in two mining cities. But the geography of the program of fair transformation is quite wide – those are 5 regions of Ukraine or more than 60 settlements with almost a million residents. The transformation of coal regions is not about closing mines. We are talking about the creation of new industries, the development of the social sphere, infrastructure and the transition to the decarbonized economy," stressed Denys Shmyhal.

The Prime Minister highlighted that the Government would take into account the experience of other countries that had already passed or were seeing the final stages of transformation in the development and implementation of projects in Ukraine.

During the meeting, the Minister for Communities and Territories Development of Ukraine presented a Government’s comprehensive vision of the policy of fair transformation. The Ministry has proposed priority communities located in all regions of Ukraine for the first stage of fair transformation.

The Prime Minister was informed that the key criteria for selecting these communities were the level of dependence of local economies, budgets and housing and communal services on the coal industry, the state of the coal industry in these areas, the readiness of communities to implement equitable transition measures. The list of these communities also includes the cities of Chervonohrad and Myrnohrad, in which pilot projects will be implemented with the support of the Government of the Federal Republic of Germany.