The stage of the voluntary association of communities is to be completed next year. And we must ensure that local elections are conducted on a new territorial basis and that a new system of functions of each authority is shaped. This was emphasized by Minister for Communities and Territories Development of Ukraine Aliona Babak during a meeting with Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany Anka Feldhuzen and Special Envoy of the Government of Germany on reforming Ukraine in the spheres of governance and decentralization Georg Milbradt.

“There is now a synergy of efforts of the President, the Government, the Parliament to switch to a key stage of the decentralization reform and to create an effective system for controlling the legitimacy of local government decisions. Due to the systemic support of our international partners, we already have a proper basis to ensure legislative regulation of this issue”, the Minister said.

She also stressed that the direction of cartographic modeling should be continued in order to create the most optimal model of the territorial structure of Ukraine. Given the importance of creating a capable public service provision network, even more importance is attached to this direction of work.

Apart from that, according to Aliona Babak, the Regional Development Strategy 2020-2027 should be approved until December this year. “And here we also expect strong expert support. The Strategy should be a positive signal to the whole world as Ukraine sees the work on regional development: recovery of the economy, social infrastructure development, strengthening of human potential. The essential objective is to raise Ukraine's position in the human development rating. Ukraine's economic growth is impossible without strong communities, without regional development. We would like Ukrainians to have a decent life - this is our priority”, the Minister emphasized.

Aliona Babak thanked the German Government and the U-LEAD with Europe program for the comprehensive support for local government reform.

In turn, the German Government's Special Envoy Georg Milbradt stressed that Germany would continue to support decentralization in Ukraine.