Specialists from 14 regions of Ukraine have been trained as part of a series of 10 trainings organized by the Kyiv School of Economics (KSE) and UNICEF, with the support of the Ministry of Social Policy of Ukraine and in coordination with the Ministry of Finance of Ukraine.

More than 300 representatives of local authorities and central executive bodies mastered approaches to child-centered and gender-responsive budgeting, learned to identify priority needs of children and youth, and created transparent mechanisms for planning local expenditures.

“We focused on the real needs of hromadas. We analyzed local budgets, worked through practical cases, and most importantly, explored ways to improve the quality of services for children and youth with the available resources. I am pleased that the participants return with a desire to apply this knowledge in practice immediately,” said Yuliya Markuts, Head of the Center for Public Finance Analysis and Public Governance at KSE.

Representatives of the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Social Policy, the Ministry of Youth and Sports, and the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine provided practical advice and helped hromadas improve their mechanisms for financing social initiatives.

The trainings revealed that 80% of participants previously did not understand the differences between local targeted programs and budget programs. Hromadas received recommendations on how to improve their budget program passports and began to analyze their documents with a child-centered approach.

“These trainings helped participants not only expand their knowledge but also rethink financial management. Hromadas are already starting to implement changes that will make financial decisions more effective. In particular, participants gained a deeper understanding of how the budget can ensure equal rights and opportunities for women and men. Another important result was the change in the program classification of local budget expenditures made by the Ministry of Finance following the training,” said Oksana Tsiupa, trainer at the Kyiv School of Economics.

“I have personally rethought the concept of good governance in the field of public finance, improved my knowledge through practical experience, seen the interconnection between goals that I thought were unrelated, assessed the effectiveness of existing programs, and am determined to implement changes in the work of the team in the hromada,” said Tetiana Sosimovych, First Deputy Head of Kulykivka Village.

The participants plan to implement a number of important changes in their hromadas. One of the key areas will be the regular collection and analysis of the needs of families with children, including surveys, meetings with young people, and monitoring the quality of social services.

Considerable attention will also be paid to the gender aspect: hromadas will identify target groups and relevant indicators, taking into account the characteristics of different age groups, both boys and girls.

Transparency in the budgeting process remains a priority, so hromadas plan to improve approaches to defining performance indicators, engage the public more actively in planning local expenditures, and expand the practice of youth councils and public hearings.

Another important step is to expand partnerships with NGOs and international donors to help raise additional funding for social initiatives.

Oleh Hodun, Head of the Housing and Utilities Department of the Zviahel City Council, shared the experience of the “School Budget” project and how the hromada has already engaged young people in decision-making: 

“This initiative gave teenagers the opportunity to propose ideas and defend their projects. The training further helped to deepen our understanding of how to make budgeting more people-centered, consider community needs, and involve more target groups in decision-making.”

At the final trainings held in Lviv, participants from Volyn, Lviv, Kharkiv, Kirovohrad, Chernihiv, Mykolaiv, Kyiv, and Dnipro finalized their own drafts of changes to local budgets and prepared recommendations for spending units.

The trainings were conducted within the framework of the projects “Integrated Social Services for Conflict-Affected Children and Their Families in Western and Central Ukraine,” funded by KfW and UNICEF, and “Shock-Responsive Social Protection: An Analytical Study of National Budget Programmes, Including Vulnerable Categories Affected by the War, Families with Children, and Beneficiary Perceptions of Social Support Response in an Emergency Context,” implemented by the Kyiv School of Economics with UNICEF funding.