Empowered Partnership for Sustainable Recovery (EPSR)

Project summary:

The Empowered Partnership for Sustainable Recovery project aims to respond to Ukraine’s current war-impacted context and aspires to strengthen local capabilities to effectively integrate sustainable development solutions into crisis response and further recovery planning, the implementation of local initiatives for improving economic opportunities for war-affected populations, and public service provisioning, as well as employ the challenge-driven partnership approach that was successfully implemented to address social and economic development issues faced by local communities across Ukraine in the previous years.

The project is being implemented in thirteen target oblasts of Ukraine – Chernihiv, Chernivtsi, Ivano-Frankivsk, Khmelnytskyi, Lviv, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Rivne, Sumy, Ternopil, Vinnytsia, Volyn, and Zakarpattia.

The project is funded by the Government of Sweden, represented by the Swedish Development Agency (Sida) and implemented by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Ukraine.

Project goals:

Drawing from previous experience, the intervention is envisaged to be specifically aimed at:

1. Piloting the sustainable recovery and development solutions in nine relatively safe regions, mainly in the western part of Ukraine; 

2. Testing the replication of the piloted solutions in four additional regions of Ukraine with high demand for such interventions and moderate implementation risks;

3. Sharing the best practices and experiences from the project with the rest of Ukraine to prepare a basis for their replication in the future. 

Expected results:

The project has four interlinked outputs:

  • The capacities of local public and private actors, including but not limited to authorities, to plan, implement, and monitor crisis response and recovery actions with a specific focus on gender-sensitive, inclusive economic recovery and livelihoods, are improved through the adoption of inclusive, gender-responsive, and green solutions and practices, as well as building multi-sectoral partnerships.
  • Recovery initiatives with a specific focus on the creation of economic and livelihood opportunities and inclusive development, designed and implemented by supported challenge-driven partnerships, are effectively addressing the multi-dimensional challenges faced by territorial communities.
  • New livelihood generating opportunities are created for women and men in the targeted regions through support for the sustainable recovery of MSMEs along the critical value chains and enhancing business-enabling conditions.
  • Improved inclusive experience exchanges and policy dialogues that link sustainable recovery practices to national policy and consolidate Ukraine´s SDG localization process for expanding equal economic opportunities for women and men, and access to finance and green economic growth.