Protecting livelihoods and supporting human capital in Ukraine

Forced displacement, physical and mental injury, and military mobilisation as a result of Russia’s full-scale invasion have created unprecedented challenges for individuals, families and communities in Ukraine. These impacts have also caused profound disruptions in the country’s labour market, leading to acute staffing and skills shortages for firms, as well as implications for the people they employ and the communities that rely on their services.

Addressing these social, humanitarian and economic challenges has required a multifaceted emergency response – ensuring reliable access to essential services such as housing, heating and finance, while also supporting the recovery and continuous development of human capital and jobs to improve economic resilience.

More than 80 per cent of EBRD investments in Ukraine in 2022-25 supported human capital development, reflecting its central role in the Bank’s response to the wartime emergency and its importance as a crucial driver of Ukraine’s eventual post-war recovery.

The EBRD has delivered a direct and systematic response by focusing on three key pillars:

1.   Restoring and improving access to finance, vital services and infrastructure

Economic activity cannot be sustained without people having reliable access to vital public services such as electricity, water and public transport. As at the end of 2025, EBRD emergency financing had enabled continued access to these services for more than 3 million residents and internally displaced people in the cities of Lviv, Dnipro, Kharkiv and Kryvyi Rih, helping to protect livelihoods and sustain local economies.

Expanded EBRD programmes with partner financial institutions have also delivered essential access to finance and capacity building for micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs), while ongoing policy dialogue with the National Bank of Ukraine is helping to broaden access to employment and finance for veterans. By the end of 2025, the EBRD’s SME Competitiveness and Inclusion Programme had delivered more than €110 million to veteran-, women- and youth-led businesses in Ukraine, as well as other war-affected business segments, directly reaching more than 1,300 MSMEs in total.

2.   Broadening economic opportunities

EBRD investments in 2022-25 helped 89 companies broaden access to economic opportunities among their staff and supply-chain partners. These companies made explicit and measurable commitments responding to human capital needs among their employees and those they work with, including introducing new training, recruitment and staff support initiatives.

The Bank’s capacity-building programmes have also directly improved job quality for 3,700 veterans, and helped EBRD client companies to support 24,600 people currently mobilised in Ukraine’s armed forces with robust new return-to-work pathways, making the labour market more inclusive and resilient.

3.    Enhancing skills 

Reliable access to skills development is critical to adjust to critical business needs, enabling employers across Ukraine to fill key vacancies and expand their operations, while equipping individuals with the necessary skills to access job opportunities. The EBRD’s support in establishing training programmes and partnerships has been shaped by client companies’ most pressing skills-related shortages and mismatches, helping them not only to continue operating, but also fuelling growth and innovation. More broadly, the Bank has helped to bring occupational skills in line with European Union (EU) definitions and standards by engaging with policy partners and collaborating with education providers, international partners and leading employers. Other initiatives have focused on strengthening healthcare skills – through engagements with the Kyiv Medical University and Esper Bionics – and on enhancing engineering skills forsupport Ukraine’s renewable energy sector. 

EBRD-supported upskilling and reskilling initiatives are expanding employment and entrepreneurial opportunities for working-aged women. A retraining programme at telecoms group Datagroup-Volia has helped more than 1,100 of its women workers gain skills for roles traditionally held by men, while a pilot training programme at renewable energy company Goldbeck Solar is providing internship opportunities for female students at local universities and vocational schools.

Responding to the evolving and differing needs of people affected by the war on Ukraine, the EBRD has provided not only urgent wartime support, but helped embed a longer-term approach to human capital development that will enhance economic inclusion and labour market resilience. 

Ukraine’s Human Capital Resilience Charter, introduced in July 2025 following EBRD policy engagement, has set new standards for inclusive business principles and is helping more women and men to develop skills and pursue new roles across the economy. 

The charter – launched with Ukraine’s Ministry of Economy, Environment and Agriculture alongside the EBRD’s Folke Bernadotte Academy partners – aligns government, businesses and international partners on inclusive business principles. More than 220 companies formally committed to the principles of the charter in 2025, and it now acts as a key platform for private-sector engagement by the ministry and for advisory work on human capital priorities. 

EBRD engagement has also helped several of the Bank’s client companies to partner with local and international universities and vocational schools on developing short- and long-form training programmes to address skills gaps. One example is the Mykolaiv Water Sector Skills Development Programme, which is filling urgent human capital requirements to address wartime needs while also providing training on modern water infrastructure

Ukraine’s human capital recovery remains a central priority for the EBRD and its donor partners, and donor contributions have been instrumental in supporting EBRD engagements in this area. The Bank secured more than €3.4 billion from over 20 donors between the start of the war and the end of 2025, helping to enable concessional financing, as well as technical assistance on workforce recovery and broader policy initatives.

The strong coordination of efforts among bilateral and multilateral stakeholders has been key to ensuring the delivery of effective and timely support. Progress has also been driven by the unwavering engagement of EBRD client companies, whose commitment to more diverse, supportive and sustainable labour market outcomes in Ukraine has underpinned the Bank’s work in this area.

A further critical success factor has been the strong presence of people on the ground, both from the EBRD and from implementing consultants. Building direct relationships with clients in the local language helps build trust, and their deep understanding of the Ukrainian context and rapidly evolving wartime realities has enabled EBRD teams to identify real needs early, adjust activities quickly and maintain momentum despite uncertainty and operational constraints.

Another key success factor has been the Bank’s holistic engagement with both public and private stakeholders. This has made it possible to support human capital recovery not only at company level, but also through more systemic and embedded changes. For example, improvements in individual firms’ human resources policies and practices have been reinforced through broader frameworks, such as the Human Capital Resilience Charter, helping to anchor inclusive labour market practices in a more durable institutional context.

A central lesson learned is that sustainable impact requires moving beyond one‑off training towards systemic capacity  building. The EBRD’s approach has, therefore, prioritised measures that enable continuation after project completion, such as training‑of‑trainer models, the development of internal expertise and the creation of accredited or scalable learning programmes. By strengthening internal systems rather than delivering isolated activities, the EBRD’s human capital interventions have helped ensure that positive effects persist and contribute to long‑term workforce resilience.