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Empowered Partnership for Sustainable Recovery (EPSR)

Project summary:

The Empowered Partnership for Sustainable Recovery project responds to the impacts of the war in Ukraine and aspires to strengthen local capabilities to effectively integrate sustainable development solutions in crisis response and further recovery planning. This involves the implementation of local initiatives for improving economic opportunities for war-affected populations, and public service provisioning, as well as employing the challenge-driven partnership approach, which has been successfully implemented to address social and economic development issues faced by local communities across Ukraine in previous years.

The project is financed by the Government of Sweden and is being implemented in five regions of western Ukraine: Chernivtsi, Khmelnytskyi, Ternopil, Vinnytsia, and Volyn oblasts.

Project goal:

The project’s overall goal is to support crisis response and the sustainable recovery of Ukraine from the consequences of the war, bringing it to the path of sustainable development, through achieving the following specific objectives: 

  1. Enable inclusive and gender-responsive transitioning from effective crisis and emergency response to socio-economic recovery, in line with good governance principles at the sub-national and local levels;
  2. Build resilience within war-affected communities by promoting a challenge-driven partnership approach to recovery and development.

Expected results:

The project has four interlinked outputs:

  • Output 1: The capacities of local authorities to plan, implement and monitor crisis response and recovery actions are improved through the adoption of inclusive, gender-responsive, and green development practices — including in project cycle management and building multi-sectoral challenge-driven partnerships.
  • Output 2: Local recovery initiatives, designed and implemented through supported challenge-driven partnerships, effectively address the multi-dimensional challenges faced by territorial communities.
  • Output 3: New livelihood-generating opportunities are created for women and men in the targeted regions through support for the sustainable recovery of MSMEs along critical value chains.
  • Output 4: Improved inclusive experience exchange and policy dialogue, linking early and post-war sustainable recovery practices to national policy, and consolidating Ukraine’s SDG localisation process.