On January 29, 2019, the first in the current year meeting of the Supervisory Board (SB) of the Ukrainian Social Investment Fund (USIF) was held in Kyiv. SB members examined and endorsed the report on implementation of the budget and the annual plan of activities of USIF in the 4th quarter and in the year 2018 as a whole.

At this point SB noted that last year USIF managed to substantially improve its interaction with donors, central, regional, local authorities and other partners. Apart from that, SB members pointed out that the quality of supervised by USIF renovation and construction works at USIF.V objects significantly increased in the year 2018. A good dynamic in implementation of USIF.V project was noticed by SB as well.

In particular, within the framework of the ‘Construction Works’ component of phase I of USIF.V Project, being implemented in Dnipropetrovsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv regions, renovation works at 15 objects (4 residential facilities for IDPs, 7 schools and 4 kindergartens) were accomplished last year. Since the beginning of implementation of phase I of the Project, 22 objects out of 35: 7 residential facilities for IDPs, 9 schools and 6 kindergartens were renovated as at the end of the year 2018. More, than 130 internally displaced persons (IDPs) got social housing and about thirteen thousand people benefitted from renovation of children school and pre-school educational institutions in the Eastern regions of Ukraine. 

Within "Construction Works" component of phase II of USIF V Project, being implemented in cities of Kyiv and Lviv, construction works were finalized at 10 kindergartens, where 18 new group premises for 309 children were renovated in 2018. Since the beginning of implementation of this phase of the Project, 98 group premises at 41 preschool educational institutions were renovated, providing additional places for about 2300 children, including children of IDPs.

At this meeting SB also examined and approved USIF work plan and budget for the current year.

In addition to that, SB members made the decision on USIF structure and staffing optimization and in particular, supported creation of USIF South-Eastern regional office, which would ensure a proper level of implementation of USIF V and USIF VI Projects in Zaporizhzhia region and in districts of Donetsk region under control of Ukraine.

USIF will be implementing at least 4 Projects in the year 2019, namely:

1. ‘Promotion of Social Infrastructure Development. USIF.V’ Project. Grant of German Government through KfW. Project cost, fully covered by the grant funds, (in thousand euros): 14000,0. Project aim: creation of social housing for IDPs, renovation of schools, kindergartens and boarding institutions in Kharkiv, Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhzhia regions, cities of Kyiv and Lviv. Project implementation period: 2015 – 2019;
2. ‘Promotion of Social Infrastructure Development. USIF.VI’ Project. Grant of German Government through KfW. Project cost fully covered by the grant funds (in thousand euros): 9000,0. Project aim: creation of social housing for IDPs, renovation of schools and kindergartens in Kharkiv, Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhzhia regions, districts of Donetsk and Luhansk regions under control of Ukraine. Project implementation period: 2018 – 2022;
3. ‘Community-based Social Service Delivery’ Project. Grant of Japanese Fund for Social Development through the World Bank in the amount of 2850 thousand US dollars, fully covering all project related acitvites. Project aim:  creation of new and improvement of existing forms of social services provision to vulnerable groups of people in the identified districts of Odesa and Ternopil regions (including renovation of social infrastructure objects and provision of necessary equipment). Project implementation period 2018-2022.
4. Part 3 of ‘Social Safety Nets Modernization’ Project. The World Bank loan. Project aim: improvement of infrastructure of boarding institutions under transformation. Project completion: 2020 (as of now, extension of the Project duration is expected).