Demining areas of agricultural land in Ukraine will reach last year’s level

Almost 10 thousand hectares of agricultural land were returned to Ukrainian farmers within the framework of the state program for compensation for the cost of demining.

This was stated by the Minister of Economy, Environment and Agriculture Oleksiy Sobolev during the annual final event on humanitarian demining in Ukraine Demine Ukraine Forum, the press service of the ministry reports.

According to the minister, the expansion of the program to households, and in the future to the plots of the “Land Bank”, will allow to increase the pace of demining of agricultural lands.

“By the end of the year, we will reach the indicators of 2024, despite the fact that the forecast for this year was not very favorable. And what is important, farmers harvested part of the harvest in already demined territories. And in the Kharkiv, Sumy and Chernihiv regions, which were affected by the war, the harvested harvest is even greater than last year,” Oleksiy Sobolev noted.

He stressed the importance for Ukraine of the support of international partners, whose contribution to humanitarian demining reached $1.5 billion. The largest support for demining programs was provided by the USA, the Howard Buffett Foundation, Switzerland, Norway, Germany, the EU, the Netherlands, Sweden, Japan and France. This concerns both projects that have already been implemented and those that are planned to be implemented by 2030.

“We are already seeing results. Communities are returning home, farmers are resuming their economic activities, and regions such as Kharkiv and Mykolaiv regions are demonstrating how demining contributes to economic stabilization and resilience,” commented Auke Lutsma, UNDP Resident Representative in Ukraine, on the results.

Tags: Ukraine, demining