EU-LEAP Launches the Project "Districts of Opportunity: A Path to Sustainable Community Development"

The EU-LEAP Analytical Center is launching the project "Districts of Opportunity: A Path to Sustainable Community Development," aimed at developing economic profiles of 8 starostate districts of the Poltava City Territorial Community.

The project is implemented within the framework of the project "Phoenix: The Power of Communities," carried out by the East Europe Foundation with the financial support of the European Union.

The Poltava community consists of 81% rural territories. It includes the Abazivka, Valkivka, Hozhulivka, Kovalivka, Palchykivka, Semianivka, Suprunivka, and Takhtaulivka starostate districts, home to approximately 26,000 residents.

At the same time, following the amalgamation of the community, the main attention and resources are often concentrated around the administrative center — the city of Poltava. As a result, the starostate districts remain less integrated into the economic life of the community, despite having significant potential for the development of local business, craft production, employment, investment attraction, and international support.

It is for this reason that the project will develop economic profiles of the starostate districts — strategic "passports" of the territories — that will help identify growth points for each district, assess its labor, financial, natural, and entrepreneurial potential, and plan development based on real data rather than assumptions.

Such profiles can become a practical tool for the Poltava community: for updating strategic documents, determining funding priorities, preparing infrastructure projects, and attracting investors, grants, and donor support.

This is particularly important in conditions where the community requires new data for recovery planning, economic development, and support for territories that have their own potential but need greater visibility, resources, and systemic support.

Within the framework of the project, the EU-LEAP team plans to:

• research the labor, financial, natural, and entrepreneurial potential of each of the 8 starostate districts;

• collect and analyze data for the development of economic profiles of the territories;

• hold meetings with starostas and community representatives;

• organize focus groups with residents of the starostate districts to identify real needs, barriers to business development, and opportunities for economic self-realization;

• conduct 3 offline workshops for veterans, internally displaced persons, and female military servicemembers, with tentative topics including sole proprietorship registration, grant support search, marketing of craft goods, and entering new markets;

• prepare infographics based on the economic profiles;

• identify 3 priority sectors or clusters on which the community can focus financial support, infrastructure projects, and further investment attraction;

• hold a final round table to present the economic profiles of the starostate districts and the project results.

  
  

In the long term, the project is expected to contribute to reducing internal migration, creating new economic opportunities in the starostate districts, and attracting grants and investments on the basis of quality data, analytics, and defined development priorities. This will strengthen cooperation between local business, authorities, the civic sector, and external partners.

Our goal is to help the starostate districts of the Poltava community become not a periphery, but fully-fledged points of economic growth.

The project "Districts of Opportunity: A Path to Sustainable Community Development" is implemented within the framework of the project "Phoenix: The Power of Communities," carried out by the East Europe Foundation with the financial support of the European Union.

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