The report was prepared by the OECD Centre for Entrepreneurship, SMEs, Regions and Cities (CFE), led by Lamia Kamal-Chaoui, in partnership with the Global Relations and Co-operation Directorate (GRC) of the OECD, led by Andreas Schaal. It was produced as part of the programme of work of the Regional Development Policy Committee. The project was implemented in the context of the OECD-Ukraine Memorandum of Understanding signed in 2014. It was made possible thanks to the financial contributions of the European Union, Latvia, Lithuania and the Slovak Republic.
The report was co-ordinated by Stephan Visser, under the supervision of Maria Varinia Michalun, Head of the Governance and Strategic Planning Unit in the Regional Development and Multi-level Governance Division in CFE, led by Dorothée Allain-Dupré. Its chapters were drafted by Stephan Visser and Geoff Upton, with significant contributions from Antti Moisio, Fernando Riaza and Andrés Sanabria in the Regional Development and Multi-level Governance Division, as well as from external experts, including Pedro Camões (Portugal), Tamara Krawchenko (Canada), Sergey Maksymenko (Ukraine) and Antonio Tavares (Portugal).
The full report benefited from valuable input and comments provided by Nadim Ahmad, Deputy Director of CFE; by Raffaele Trapasso in the CFE Entrepreneurship SME and Tourism Division; by James Hermanson, Kristine Langenbucher and Antonella Noya in the CFE Local Employment, Skills and Social Innovation Division; by Dorothée Allain-Dupré, Isabelle Chatry, Jeannette Dubois, Enrique Garcilazo, Meghan Hennessy and Miquel Vidal Bover in the CFE Regional Development and Multi-level Governance Division; by Peline Atamer, Elisa Larrakoetxea, Gabriela Miranda, Mykhailo Semchuk, William Tompson and Yustyna Zanko in GRC’s Eurasia Division; by Martins Krievins, Monica Kurian and Lech Marcinkowski in the Support for Improvement in Governance and Management initiative (SIGMA); by Tenzin Dekyi, Edwin Lau, Dejan Makovsek and Masayuki Omote in the Infrastructure and Public Procurement Division of the Directorate for Public Governance; and by external expert Bohdan Krawchenko (Canada).
The OECD wishes to extend special thanks to Igor Korkhovyi and Ivan Lukeria (Ministry for Communities and Territories Development of Ukraine), Oleksandr Melnychenko, Kateryna Penkova and Oleksiy Voloshyn (Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine), as well as Tomasz Ostropolski and Natalia Starostenko (European Union Delegation to Ukraine) for their support of the project and for the input provided throughout the project implementation process. Special thanks also go to Anna Nyzhnyk (Ministry for Communities and Territories Development), and Igor Plisa (Ministry of Finance of Ukraine), for their valuable support on municipal data collection.
The OECD also warmly thanks the representatives from central government executive agencies, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, oblast and rayon state administrations, municipalities, associations of local governments, business associations, academia, civil society, the international donor community, as well as independent experts who met with the OECD team during their virtual missions. The OECD is also grateful to the 741 municipalities that completed an online questionnaire, which provided unique local-level perspectives on advances in and challenges to regional development and decentralisation.
The OECD would like to gratefully thank Andrej Horvat and his colleagues at the U-LEAD (Ukraine – Local Empowerment, Accountability and Development) programme who provided invaluable comments and input and supported the review process. The OECD is also grateful to the team of the DOBRE (Decentralization Offering Better Results and Efficiency) project for the insightful conversations and information shared.
Thanks are also extended to Pilar Philip and Shayne Maclachlan (CFE) who provided guidance to prepare the publication, to Nikki Trutter (CFE) for the cover art and to external editor Andrew Brenner who edited the final manuscript.