From the beginning of January 2024, Ukrainian Deminers Asocciation (UDA) launched new project with the support of the non-profit organization International Rescue Committee, Inc. (IRC), funded by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) donor. The project name “Child-focused victim assistance to children and their caregivers affected by mines the war, in Mykolaiv, Odessa, Kharkiv, and Kherson Oblasts and explosive remnants of war (ERW) and other at-risk children affected by the war, in Mykolaiv, Odessa, Kharkiv, and Kherson Oblasts”.
Work on the project will continue until the end of September this year. The UDA will carry out three main types of activities within the framework of this project:
- Case Managment. Identify and refer children, their parents, caregivers and teachers to IRC for case management services or other individual support. Target is 100 beneficiaries.
- Explosive Ordnance Risk Education (EORE). Implement EORE sessions for children and caregivers in IRC’s SHL Spaces and other identified locations. Target is 8,110 beneficiaries.
- EORE for teachers. Implement capacity building sessions on EORE for teachers. Target is 100 beneficiaries.
The goal of all project tasks is to: raise awareness of the risks from mines and explosive ordnance of people living in the communities of Odesa, Mykolaiv, Kharkiv, and Kherson regions; encouraging them to change their behavior to safe in order to reduce the risks of injury and death.
In addition, in February of this year, as part of this project, it is planned to hold a ToT for EORE instructors, where it is planned to improve the qualifications of at least 6 UDA trainers regarding the explosive ordnance risk education, the principles of humanitarian mine action, introduction to the group psychology, safeguarding and first aid etc.
Since 2022, this is already our fourth partnership project with IRC. In 2023, one project was successfully completed and two more were started. All projects are of a humanitarian nature and are aimed mainly at the EORE component for regions that have suffered the greatest contamination by explosive objects, as well as at the most vulnerable categories of the population - IDPs and children.
We continue our work on humanitarian aid to the population of Ukraine, later the interim results of the project will be published.
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