Kyrychkove village is located in Dnipropetrovska oblast, where there is a high risk of missile and guided aerial bomb attacks. Olena lives here with her son and two daughters. Before the full-scale invasion, Kyrychkove was quite a big village, but now only 7 houses are still inhabited. There is limited functional infrastructure and no public transport in the village, so to buy food or to access medical services, Olena must take an expensive taxi and go to a nearby village located closer to the highway or to a large town further away.

Olena’s children attend online classes as there are no in-person options nearby, with the closest school being more than 20 kilometers away from their home. Olena explained to ERC’s team that this is not an ideal method of education, nor are her children receiving the level of education she had always hoped. Unfortunately, she has no ability to send her children to the aforementioned school as it would require spending 300 hryvnias (approximately 7 EUR) each day for a taxi, or 1500 hryvnias (approximately 35 EUR) per week - an amount that she cannot currently cover. For context, the average monthly income in Dnipropetrovska oblast is roughly 19,000 hryvnias (approximately 435 EUR) and the labor market situation remains difficult, particularly in rural areas such as Kyrychkove village.

To earn a living, Olena primarily keeps cows and chickens and sells milk and eggs. She used to have one cow but the income generated from its milk was insufficient to cover the family's basic needs. Olena learned about the European Union’s support for ERC’s Emergency Livelihoods Programme and decided to apply for support in order to purchase another cow and the supplies needed to care for her animals.

Olena received a grant of 36,000 hryvnias (approximately 830 EUR), which allowed her to purchase one more cow and fodder. Olena recalled that getting fodder independently was a big challenge in her local area. Her cattle need one bale of hay daily which costs 100 hryvnias (roughly 2 EUR). With her previous level of income, Olena could not afford enough fodder for her livestock to survive the winter and she was worried about the potential loss of her sole stream of income.

With a new young cow and adequate supplies, Olena started to sell more milk which had a tangible impact on her household income. She even managed to save some earnings from selling milk which has brought her some peace of mind. As the security situation in the region remains volatile, she expressed her gratitude for the assistance she received as it gave her a chance to build a more secure future for her children.

Image

“It’s not easy to live here under these circumstances but I cannot imagine myself elsewhere. I love my cows and the fruit trees I’ve planted in my garden. I’m grateful for the timely and efficient support ERC provided to me. Every day I do my best to keep the household running. I’m not going to leave all this behind”, Olena says.

ERC and its partner Acted, through the support of the European Union, are providing Emergency Livelihoods grants to conflict-affected Ukrainians so that they can launch or rebuild their income-generating activities. Through this project, ERC helped 420 highly vulnerable households to provide for their families in a sustainable and dignified manner, by leveraging the unique skills and interests of each unique person reached with financial assistance.