General Situation of the Country
Ukraine is situated in the south-eastern part of Central Europe and has its own territory, government, national emblem, flag and anthem. It borders on Russia, Byelorussia, Moldova, Slovakia, Romania, Hungary and Poland on land and Russia, Georgia, Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey on sea. The city of Kyiv is both the capital and the largest city of Ukraine. As of April 2006, the country’s population totaled 46,8 million, youth aged 14-34 constituted 14828497, including 7493679 – young men and 7334818 – young women.
The state institutions responsible for Youth Policy and their contacts:
Legal framework (laws, strategies, etc.):
- Law of Ukraine “On Association of Citizens” (adopted in 1992);
- Law of Ukraine “On Youth and Children Organizations” (1998);
- Law of Ukraine “On assistance of the social youth development in Ukraine” (1993)
Relevant draft laws lobbied by civil society to be adopted:
- Law on Civil Society Organizations
- Law on Charity and Charitable organizations
Youth NGO sector
One of the most positive developments in Ukraine’s democratic transformation has been the growth of the civil society. According to the State Committee of Statistics of Ukraine 70981 non-governmental and charitable organizations are registered in the country as of January 2009. 10,3 % of the total amount are youth NGOs. This relatively impressive number could be considered as an indicator of a high level of civic participation in Ukraine. But in fact, no data is available about how many of those are active and do not simple exist on paper.
It is also evident that the number of NGOs is growing annually, e.g. as of 1995 there were 28 All-Ukrainian youth and children NGOs, in 1998 –52, 2001 –80, 2004-120. But at the same time the number of engaged youth leaves much to be desired, as only 5% (1% from rural areas and 4% -from urban) of young of the total amount are members of youth and children NGOs. One of the reasons of the low involvement of young people into the youth NGOs is a lack of information about NGOs’ and their activities both young and the population as a whole.
Youth NGOs provide a wide variety of services including trainings, consultations, advocacy, legal and information support, publications, policy analysis etc. Most services are provided for free, some are offered pro bono. Many of youth initiatives especially on the national level are supported by the Ministry on Family, Youth and Sport and its respective departments on the local levels.
The positive tendencies have been prevailing in the dynamic of the civil society development for the last years in Ukraine. But the further process is hampered by a number of reasons: lack of financing; low level of trust on behalf of the population and law level of participation in NGOs; imperfection of the legislation, lack of the strategy of the civil society development in Ukraine.
