Without quality data, it is impossible to make effective government decisions. This was stated by Viktor Maziarchuk, Head of the Center for Fiscal Policy Research, in his speech at the Resilience Conference organized by the International Renaissance Foundation.
According to Maziarchuk, since February 24, 2022, Ukraine has received more than $100 billion from international partners. Of this amount, about 60 billion hryvnias were used for the recovery in 2022-2023. “As for local budgets, it is difficult to say how much has actually been spent, but the verified data from our Cost of War project shows that projects worth approximately UAH 200 million have been funded for reconstruction in Kyiv region during this period. We are now continuing to work on verifying the expenditures of individual territorial communities in the region,” Maziarchuk said.
One of the key problems is the lack of accurate data on recovery costs at both the central and local levels. The expert emphasized that the state does not have complete information on the facilities being restored: “I can say with 100% certainty that the state does not know how much it has spent on reconstruction.”
To solve this problem, the Center for Fiscal Policy Research is conducting verification of expenditures in 70 communities of Kyiv region. “We are actually conducting a financial audit, collecting information and checking each payment,” emphasized Maziarchuk.
One of the important aspects is cooperation with the Kyiv Regional Military Administration, which helps with obtaining data from communities. Summarizing his speech, Maziarchuk emphasized the importance of systematic work with data for making effective government decisions. “Without the basis of quality data, we will not have effective decisions. This is the main challenge for the future,” he summarized.