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Center of Excellence for Humanitarian Aid
Ukraine is going through a large-scale humanitarian crisis. At the same time the response from the international humanitarian ecosystem has been unprecedented. Hundreds of organizations have setup relief funds and grant programs to support Ukraine, but access to these funds and their best use is often challenging for several reasons:
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Language barrier and information silo in the Ukrainian humanitarian aid community: the humanitarian movement developed organically in the wake of the war. As a side effect, individual organizations have poor visibility into existing best practices across the sector. Furthermore, lack of foreign language skills restricts the pool of foreign donors.
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Inadequate medium-to-large-scale and formal aid management skills in the Ukrainian society: few Ukrainian NGOs and government officials have the experience and skills to prepare grant applications, manage the implementation and ensure the governance of medium-to-large-scale humanitarian projects. The war drastically strained skilled resources in Ukraine while simultaneously increasing the need for such skills
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Language barrier and lack of local know-how among donors: foreign donors have difficulties accurately assessing local needs, which results in resource misallocation and waste; local sourcing opportunities are missed. For example, a typical aid request can contain 100 items, but only 5-10 are the highest priority. Local sourcing can save 50% of the cost of purchase, removes international delivery costs and has a side effect of supporting local businesses.
As a result, the huge aid potential offered by the global community is often underutilized, misallocated or even does not get to Ukraine. The access barrier is simply too high for the overwhelmed, distressed, understaffed and financially deprived civic society in Ukraine.
This is where UA Brokers Without Borders come in – our mission is to increase access to humanitarian aid for Ukrainian society, by treating aid process as an end-to-end holistic process. We review every need, carry out due diligence, provide mapping of adequate suppliers and donors, and arrange bespoke logistics to the end user. We also take on all documentation, application process, pitching, donor outreach, monitoring and evaluation and reporting. We prioritize local procurement where possible: if a certain need can be fulfilled by a local provider, we propose this solution to the foreign donors.
Examples of projects done so far:
Holistic support to Misto Dobra
City of Goodness (Misto Dobra) - is a Ukrainian NGO caring for vulnerable women. When war started it was overwhelmed by an inflow of women and children fleeing the war. Since UA Brokers Without Borders began to support this organization, we have arranged food donations, multiple money grants and we continue supporting the team with funding for ongoing construction project;
Support to on the ground logistical team of Zdorovi Agency
Zdorovi Agency was one of the first organizations in Ukraine that very quickly adapted to the new war realities, understood that their medical and logistical expertise is invaluable for the times of humanitarian crisis, and became one of the largest distributors of medical humanitarian aid in the country. At their warehouses they have been sorting all incoming aid, repacking it, coordinating with hospitals to confirm the best distribution model and carrying out last time delivery - all of that as a 100% voluntary mission. At UA Brokers Without Borders we appreciated the importance of this work on the ground and therefore have been supporting Zdorovi with operational activity funding so that they continue their work. They have also been our trusted partner in Ukraine for medical equipment distribution.