During press-conference in the Crisis Media Center, dedicated to the foundation of Economic and Humanitarian Forum UKRAINIAN ID, NGO “Ukrainian Humanitarian Development Foundation”, Mayor of Kaniv city and Ukrainian Chamber of Commerce and Industry have signed the “Memorandum of Understanding” to stipulate the Forum’s initiative, as well as other events targeted at revitalization of Kaniv city. The Forum will bring up the question of inseparability and correlation of economic and humanitarian development of States, not only drawing attention to complex issues of regional development in Ukraine and in the world, but also proposing effective solutions for them.
“This initiative is appealing two me in two aspects: firstly, it is the necessity for the dialogue intensification and focusing attention to the central part of Ukraine – of both Ukrainian government and world community. Speaking not only about Kaniv, the whole Cherkasy-Poltava region. This cause is very useful and furthermore – it is rightly motivated spiritually, economically and politically. Secondly is indeed this image of unfinished Ukraine. Because often when Ukraine has this image of revelry and desperation, Ukraine also has all the pre-conditions for success, just not all of them are leveraged, not all are put in place and activated… Kaniv city, as well as lots of cities throughout Ukraine, have 90-95% already in place, you just need extra 5-10% of efforts, initiatives, drive to fully activate this potential”, - underscored Roman Waschuk, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Canada to Ukraine, honorable guest of press-conference.
One of the Forum’s tasks is to attract foreign investments and projects to Kaniv in order to elaborate a successful model of development for small, but interesting cities in terms of creation of logistics and touristic infrastructure, with the aim of stimulating cultural tourism in regions.
Kaniv city has been chosen as a Forum’s venue not by coincidence. This city is a power place, city-symbol, geographical and spiritual center of Ukraine. In the meantime, this is the city of unrevealed economic, social, cultural, as well as touristic potential, which is to be revealed to Ukraine and to the world by the initiators of the Forum. “We have to show that the country is being developed not only in capital city, but also in regions, not even the regional capitals. And to give this opportunity to every region in our country – to begin a dialogue on what has to be done by each and everyone of us for the development of our country. It is necessary to hold not only economic events, but to draw attention to inclusive dialogue in society from small cities like Kaniv”, - underlined Gennadiy Chyzhykov, president of Ukrainian Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
Underscoring the necessity of decentralization’s reform conclusion and giving the right impulse towards the development of local communities, the mayor of Kaniv city stated: “I would like to thank all participants here today, I’ve also gathered a strong team of like-minded citizens who will work for this initiative. And now I can see that we have the abilities to accomplish everything”, - Igor Renkas, head of Kaniv City Hall.
“I represent here the Family Foundation of Bohdan Hawrylyshyn, highly renown Ukrainian, world-famous economist who was a co-founder of Swiss Davos and today we are talking about Ukrainian Davos… Kaniv is absolutely unique city, special for every Ukrainian, city, that is already deemed to become a pearl in Central Ukraine. Bohdan Hawrylyshyn Family Foundation, named after a Ukrainian who founded global initiatives, would like to join because big and daring ideas are deemed to be accomplished – that was believed by Bohdan Hawrylyshyn, as well as by today’s Ukrainian youth”, - pointed out Olena Bekreniova, director of Bohdan Hawrylyshyn Family Foundation.
Organizers of the Forum will engage leading Ukrainian and international specialists in its five thematic areas – Economy, Community, Human Security, Culture and Technology, in order to establish effective international dialogue to seek the solutions to the modern challenges. «I worked in 12 countries and 60 cities around the world but Ukraine is the first country I’ve left Canada to live in. Right now I work with 16 cities around Ukraine (not Kaniv, yet!) and what we see is that’s where the real potential lies at the local level So I really support initiatives like these when people invest their passion and energy, pull together the right stakeholders to bring attention to the potential. I applaud this effort and I’m ready to support it because it really does demonstrate the future direction of development» - Kadie Ward, developer and consultant, hear of “Build Strong Cities” organization that focuses on community development.
In parallel to the Forum, 7th of July 2022 is the date for the kick-start of International Multidisciplinary Festival “Doba Shevchenka”. This will be the festival of modern music, modernliterature, modern theater and modern cinema. It will draw the attention to Kaniv as to an interesting cultural itinerary.
“With the help of two powerful events – international Forum and international Festival, we would like to rebrand Kaniv city, to reload its perception. I’m convinced that we can direct tourist flows to Kaniv and people will leave real money there for the community to flourish. To accomplish all this, we started to draft a law “On Kaniv city, a city of exceptional value” that will provide necessary incentives for developers and constructors to come”, - stated Nataliia Zabolotna, the initiator of the Forum.
The presentations of summer events in Kaniv city can be found here:
http://ukr-id.com/ - International Economic and Humanitarian Forum UKRAINIAN ID
http://shevafest.com/ - International Multidisciplinary Festival “Doba Shevchenka”
