FROM INTENTIONS TO ACTION!

Today, Ukraine has more reconstruction plans than ever before. Strategies, registries, digital platforms, and priority lists create an impression of systemic progress and forward movement. However, between intentions and actual construction there still lies a dangerous gap – weak governance and management of investment project implementation.

ANNA YURCHENKO, co-founder of the We Build Ukraine Think Tank, explains why the first wave of public investment reform gave Ukraine a language of planning but not the mechanics of delivery, what losses this creates for the state, business, and hromadas, and why – without a second, implementation-focused wave of reform – the country risks remaining stuck between plans and action.

THE FIRST STAGE OF REFORM: A FOUNDATION THAT STILL NEEDS TO BE BUILT UPON
The reform of public investment management in Ukraine became a long-awaited step toward creating a coherent and logical investment policy. For the first time since independence, there was an attempt to bring chaotic budget decisions into a single process based on objective criteria, digital registers, and analytical tools. For the public sector, which for decades had operated on the principle of «whoever asks the loudest gets the most, » this was a genuine revolution. The launch of DREAM, unified approaches to efficiency assessment, and the shift to medium-term investment planning all provided grounds to say that Ukraine had begun moving closer to practices that have long been the norm in EU countries.

But any reform must not only create rules – it must also create the capacity to implement them.
A study by We Build Ukraine, conducted in 2025 as part of a project with ISAR Ednannia among hromadas, showed that only about 7% of local self-government representatives fully understand the logic of the new system. The vast majority – nearly three quarters – have grasped it only fragmentarily. In many cities and hromadas, there is a lack of analysts, engineers, or managers capable of delivering high-quality investment planning. As a result, investment plans in numerous hromadas exist largely on paper: preparing them is a formal requirement of the reform, while implementing them is a task for which there are simply no human resources.

One of the hromada heads, in a conversation with our team, put it this way:

«The system looks logical, but we don’t have the tools to use it. It’s like having a modern GPS in your hands while driving an old car on a broken road.»
This dissonance – between the elegant architecture of the reform and weak institutional capacity – became the first clear signal that the reform cannot stop at the planning stage.

WHEN A REFORM COVERS ONLY 10% OF THE INVESTMENT CYCLE

In most developed countries, public investment management is viewed as a full life cycle – from the moment an idea emerges to the evaluation of results after a facility is commissioned. This cycle is divided into successive phases: concept development, preliminary analysis, preparation of documentation, procurement, contract management, technical supervision, quality control, reporting, operation, and post-project evaluation.

In Ukraine’s reform model, only the initial, preparatory stage has been clearly structured. It provides the logic for setting priorities, assessing efficiency, registering projects in DREAM, and approving funding. However, the most complex part – implementation – has remained underdeveloped. This is where the main systemic risk lies: a reform that covers only 10% of the process cannot guarantee results.

In practice, this means that the state may select projects perfectly, yet cannot guarantee that they will be implemented with quality. One symptom of this problem is that many projects which passed prioritization long ago remain stuck for years without moving to the tendering stage. The difficulties begin immediately: in some cases there is no proper design and cost documentation; in others, there is no capable contracting authority; elsewhere, technical specifications are drafted in a way that makes implementation impossible without substantial changes.
As a result, the reform has created the preconditions for quality planning, but not the preconditions for quality construction.

THE COST OF INEFFICIENCY: LOSSES FOR THE STATE, BUSINESS, AND HROMADAS

The shortcomings in managing the full investment cycle are not merely a bureaucratic issue. They come with a very real economic price. According to estimates by We Build Ukraine, losses caused by uncoordinated processes, delays in tendering, untimely adjustments to documentation, and the absence of unified contract standards amount to 15–30% of the total project value. When it comes to projects worth tens or hundreds of millions of UAH, this translates into direct financial losses for both the state and the businesses implementing these projects.

Businesses feel the uncertainty most acutely. Contractors spend years fulfilling agreements in which any change in price or technical specifications turns into a bureaucratic battle. Companies incur financial losses because they are forced to work in conditions where deadlines depend not on them, but on the weaknesses of the client or the lack of clear state procedures.

Increasingly, in Ukraine, businesses do not complain about low payment – they complain about the lack of predictability. For the private sector, the key value is certainty: if a 12-month contract can easily stretch into a two-year marathon with delays and modifications, it ceases to be a partnership and becomes pure risk.

Communities fail to receive infrastructure that could generate economic benefits: renovated schools remain closed, roads go unbuilt, and hospitals never move from the planning stage to actual operation. Most importantly, citizens do not see the changes they expect.

DREAM: TRANSPARENCY WITHOUT MANAGEMENT SUBSTANCE

DREAM has become a symbol of the PIM reform and has indeed ensured a level of transparency that was previously impossible. However, DREAM focuses on project registration and evaluation rather than managing the full project lifecycle. The system shows a project at the moment it is submitted but stops short of demonstrating, at the necessary level, what happens to it afterwards.

DREAM lacks tools for monitoring implementation: the system does not track the progress of tenders, contract statuses, construction timelines, or schedule deviations. The absence of integration with Prozorro, construction registries, and financial systems creates an effect that one expert aptly described: «We have transparency of intentions, but not transparency of actions.»

This weak point is especially noticeable to international partners. When a country seeks multi-billion reconstruction aid, it must demonstrate not only the ability to justify projects but also the ability to manage them effectively.

HROMADAS’ CAPACITY: A REFORM THAT RISKS WIDENING INEQUALITY

One of the most dangerous consequences of an incomplete reform is that it exacerbates the disparity in hromadas’ capacity. Large cities, which have analysts, lawyers, and engineers, are able to work effectively with PIM systems. Smaller hromadas, however, with real reconstruction needs, lack sufficient personnel to prepare high-quality projects or manage them.

The core problem is not a reluctance of hromadas to work under the new rules, but a mismatch between the ambitions of the reform and the actual local capacities. In many smaller hromadas, only a few specialists are working, who physically cannot provide the volume of analysis, documentation preparation, and project management considered standard at the central level. As a result, instead of leveling the playing field, the reform risks reinforcing structural inequality: hromadas with sufficient capacity move forward, while less equipped ones fall further behind.

WHY UKRAINE NEEDS THE SECOND WAVE OF PIM

Ukraine faces the necessity of an institutional transition: from a planning system to an implementation system. The second wave of the PIM reform must cover the entire investment cycle – from documentation preparation to commissioning and evaluating the effectiveness of a project. This involves establishing unified contract standards, technical supervision, change management mechanisms, a post-project analysis system, and accountability for the project owner.

It is important not only to create rules, but also institutions capable of enforcing them. In EU countries, it is the Project Management Offices (PMOs) that provide continuous oversight of investment projects, monitoring every stage from documentation preparation to commissioning. In Ukraine, such structures need to be established at the national, regional, and local levels to ensure professional project management and to relieve local hromadas of excessive burdens.

At the same time, there is a risk that the state may try to confine these new institutions within rigid frameworks – for example, by creating special registries, certifications, or narrow regulatory requirements, which could turn PMOs into a closed club, similar to a Guild of Consulting Engineers. This risk is already evident in government approaches: some ministries propose formalizing the activities of such centers so strictly that it could stifle the ecosystem before it even has a chance to develop.

This is dangerous: instead of strengthening the country’s institutional capacity, we may end up with yet another overregulated instrument that excludes most potential participants. What Ukraine needs is a push to build a project management ecosystem – open, competitive, and capable of growth – not another framework that defines «who is allowed» to exist in this field.

Equally critical is the integration of digital systems. Only by linking DREAM with Prozorro, the construction registry, and the Treasury will the state be able to track and manage the entire project pathway – from application to a completed facility.

CONCLUSION: A SYSTEM MUST EMERGE BETWEEN PLANS AND REALITY

The first wave of reform gave Ukraine a new «language» of investment policy. But language is only a tool – it does not guarantee results. To achieve real change, a second wave is needed: one that will create a full institutional project management cycle.

This will determine whether Ukraine can effectively use the tens of billions of dollars that will be directed toward reconstruction. Whether a hromada can actually receive a school, a road, or a hospital that does not remain just another entry in a registry. And whether businesses can operate in a country where public investment is an opportunity rather than a risk. Ukraine cannot allow itself a reform that takes only the first step. A real reform is one that delivers projects to results.

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