Ukraine, while active hostilities with the Russian aggressor continue, is in survival mode, and during this period it is too early to take on billion-dollar projects for decades, Infrastructure Minister Oleksandr Kubrakov believes.
“Now we need to launch a lot of low-cost and small projects that will help us and our trading partners to implement them quickly and concretely,” he said in an interview with the Swiss newspaper Neue Zürcher Zeitung.
“Instead of planning completely destroyed hospitals from scratch, I prefer to focus on repairing hospitals with broken windows and damaged roofs,” the minister explained.
Among such priority projects, he named the rapid repair of bridges, roads and railway lines, which are key for the army and economic recovery, as well as all projects related to increasing the country’s export capabilities.
“Honestly, we are not talking about billions, but millions and many other small projects. New, more efficient checkpoints on the border with Poland, Romania and Moldova, new railway lines from the nearest cargo points in Ukraine, which use the European standard track instead of the Russian wide track,” Kubrakov explained.
According to him, global reconstruction in Ukraine will begin with the end of the war. The Minister of Infrastructure noted the need not just for the reconstruction of old Soviet bridges, but for the construction of new ones using modern technologies.
“Instead of repairing Soviet bridges, we should seize the opportunity to create new ones using the latest technology. And we should at least convert and electrify railways from the Soviet wide track to the European standard one in such a way that all the country’s important cargo hubs are directly connected with Europe,” the minister said.
