The National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management (NFOŚiGW) and the World Bank, in agreement with the European Commission, have started cooperation aimed at exchanging experience between the mining regions of Poland and Ukraine. This is to help both countries prepare for the energy transition in the coming years. The initiative is part of an international programme that supports countries in developing and implementing socially friendly, low-carbon energy.

The National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management will coordinate study visits, conferences and meetings organised in Poland by the Institute for Ecology of Industrial Areas and the Central Mining Institute. The participation of the Ukrainian side in the knowledge exchange will in turn be ensured by the World Bank (EMNAP and EGPS Trust Funds), in cooperation with the European Commission.

Poland understands perfectly well what the different starting points for the energy sector transition mean for economies and how they affect the pace at which we are all moving towards a common goal. We know the grave importance of the decisions which have made the industrial development of our country dependent on a narrow set of resources. Poland has undergone the complex processes needed to carry out the major economic and political changes that our country has successfully completed over the course of the last three decades, said Vice-Minister Adam Guibourgé-Czetwertyński.

I am deeply convinced that this undertaking – carried out in a spirit of solidarity, which is an important value for the Poles – will help Ukraine to better prepare for the upcoming challenges, facing which is necessary to carry out the transition in the coming years, he added.

The launch of the new platform was also attended by the Vice-President of the National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management Artur Lorkowski, Regional Director of the World Bank for Ukraine Arup Banerji, World Bank Representative for Poland and the Baltic States Marcus Bernhard Heinz, Director for the Internal Energy Market in the Directorate General for Energy (European Commission) Catharina Sikow and Advisor to the Prime Minister of Ukraine for regional policy Valentina Moskalenko.