Power Crisis in Ukraine: Emergency Support Needed

Photo by Dmytro Vynohradov on Unsplash

Project Kesher is launching an emergency, $20,000 campaign to purchase generators for 13 small women-owned businesses in Ukraine that have received grants through the Women’s Opportunity Fund (WOF-UA).

Russia is continuing its attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, aiming to plunge the country into total blackout. On the night of November 8, over 450 drones and 45 missiles targeted power facilities across Kyiv, Kirovohrad, Poltava, Kharkiv, and Dnipropetrovsk regions. As a result, communities in Dnipropetrovsk, Poltava, Kharkiv, Chernihiv, Kyiv, Zaporizhzhia, Odesa, and Kirovohrad were left without electricity, with Kharkiv, Sumy, and Poltava facing particularly severe outages.

Experts warn that multi-day power outages could continue this fall and winter. During peak cold periods, electricity could be off for up to 20 hours a day, while at other times, outages of up to 12 hours daily are expected. Ukrainian households are already experiencing these challenges day by day.

WOF-UA has received multiple urgent requests from grantee entrepreneurs seeking crisis support to maintain their businesses during these blackouts. A few messages:

Olena: Our café-shop in Vinnytsia region has stopped due to lack of electricity. Winter hasn’t even started yet, and displaced people and elderly residents will struggle to survive. We need a generator to keep operating and support our community.

Olha: “My business is on pause. Even during the brief hours when power is on, the voltage is too low to work. Yesterday our team worked from 2–4 a.m., but today and last night we couldn’t work at all.”

Your support can make the difference between survival and closure for these small businesses — and help keep communities supplied and resilient during the harsh winter months.