Ukrainian businessman and philanthropist Vadym Novynskyi has been using all the resources at his disposal to help Ukraine after Russia launched its full-scale invasion back in February. One focus of his efforts has been donating humanitarian aid kits and food packages.
The billionaire’s charitable Vadym Novynskyi Foundation, along with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, has sent more than 40,000 of these essential packages to residents of Ukrainian settlements located on the front lines, as well as to refugees and internally displaced persons affected by Russia’s hostilities.
The foundation’s website posted, “The Vadym Novinsky Charity Foundation regularly helps our fellow citizens who have found themselves in difficult life circumstances due to the full-scale war, and provides comprehensive support to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in the field of social service.”
Vadym Novynskyi Nourishes His War-Torn Country
Ukrainian citizens living in Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, Kharkiv, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Chernihiv, Sumy, Kherson, and the Dnipro regions, as well as cities around Kyiv, have been among the recipients of Vadym Novynskyi’s aid packages. The majority of these people meet one of the following categories: single senior citizens, disabled people and their caregivers, or low-income families.
In a statement on the Vadym Novynskyi Foundation’s website, it says, “We understand that as a result of this [war], it is difficult for the people who live there to get the most necessary things, in particular food, so the foundation focuses on providing long-term storage products.” The foundation shares that these parcels include basic food necessities such as cereals, flour, canned meat, canned fish, oil, vegetables, baby food, and tea.
According to Vadym Novynskyi, the foundation was created to “broaden the territory of the good and make the life of our society healthier and better.” It achieves this mission by pulling together societal efforts and providing conditions for fruitful long-term cooperation to guarantee better living standards for all.
In a more recent statement, the foundation acknowledged the fact that many Ukrainians are currently in dire straits and need access to food and hygiene products. “That is why we are constantly expanding the amount of aid to those who survive under shelling every day, and to those who were forced to leave their homes, jobs, their usual lives and become refugees,” it says.
According to the foundation, which was established in 2008, the food aid project is gradually increasing pace and, on the orders of Novynskyi, 5 tons of food kits and 500 hygiene kits are being dispatched each day with the help of Ukrainian postal services Nova Poshta and Ukrposhta.
The foundation delivers its food aid packages based on individual applications. However, opportunities and additional avenues of identifying citizens who need the packages are currently being explored, as is the delivery of packages to regions where postal services are no longer functioning.
One of Ukraine’s Largest Aid Projects
The foundation is working in partnership with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church as part of one of the largest aid projects ever mounted in Ukraine, for the delivery of ambulances, medical equipment, and specialized medical transport. Between April and October, more than 100 ambulances were donated to health care facilities located in various regions throughout the country, with UAH 900 million (approximately $24 million) already allocated by Vadym Novynskyi to finance the initiative.
The foundation also recently donated a second mobile X-ray machine to the M. Amosov National Institute of Cardiovascular Surgery. The first machine has been operating in the intensive care unit of the clinic for several months, significantly helping medical staff carry out their work.
Said a spokesperson for the foundation, “Vadym Novynskyi set us the task of helping everyone. We understand the importance of your noble work, especially in this most difficult time, and we will continue to try to remain your reliable partner, always ready to help.”
The Vadym Novynskyi Foundation has donated ambulances and specialist medical equipment in a bid to do whatever it takes to help the Ukrainian health care system recover and make it easier for medics to provide emergency aid to people in critical regions.
Since the outbreak of the war in February, Russian forces have brutally targeted health care facilities and infrastructure on several occasions, including a maternity hospital in Mariupol, prompting the Red Cross to accuse Russia of “engineering a humanitarian crisis.”
Ukrainian officials assessed the toll on the country’s health care system in July. As reported by the Ministry of Health of Ukraine, at least 18 medical personnel have been killed and almost 900 medical facilities damaged or destroyed by Russian attacks since the beginning of the war.
“The foundation constantly helps our fellow citizens who are in difficult life circumstances — war veterans, retirees, large families,” says spokesperson Dmytro Sergeyev. “Unfortunately, with the advent of the war, many Ukrainian families found themselves in difficult circumstances, so in recent months the foundation has significantly expanded this area of aid.”
