What Construction Sites Are Silent About: The Scale of the Crisis in Figures
Before 2022, 600,000 people were employed at the country’s construction sites. Today, the industry has “thinned out” by 30–50%. If we want to rebuild the country within 10 years, the sector must grow 7- to 9-fold. This means we are facing a catastrophic shortage of hundreds of thousands of hands right now.
Why won’t “our own” return quickly?
Mobilization, career changes, and a massive wage gap with the EU (wages in Poland are 2–3 times higher) make the Ukrainian labor market uncompetitive. Even a mass return of refugees will not save the situation — the deficit runs too deep.
The New Faces of Reconstruction
The potential “saviors” of Ukrainian projects are workers from Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan, and in the future — India and Pakistan. They already have experience on large-scale construction sites abroad and are ready to come to Ukraine.
Wallet or Time?
Attracting migrants is not a cheap endeavor. Costs will rise by 20–30% due to logistics, housing, and red tape. However, the lack of labor is even more expensive: every day of downtime means billions in lost GDP and the frozen dreams of people waiting for their own homes.
Barriers to Tear Down
The state must act “as of yesterday”: simplify the legalization process for foreigners (so permits take weeks, not months), create conditions for adaptation, and offer language courses. Otherwise, we will lose the battle for migrants to the likes of Germany or Poland.
Read the full article at the following link: Ekonomichna Pravda
