Winners of AVK Grant Competition Named

The final results of the first grant competition organized by AVK Company among independent consumer organizations earlier this spring have been publicized. Two non-government consumer rights organizations – the Consumers’ Union of Ukraine from Kyiv and the Association on the Human Rights Protection “Advokat” from Dnipropetrovsk – have been named as the grant competition winners. AVK Company will enable these NGOs to implement their project proposals through grant funding.

The project submitted by the Consumers’ Union of Ukraine (CUU) aims to conduct a nation-wide information campaign among children and teenagers to popularize the health lifestyle and high nutrition standards. As part of the project, a how-to directory for children will be distributed in Ukrainian schools at a wide scale.

“This information campaign means to reach the most vulnerable consumer groups, from the consumer point of view, i.e. children and teenager audiences. It is important for us that children learn how to distinguish quality products from low quality products. In doing so, we make our contribution to the education of the well-informed and demandable generation of consumers”, explains his position Andriy Dykunov, the acting General Director of the AVK.

The other project proposed by the Dnipropetrovsk Association “Advokat” will hold training sessions for journalists who cover consumer-related issues and trends of the foodstuff markets. During the seminars representatives of the regional media will be able to improve their professional skills and expertise and learn, in particular, about the legal environment in the area of the consumer rights, and the basics of the consumer rights protection.

According to the Advokat Association President Svitlana Toropchynova-Ahalakova, no non-government organizations in Ukraine has ever-received grant funding through the grant competitions organized by Ukrainian business.

“The Ukrainian non-government organizations have an extensive work experience with international donor agencies, however, this is the first grant provided by a Ukrainian private-run company to a Ukrainian NGO. Unfortunately, such pioneering initiative is the exclusion from the general rule rather than a standard approach advocated by the national business. We believe that the implementation of our project will enable to increase the overall consumer’s culture in our country”, says Toropchynova-Ahalakova.

Overall, 16 All-Ukrainian and regional non-government organizations filled their applications to compete in the grant competition. A total of 22 project proposals on strengthening the public mechanisms and interests of consumes have been submitted for review of the corporate donor. The grant competition organized by AVK with the support from the League of Foodstuff Manufacturers continued from May 11 through July 11. This year the overall competition budget on funding NGO projects by AVK amounted to UAH 60, 000.