Socio-economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s full-scale invasion on the development of EU and Ukraine

Socio-economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s full-scale invasion on the

development of EU and Ukraine: fostering research collaborations through establishing of a

digital knowledge exchangeplatform

At the beginning of the third decade of the 21st century humanity has faced the most devastating problems since the end of the Second World War. So, in 2020 the global Covid-19 pandemic began, which led to both significant loss of life and significant restrictions in the socio-economic sphere of most countries of the world. And on February 24, 2022, a full-scale war of Russia against Ukraine began. And although so far the number of those killed in this war is inferior to the number of people who died during the Covid-19 pandemic, and the number of countries directly affected by Russian aggression is still limited, Russia's military actions potentially pose a threat to the future of all mankind.

Both of these troubles had the greatest impact on the European countries and Ukraine. Thus, in the context of the pandemic, the EU countries were forced to allocate trillions of euros to support their own healthcare systems, citizens and, in general, economic activity in the countries. After the start of the Russia’s war against Ukraine, in addition to spending on post-COVID economic recovery, the EU countries were forced to allocate additional funding for the reception of Ukrainian refugees, as well as financial assistance to Ukraine. In addition to this, due to the military actions of Russia, the prices of many goods, primarily energy, have increased significantly, which forced the EU countries to provide direct financial support to certain industries and the population in order to mitigate the negative consequences of price increases. At the same time, in Ukraine, where Russian aggression forced a significant part of the population to leave the country, the production and human potential was greatly reduced, which made Ukraine dependent on significant financial assistance from the allied countries.

The key research objectives of the project are: to study the influence of COVID-19 shock and Russia’s war in Ukraine on the development of international economic relations; to evaluate the impact of the budget deficits caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia's aggression and monetary policy on the socio-economic development of the EU countries and Ukraine; to identify social responsibility challenges and ways to mitigate them for Ukrainian and EU businesses during the postwar reconstruction.

The proposed study is related to the results of previous research of the four project participants from ONU, which were published over the past 5 years in 7 articles in international journals indexed in the Scopus database. However, the events of 2020- 2023 have radically changed the conditions for the functioning of societies, national economies and financial systems which necessitates new studies in the project area.

To conduct research statistical data will be collected on the socio-economic and financial indicators of Ukraine and the EU countries. The main sources of data are the IMF databases (that are available online) and the following professional databases: IGI Global InfoSci-Journals database; International bibliography of periodical literature in the humanities and social sciences database; Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research database; Trade and Globalization Studies Online; Wharton Research Data Services. All of these professional data collections, that will be used for the data analyses and forecasts creation, are expensive and will be available for the Ukrainian scientists’ usage only due to the support of the project partners from the EU.

For fostering collaborative research between scientists from Odesa National University (ONU) and researchers from Free University of Berlin (FUB) and the University of Milan-Bicocca (UNIMIB) a digital interactive platform for knowledge and scientific results exchange will be established. This interactive digital platform will allow for: an online interactive knowledge sharing for scholars and PhDs from ONU and FUB and UNIMIB professors; knowledge and research results sharing to a wider public; exchange of educational materials between partner Universities.

Within the framework of the project to gain access to the full versions of recent publications and professional databases, researchers from ONU will be able to use the resources of the Free Universityof Berlin Datenbank-Infosystem and of the Department of Economics, Management and Statistics of the University of Milano-Bicocca. Moreover, researchers from ONU will have facilitated participation in the University of Milan-Bicocca Department of Economics, Management and Statistics visiting program and the visiting program of the two core research centres connected to the Department, i.e., the Centre for European Studies and the Rimini Centre for Economic Analysis Europe ETS. Within the visitor status, full access to Departmental resources, including full-text access to scientific journals and books, licensed economic, financial, and social databases, and software for social and economic research will be granted.

Timeline of the project: visit of Dr. Alekseievska to the FUB – May 2024; conducting the online session “The Economics of Russia's War in Ukraine” within “The 2024 Rimini Centre for Economic Analysis International Conference in Economics, Econometrics, and Finance” – May 2024, Natalia Bychkova will be the chair of this section and will present the results of her research (in coauthorship) «Financing of social development: challenges for Ukraine»; conducting the online session “The Economics of Russia's War in Ukraine” within “The 6th International Conference on European Economics and Politics” – organized by the Centre for European Studies in June 2024; visit of Dr. Alekseievska to UNIMIB – July 2024; organization of the online conference “Economics of a Country Amid Global Challenges: Scientific Approaches and Implementation Practice” – September 2024; establishing of the digital interactive platform for knowledge and scientific results exchange - May-November 2024; collecting statistical data on the socio-economic and financial indicators of Ukraine and the EU countries - May-November 2024; organization of the online conference “Reforming and Stabilizing the Economy in the context of International Cooperation” – November 2024; cross-departments online meeting on the topics related to the current and future socialeconomic development of Ukraine during the postwar reconstruction – February 2025; organization of the third online conference “Socio-Economic and Political Development of Countries in Conditions of Global Instability – April 2025; participants of the online conferences will be project fellows and EU partners, as well as PhD students and scientists from ONU and other research institutes of Ukraine and Europe. Based on the key research objectives of the project study, submitting of at least three scientific articles to the editorial board of international and Ukrainian peer-review journals – during the entire project period.