You're reading: Expats To Watch: Working to promote growth in Ukraine’s smaller cities

Editor’s Note: This Kyiv Post feature introduces readers to interesting expatriates who have chosen to make Ukraine their home. We welcome readers’ suggestions about expats to profile. Please send ideas to [email protected].

Howard Ockman

Nationality: American

Age: 61

Position: Chief of party of U.S Agency for International Development’s Local Investment and National Competitiveness project.

Length of time in Ukraine: Six years

Tips for succeeding in Ukraine: “Being humble and having lots of humility.”

Howard Ockman is never seen at ribbon-cutting ceremonies or caught pouncing on photo opportunities when an investment deal is inked.

He prefers working in the background, helping some 140 small towns and municipalities achieve economic growth through the nitty-gritty work of planned development in knowledge, management and training.

In his line of work, this is called capacity building, perhaps an amorphous and bureaucratic term, but something tangible that carries meaning to Ockman.

“Capacity building isn’t glamorous,” Ockman told the Kyiv Post in his Podil office. “Basically our work is always to stay in the background. I think that’s the only kind of successful donor project if it supports capacity building, bringing new ideas, new ways of doing things. Our work is humble work but the results are there.”

Communities with high growth potential were targeted mostly in the south and east, with a particular focus on Crimea, and some pockets in the west. The idea is to set up one-stop shops for business permits that limit opportunities for corruption and bureaucratic foot-dragging.

Ockman describes it as letting entrepreneurs do what they do best.

But the transition from Soviet-era industries to a modern market economy is a long one. “Ukraine has to be more open and say: ‘This is who we are, come join us as partners’…instead of being the black box that it inherited,” Ockman said.

Ockman is helping the government’s investment promotion arm to inventory the country’s assets in the regions, where much investment is expected.

“We gather this information and keep it current, we make sure the agency can send the investor with a certain criteria set to the right place…because (Kyiv)…tends not to know what’s happening in many cities,” said Ockman.

This effort includes reacquainting businesses with forgotten research institutes that were the brains behind the Soviet military-industrial complex.

All institutes “need to be tapped,” Ockman said. “This sector is undeveloped and should be targeted … by taking the commercial side and bringing it to science.”

Like any business project, success is measured through private investment and jobs creation. Since 2006, some $3.5 billion worth of greenfield investment deals have been signed and 80,000 additional jobs were created.

Ockman sells the idea for cities to stick to a strategic development plan and enshrine it in their legislation. This often involves five months of planning and another 18 months of implementation.

“Foreign investors would prefer to invest in a thinking community, one that gives thought to its future,” said Ockman.

He also is pushing for more cooperation to create industrial zones or parks to foster innovation. Although Ukraine has the potential to create its own Silicon Valley, Ockman said it doesn’t have to be high-tech. “It could be textiles, low-tech stuff like precision engineering,” he said.

The hard part, he said, is getting regional authorities to talk to each other, pool resources and to look at the economic potential of their area.

With investors, he said: “You have to be clear what you tell them. You need to have a clear idea and then you have to honor it.”

He thinks most of the mayors he works with understand that. Now it’s up to convincing the politicians at the top.

Kyiv Post staff writer Mark Rachkevych can be reached at [email protected].