Almost 39% of agricultural companies in Ukraine face difficulties in finding staff. This is evidenced by the results of the study “Ukrainian Labor Market Assessment 2024-2025” conducted by Helvetas Ukraine in cooperation with the State Employment Service and the Federation of Employers of Ukraine. The study involved about 55,000 employers who employ more than 4.2 million people. The analysis showed that agriculture is among the industries with the largest shortage of personnel.

During the presentation of the survey results, Dmytro Kokhan, Deputy Chairman of the Ukrainian Agri Council, outlined the main challenges faced by the agricultural business in terms of staffing.

"In all the surveys we conduct among the UAC members, the labor market issues are consistently among the most pressing. First of all, it is a shortage of personnel, especially qualified specialists. But frankly speaking, the main problem is mobilization," noted Dmytro Kokhan.

He emphasized that, of course, the defense of the country and the protection of Ukrainian land was a priority. At the same time, the agricultural sector, like many other sectors of the economy, is already experiencing a staffing pressure caused by mobilization processes.

Urbanization and the outflow of young people from rural areas are significant challenges for the agricultural sector, making it difficult to find personnel locally.

"It is a big challenge to attract young people to agriculture. But we are already working at our level: The UAC, together with SvitOsvit, has introduced the ‘Agrosfera’ educational program at schools. This is an optional course that introduces students to the modern agricultural industry. Currently, it is implemented in 150 schools, and 85 more teachers are being trained to cover more than 230 educational institutions next year," said the UAC Deputy Chairman.

Dmytro Kokhan also drew attention to the problem of the quality of vocational education.

"The agricultural machinery that our companies work with changes dramatically every five years. But educational institutions often lack modern material and technical facilities. If a teacher shows a student old models of machinery, and the company needs to work with modern ones, the employee has to spend another year and a half training in practice. The state should invest in education and develop it in partnership with business. We, as the UAC, for our part, are always open to cooperation and ready to help," summarized Dmytro Kokhan.