A single RnD hub has been created in Ukraine, which will become a platform for developing innovations and further supporting their implementation in the demining of Ukrainian territories, said Chairman of the Board of the public organization Demining Cluster of Ukraine Maksym Tkachenko at a press conference at Interfax-Ukraine.

The initiators of the creation of the RnD hub were the Ukrainian National Humanitarian Demining Association, the Ukrainian Association of Humanitarian Demining, and the Ukrainian Association of Humanitarian Demining and Restoration.

According to the initiators, the main goal of the hub is to identify existing and develop new innovative solutions that will accelerate demining and become reliable assistants for the deminer. The hub will include innovators, operators, scientists, and experts in mine action.

"One of the main tasks of the Demining Cluster is to search for existing and develop new innovative solutions that can accelerate the demining of Ukraine. The RnD hub is a community whose goal is to provide sustainable financing for promising innovative developments, create an incubator of ideas and projects for the production of equipment and testing new technologies, as well as launch the Demining Market. Accelerating the demining of Ukrainian lands is realistic only by scaling up the application of innovative solutions," Tkachenko emphasized.

First Deputy Head of the Ukrainian National Humanitarian Demining Association Oleksiy Botnarenko noted that the specialists of the Ukrainian Association of Humanitarian Demining are deeply immersed in the issues of the technical component of humanitarian demining. Practice has already proven that an innovative approach plays a key role directly in field conditions. The safety of sappers during work, the quality, speed and reduction of the cost of demining depend on it.

"Our association represents the main players in the humanitarian demining market, including operators and manufacturers of specialized equipment… The development of technologies in the field of demining is not just a modernization of the process, it is a strategic step towards safe, high-quality and cost-effective demining of Ukrainian territories," the expert said.

He recalled that Ukraine is today one of the most mine-contaminated countries in the world, and therefore the state must not only apply the best global practices, but also become a center of innovation in this area. Young people involved in the demining process - engineers, programmers, robotic and artificial intelligence specialists - are in search of non-standard solutions that can revolutionize the methods of detecting and neutralizing explosive objects.

"Today we see promising developments by domestic startups and scientific institutions, in particular, unmanned platforms for remote demining, robotic systems that can operate in difficult conditions, and algorithms based on artificial intelligence for analyzing satellite and drone images," the expert emphasized.

Botnarenko pointed out the importance of financial and organizational support for these initiatives by the government, since Ukraine has all the prerequisites to solve the problem of mine safety and become an international leader in the field of humanitarian demining.

Among the problems of implementing innovations that exist today in the humanitarian demining market, he named the lack of funds for the development of innovations, the lack of communication between operators and innovators, the dispersion of innovative projects, and the unformed market for promising technological developments in this field.

According to him, the solution to these problems will be facilitated by the RnD hub team, which has experience in developing and implementing successful innovative solutions, national projects that work effectively in the demining market in Ukraine. The RnD hub team has already established and is working with international financial organizations and funds.

The RnD hub has a physical office in Kyiv and access to testing grounds for innovative products. Hackathons and field testing of technological solutions are planned to be held during the year.

The project initiators called on developers and scientists to join the joint work in the RnD hub.