Environmental Resilience of Ukraine’s Regions: The Integrated Assessment, Typology, and Transformation in the Context of Wartime Shocks
Samoilenko V. S.

Samoilenko, Vladyslav S. (2026) “Environmental Resilience of Ukraine’s Regions: The Integrated Assessment, Typology, and Transformation in the Context of Wartime Shocks.” The Problems of Economy 2:158–167.
https://doi.org/10.32983/2222-0712-2026-2-158-167

Section: Regional economy

UDC 332.14:504.06:338

Abstract:
The article assesses the environmental resilience of Ukraine’s regions amid consecutive crisis shocks caused by the military conflict of 2014–2015 and the full-scale armed aggression in 2022–2024. The aim of the study is to determine the dynamics, spatial differences, and transformation trajectories of environmental resilience at the regional level. The methodological basis of the study is the construction of an integrated environmental resilience index, which aggregates five key components: air emissions intensity, level of circular waste management, status of water resources, forest recovery index, and volume of environmental investments. The indicators were normalized using the Min–Max method, and the weighting coefficients were determined using the entropy method, ensuring an objective evaluation. The typology of regions was carried out using a modified Harrington desirability scale, which allowed us to identify four types of regions: ecologically sustainable, regions of ecological transformation, ecologically vulnerable, and regions of ecological degradation (including ecological collapse). The study results indicate that compared to the baseline year of 2013, in 2021, the ecological resilience of Ukraine’s regions was marked by increased vulnerability and a loss of conditions for developing sustainable development models. At the same time, compared to 2015, in 2021 there was a trajectory of partial stabilization, reflecting the adaptation of regional systems after a phase of active war shock. In 2022–2024, there was a radical break from previous trends and a shift to a model of forced adaptation, in which the dynamics of ecological systems are determined mainly by war-related factors. It has been found that ecological resilience in modern conditions is losing its regenerative nature and operates on the principle of survival under limited resources. This is accompanied by increasing spatial asymmetry, the expansion of groups of ecological degradation, and local collapses.

Keywords: ecological resilience; regions of Ukraine; integral index; emission intensity; waste circularity; water resources; forest restoration; ecological investments.

Tabl.: 7. Bibl.: 23.

Samoilenko Vladyslav S. – Postgraduate Student, Research Centre for Industrial Problems of Development of NAS of Ukraine (2 floor 1-a Inzhenernyi Ln., Kharkіv, 61166, Ukraine)
Email: samoylenko@gmail.com

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