Blog of Engagement Read 3 min
The Engaged 2024. CSR Conference
On December 3, the Zagoriy Foundation hosted the Engaged 2024 conference in Kyiv, focusing on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). The event was dedicated to Giving Tuesday, an international charity initiative exploring the culture of engagement and gratitude in Ukraine. At the conference, the annual nationwide survey of the charity sector and a CSR Guide — 220 pages including case studies, life hacks, and action plans — were presented.
Over 250 representatives of businesses, media, charities, and NGOs attended the offline event. A total of 37 speakers participated in seven panels and individual presentations. The venue also hosted Radio Skovoroda’s mobile studio, where speakers and participants shared their insights and case studies live on air. Media partners included NV, Rubryka, Vector, and Marketer.ua.
In 2024, the Giving Tuesday team conducted over 60 interviews with representatives of business, creative community, the public sector, and military foundations. The goal was to explore how CSR works in Ukraine today, the challenges businesses and foundations face, how the social mission aligns with the corporate one, and how traditional CSR is transforming into corporate citizenship during the war.
Speakers included Nataliia Kryvda (UCF), Olena Plakhova (Nova Poshta), Natalya Yemchenko (System Capital Management), Svitlana Denysenko (KSE), Andriy Shuvalov (Serhiy Prytula Charity Foundation), Alyona Zhygura (Avrora Multimarket), Hennadiy Karlinsky (WOG), Kateryna Zagoriy (Zagoriy Foundation), Anna Zavertailo (Honey, Zavertailo), Yelyzaveta Bordunova (Vector), Orysia Khimiak (miltech, ex-Reface), Yar Birzool (KOLO), Anna Manukhina (MacPaw Foundation), Vira Shcherbakova (Ajax Systems), Volodymyr Dehtyarov (Khartiia Brigade, National Guard of Ukraine), and other business and charity representatives.
Two studies were presented at the Conference.
Iryna Hrytsaienko, CEO at Zagoriy Foundation, presented the results of the annual national charity survey conducted by the Zagoriy Foundation in partnership with Info Sapiens. The study dispelled the myth that Ukrainians are now donating less than in 2022. It revealed the share of Ukrainians giving to charity, the average donation amount, foundations trusted, and who Ukrainians were most likely to help in 2024.
“Sociological studies allow us to truly sense the spirit of the times. The Zagoriy Foundation has been conducting these surveys systematically since 2019, when cash donations in physical boxes still dominated and charity was supposed to be quiet. Just imagine how much has since changed. The annual survey helps us gather current information, track trends, and anticipate new challenges. Over the past two years, we focused on just certain aspects of the charity sector, as the situation changed rapidly. Now, we’re excited to return to our annual format,” says Iryna Hrytsaienko, CEO at Zagoriy Foundation.
The second study was dedicated to Corporate Social Responsibility. In 2024, the Giving Tuesday team conducted 60 interviews with businesses, the public sector, and creative communities, distilling their findings into a Corporate Social Responsibility Guide.
In addition to the interviews, practical CSR cases, and a map to help build CSR within an organization, Yevhen Hlibovytskyi, Natalia Kryvda, Iryna Solovey, Olga Royenko, Natalia Yemchenko, and others shared their expert opinions on the culture of social responsibility.
“Social responsibility in Ukraine is different from elsewhere. Many of the business leaders we spoke to for this Guide support the state and have created institutions to back it. For them, supplying the army is a given, regardless of what their core business is or how far removed they are from the technical aspects of military equipment. If social responsibility means actions that contribute to the future development of business, better conditions than the end of the war are hard to imagine. This is why businesses create their own foundations, demonstrate solidarity, and enter partnerships they could have never imagined before. They gain public agency, while the public sector develops management and business skills. This engagement experience can change the relationship within the state-business-public sector triangle,” says Iryna Uhnivenko, the Guide’s author and Creative Strategist at Zagoriy Foundation.
