Ukrainian women are gradually taking up traditionally male positions – The Guardian

Such a trend is observed at the coal-mining enterprise Metinvest Pokrovskugillia due to the mobilization of men

Ukrainian women are gradually taking up traditionally male positions. This is the conclusion reached by journalists from The Guardian, one of the world’s leading media outlets, after visiting Metinvest Group’s coal mining enterprise in Pokrovsk.

In particular, 49-year-old Lyudmila Bashkatova became an example of female strength. She works a grueling six-hour shift without fear at a coal mine in eastern Ukraine, which is -600 meters deep.

«The Russian invasion, which has sent hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian men to the front, has forced women like Bashkatova to descend into the mines and do traditionally male jobs to support the country’s economy,» the article says.

According to a recent study, almost three-quarters of Ukrainian employers complain of labor shortages, and in Kyiv, subway train intervals have increased due to a shortage of workers as up to 10% of the staff has been mobilized. Nationwide, the shortage of bus drivers is 30%.

Bashkatova, formerly a teacher at a rural school in eastern Donetsk region, lost her job last year when constant Russian shelling forced her students to switch to online learning. While browsing Facebook, she saw an ad from Ukraine’s largest steel producer, Metinvest, looking for workers to work on underground installations at its Pokrovsk mine.

«The salary is good and stable, which is quite rare nowadays. I used to be a teacher, but now I’m a student again. It’s an interesting process,» she comments.

To allow women to work underground, the Ukrainian government repealed a law that previously prohibited women from working in «harmful or dangerous» conditions. Some have jumped at the opportunity as jobs have dried up in the war-torn region.

Another example of strength at Metinvest Pokrovskvugillia is 50-year-old Marina Vikhreva. Having worked for three decades in a surface mine sorting dry coal, she was excited to get a job as an underground machine operator and work underground.

«I think it’s great that more and more women are joining us. The girls support each other,» says Vikhreva.

Violetta Loevska, 21, who recently started working in the mine measuring methane levels, says she felt it was her “duty” to keep the mine running, especially after her uncle, who worked in the mine, went to the front.

«I knew very well what I was doing. Women can do the job just as well as men. The main thing is to keep other miners safe,» emphasizes Loevska.

Mobilization has differential impacts on labor-intensive industries, such as mining, transportation, and construction, which are dominated by strong working-age men. These important industries are expected to experience further labor depletion following President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s decision to reduce the conscription age to 25.

But in the east of the country, the shortage is particularly acute, as many families have moved abroad or to the relatively safe western regions of Ukraine.

According to Serhiy Stepanenko, HR and Social Affairs Director at Metinvest Pokrovskugol, about 30 women are already working underground, and some of them have started working in traditionally male positions in logistics and transportation.

However, he emphasized that many of the most physically demanding positions will remain difficult for women, and that the shortage of workers is a problem, and hiring women will not solve it.

It should be noted that Ukraine has the sixth largest coal reserves in the world, 90% of which are located in Donbas. In 2023, Metinvest Pokrovskvugillia produced 3.1 million tons of coal concentrate and sank 20 km of mine workings. By the end of 2024, miners at Pokrovske and concentrators at Svyato-Varvarinskaya plan to produce about 2.8 million tons of concentrate. At the same time, the plans of the company and the Ukrainian industry as a whole directly depend on the negative pressure of a number of factors, including lower demand for products, problems with energy supply, shortage of personnel due to mobilization, etc.

In particular, on June 1, 2024, CMU Resolution No. 661 amended the Regulation on the Peculiarities of Electricity Imports under the Legal Regime of Martial Law in Ukraine, which obliges Ukrainian producers to buy at least 80% of electricity from the EU at the European price to avoid forced restrictions on electricity supply. Previously, the mandatory share of imports was 30%.

This decision by the Ukrainian government may lead to numerous negative consequences for domestic energy-dependent industrial companies, especially those in the mining and metals sector.