Ivan Verbytskyi has completed his work as a director of the NGO Cedos, a position he has held since September 2019. The decision to dismiss him was approved by the Cedos Supervisory Board on 6 December 2024.

Ivan plans to focus his efforts on supporting the Defence Forces of Ukraine, but he will remain part of the Cedos team and continue to contribute to the organisation’s work.

Over the past five years, the organisation has grown several times, both financially and in terms of staff. We have rethought our activities and updated our strategy, finding a new balance between research and urban projects. In response to the pandemic, Cedos began analysing the impact of the quarantine on social protection, housing, education and other areas of public life. We continued to work on this analysis after the full-scale invasion began. In 2022, the organisation began researching the diversity of experiences of people in Ukraine living through the war. We also prioritised supporting local communities to engage residents, build understanding and strengthen hromadas. On the other hand, Cedos focused on finding solutions to the social challenges caused by the war: developing social housing, supporting families of killed and missing soldiers, improving the work of recruitment centres and increasing the resilience of the education system.

Ivan Verbytskyi, Cedos Director (2019–2024)

According to Cedos’ Charter, the independent Supervisory Board appoints and dismisses the directors. Since its establishment in 2010, the organisation has successfully changed directors several times, under whose leadership it has continued to operate and develop. This has strengthened Cedos’ institutional capacity, confirmed the effectiveness of internal policies and practices, and reduced the dependence of the organisation’s success on personal factors.

The Cedos team continues to work on implementing the organisation’s updated strategy until 2027, which was approved by the Supervisory Board a few months ago. We implement projects dedicated to social and territorial development:

We have recently completed a study on the housing conditions of Ukrainian women and men, held a workshop on the creation and functioning of social housing, and an online discussion on the future of housing policy in Ukraine. We continue to work on the research of the Ukrainian army recruitment centres, the experience of people who were forced to go abroad because of the war, and other analytical projects.

Thank you to all our partners, thanks to whom we have achieved so much, for your trust, support, and cooperation! Thank you to everyone who was and is with Cedos!

Ivan Verbytskyi

Ivan Verbytskyi joined Cedos in 2014. Since then, he has worked on research on urban development, civil society and civic participation. In 2015–2019, he was the editor and project manager of the Mistosite, and in 2018–2019, he was the curator of the Ukrainian Urban Forum.