Currently, the situation in Chernivtsi, where our company is located, remains under control. Therefore, the city’s residents have the possibility to help those who really need it, because the relatively safe residential area was not ready for such a huge number of internally displaced persons (IDPs). The stores are running out of groceries and other goods, there is no fuel at gas stations, there is a lack of medicine and hygiene products in pharmacies, and delivery is just impossible sometimes.
According to the official statistics, the small town of Chernivtsi, which previously had a population of approximately 260,000, has now received approximately 100,000 IDPs, and these are only the people who have been officially registered, but in fact this figure is a few times bigger for different reasons. The city and its infrastructure are extremely overloaded, and yet we do not stay aside from the common trouble and try to help everyone who needs it.
The city’s residents themselves are organizing temporary shelters for IDPs in gyms, restaurants or accommodating them in their own homes. They are raising clothes, hygiene items, food, and suchlike. Some things are provided to IDPs from the country’s hot spots, whereas everything else is sent to places that, unfortunately, people do not have the opportunity to leave.
A lot of catering establishments feed IDPs for free, and there is constantly a severe lack of food, as store shelves are empty.