LECTURE ON SNAU’S COOPERATION WITH COMMUNITIES IN CHINA

A series of lectures was held in the Chinese city of Hachinohe as part of the Welfare and Art project.
Olena MELNIK, Head of the International Projects Sector of the Sumy NAU, Associate Professor of the
Department of Ecology and Botany, Senior Research Fellow at ETH Zurich, Honorary Professor at RAU,
also made a presentation on Russia's war crimes on the territory of Ukraine and cooperation between
Sumy NAU and communities.

The Welfare and Art project included a separate session consisting of 3 reports on Ukraine and the
military situation in our country. China wants to spread information about the aggressor’s terrorism,
thus supporting it, so lectures on the full-scale invasion and its consequences will be broadcast in
museums, during exhibitions, and at public events.

Olena MELNYK’s lecture, “The Environmental Consequences of the War in Ukraine from a Global
Perspective,” focused on the cooperation of Sumy National Agrarian University with communities, in
particular within the framework of the UNICOM Erasmus+ project: KA2 CBHE, to overcome the
consequences of a full-scale invasion. One of the best cases shared with Chinese colleagues was the
implementation of the Soil-Experts project. SNAU has become a platform for training specialists in the
field of soil restoration affected by hostilities, and the staff of our higher education institution shared
their knowledge and experience. Thanks to cooperation with farms in the Sumy region, we are able to
collect samples contaminated with heavy metals from explosives and analyze them. Read more about
the Soil-Experts project: https://soil-expert.snau.edu.ua/

In addition, high school students from Hachinohe, China, joined the project and are now developing
their own regional project to help Ukraine. They raise funds, send humanitarian aid, and spread
information about the consequences of the war. Now, the students want to start cooperation with a
Ukrainian school to learn directly about the needs of Ukrainian children and the challenges they have to
overcome. The SNAU and its staff became a so-called “link” in the work, inviting students of Sumy
Secondary School No. 15 to participate in joint projects with students from China, establishing strong
partnerships. The Chinese partners held a series of discussion meetings for Ukrainian students.
Subsequently, students from Hachinohe will present the results of the cooperation at the state level of
the project in Tokyo.