Medical tourism and IT can draw visitors back to Ukraine after the war, UN Tourism’s chief told a Kyiv briefing
Her Kyiv visit—the first by a UN Tourism chief in a decade—came with a concrete deliverable: 500 online-academy scholarships, 200 of them for veterans.
Shaikha Al Nowais, the first woman to lead UN Tourism, highlighted medical tourism and Ukraine's IT sector as key assets for attracting foreign visitors post-war, during a briefing in Kyiv. She noted that Ukraine already possesses all the necessary elements for a thriving tourism economy, including culture, landscapes, and cuisine.
As the first UN Tourism chief to visit Ukraine in a decade, Al Nowais presented the country as a future destination, rather than a war zone, in an effort to anchor its reconstruction around sectors capable of generating hard currency and drawing tourists back to devastated areas. Both medical tourism and IT were among Ukraine's strongest performers prior to the 2022 invasion.
Prior to the conflict, Ukraine welcomed approximately 13 million visitors annually, with tourism accounting for 3 to 4 percent of the country's GDP, according to RBC-Ukraine's report citing figures from the briefing. Al Nowais emphasized the potential for unlocking significant opportunities by unifying all stakeholders in the tourism sector under a unified state framework.
As a medical tourism hub prior to the war, Ukraine boasted an affordable reputation for fertility treatments, surrogacy, dentistry, laser eye surgery, and cosmetic procedures. The country's medical tourism association reported tens of thousands of foreign patients visiting each year, with prices often significantly lower than in Western Europe.
Before Russia's full-scale invasion, Ukraine's medical tourism sector generated substantial revenue, accounting for a significant portion of the nation's total exports. The IT sector, which experienced growth even during the war, contributed about $6.8 billion to Ukraine's exports in 2021, representing nearly 10 percent of the country's total exports.
This sector, with notable achievements such as the Diia app and globally recognized products like Grammarly and GitLab, demonstrated its ability to scale and deliver essential services, even amidst conflict. Ukraine's Acting Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha met Al Nowais in Kyiv on August 15, 2026, to discuss the integration of tourism into the reconstruction process.
In response to her visit, UN Tourism committed to providing 500 scholarships for Ukrainians to study at its Online Academy, with 200 reserved for veterans, while the remaining scholarships to be allocated by the Ukrainian government.
Written by urgent.news from Euromaidan Press's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
