GURT Resource Centre studied the needs of the Ukrainian non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the information and communication technologies (ICT) during October-November 2016.

776 managers of Ukrainian NGOs and 10 ICT experts took part in the study.

Based on an online survey and expert interviews within the study on needs of Ukrainian NGOs in information and communication technologies we can outline the following trends.

According to experts, most of the NGOs tend to use only standard office programs. Organizations almost do not work with specialized software that would help them in cost, human resources, membership or volunteer accounting. Furthermore, specialized software can also be used to reasonably defend the interests of their recipients and solve their problems in cooperation with the authorities, socially responsible business, international partners and donors.

The statement confirmation is that only 8% of the surveyed NGOs have ICT fully meeting their current needs. Meanwhile, 51% of respondents did not know about the innovations in the IT-industry. The organization’s functions NGOs need most to effectively use ICT are defined as project management (64%) and data analysis and data processing (54%).

Another common trend is full or partial transition of Ukrainian NGOs to cloud services (over the next two years 12% respondents plan to complete full transition, 49% plan to partially transit to the cloud, 6% respondents have already completed full transition to «cloud»). At the same time 18% mentioned that they do not know what a «cloud» means.

The majority (64%) of CSOs surveyed do not have an IT specialist, while 79% state the problem of cyber-security (57% said that their organization’s information system is secure to a certain extent, and 22% consider that it is not secure at all).

Among the most common cyber security threats respondents defined virus attacks (37%) and incorrect configurations (30%). Despite the fact that 37% of respondents affirmed that over the last year their NGO experienced no problems with cyber-security, general trends that are confirmed by experts demonstrate the sustainable need to use high quality anti-virus software and to meet basic requirements of cyber security.

Despite the fact that the majority of organizations surveyed (59%) indicated that the annual budget of their organizations for 2015 does not exceed 100 thousand hryvnas, only 15% are aware of the opportunity to receive software as a donation and only 5% are familiar with the Technology Assistance Program (TechSoup).

Designer of infographics – Olexandra Mykhailutsa