Ukraine risks losing a significant portion of its potential migrants and international students not only because of the war, but also due to the inefficiency of the State Migration Service. This is according to Ulyana Kostenko, an associate expert at CASE Ukraine, who proposes four key reforms designed to transform the State Migration Service from a bureaucratic obstacle into a tool for attracting human capital.
According to a study by the Ukrainian State Center for International Education titled “Foreign Students in Ukraine During the War (2022–2023),” 47% of foreign students who were abroad are ready to return to Ukraine to continue their in-person studies. At the same time, the current system for employing and legalizing foreigners remains complex and opaque. To officially hire a foreigner, an employer must go through procedures at two separate institutions—the employment center and the State Migration Service. A work permit can even be revoked retroactively if the employer has failed to pay the Unified Social Tax (UST) for at least one month, including during martial law.
In Kyiv, there is only one center that processes employment documents for foreigners. The State Migration Service itself acknowledges that staffing levels and the number of workstations limit the service’s capacity. At the same time, the law contains vague wording regarding the grounds for denying residence permits, specifically phrases stating that “the data does not corroborate the information provided by the foreigner.” This gives officials broad leeway for subjective decisions. In 2024, the rate of denials for immigration permits was 10–13% of all applications.
Estonia serves as an example of an effective system, where applications for residence permits can be submitted online, decisions are made within 90 days, and the document itself is issued 14–20 days after approval. In 2025, the country enshrined the digitization of all migration procedures in law. The e-Residency program operates separately, through which over 126,500 people from 181 countries have obtained digital identity and established 27,000 companies without a physical presence in the country. Ukrainians make up the largest group of e-Residency users.
The second focus of the reform is the introduction of a points-based system for selecting migrants, modeled after the systems in Canada and Australia. Applicants receive points for education, age, language proficiency, work experience, and whether they have a job offer. In Australia, a list of 456 in-demand occupations is compiled annually, for which immigration quotas are set. The 2025–2026 program provides for 185,000 spots, 71% of which are allocated to skilled migration. For Ukraine, it is proposed to create a similar mechanism with a focus on construction, medicine, IT, and the agricultural sector.
Another problem lies in the lack of systematic analysis of migration flows. Currently, the State Migration Service primarily performs a registration function but does not forecast how many workers and in which specialties the economy will need. It is proposed that the service, together with the Ministry of Economy and business associations, annually develop a forecast of labor market needs, identify priority countries of origin for migrants, and establish selection criteria.
The law on reforming the State Customs Service provides for an international competition for leadership positions, the re-certification of all employees within 18 months, the participation of international experts in personnel committees, and salary increases. A similar approach is proposed for the State Migration Service—with public KPIs, transparent integrity assessments, and market-based salaries.
A reformed migration system could send a signal to the world: Ukraine is ready to compete for people, specialists, and investments, rather than losing them due to long lines, bureaucracy, and corruption.
❗️The publication by the Center for Social and Economic Research (CASE Ukraine) was made with the support of the Civil Society Home of ISAR Ednannia as a part of the project «Strong Civil Society of Ukraine – a driver towards reforms and democracy,» funded by Norway and Sweden. The contents of this publication are the sole responsibility of the Center for Social and Economic Research (CASE Ukraine) and can in no way be taken to reflect the views of the Government of Norway, Government of Sweden and ISAR Ednannia.