URC 2026: Ukraine's half-trillion-dollar rebuild docks in Gdańsk

For two days, the Polish port city of Gdańsk is the political and economic capital of Europe. AmberExpo is hosting the fifth Ukraine Recovery Conference (URC 2026), the world's largest forum dedicated to rebuilding Ukraine, with delegations from nearly 70 countries, the heads of the world's leading financial institutions and a wall of business leaders under one roof. The headline number is measured in hundreds of billions of dollars – and for the maritime and logistics sector, much of it will move by sea, road and rail through the Baltic.

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25 june 2026   |   16:58   |   Source: Gazeta Morska   |   Prepared by: Kamil Kusier   |   Print

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Co-hosted by the governments of Poland and Ukraine, the conference was opened on Thursday morning by Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk. Poland's delegation is led by the head of government and his ministers; Ukraine's by Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko. After Lugano, London, Berlin and Rome, this year's host is Poland, and the choice of Gdańsk – the home of Solidarity and a Baltic port – was no accident.

Half a trillion dollars, and counting

The hardest numbers came from the president of the World Bank. Ajay Banga warned that Ukraine will need more than $580 billion over the coming decade to rebuild, and that the Bank is raising $2 billion for its SPUR 2.0 programme (Special Program for Ukraine Recovery), including from European partners. Part of that money can come from the public purse, he said, but the lion's share has to come from the private sector – and the private sector, he was blunt, will not show up without the rule of law and proper reforms, including in energy. Estimates of the total bill are broadly consistent: the World Bank, the European Union and the United Nations put it at around €500 billion (about $588 billion), with some assessments running as high as $800 billion. Whatever the methodology, this is a project counted in hundreds of billions and spread across a decade.

The money is already moving

That these are not just declarations was made clear in the opening address by the President of the European Commission. Ursula von der Leyen announced that the first €3.2 billion tranche of the EU's €90 billion support loan would reach Kyiv that same day, with a separate package – reported at €5 to €6 billion – to follow for drone production in Ukraine.

The Commission also launched the European Flagship Fund for the Reconstruction of Ukraine, set up jointly by the EU, Poland, Germany, France and Italy. With initial capital of around €220 million, it is designed to mobilise up to €1 billion for strategic sectors. The logic is simple: public capital takes the first risk to build the confidence needed to attract large private investment. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz echoed the point, stressing that public money alone will not rebuild a country hit by such vast destruction.

- Now is the time to invest in Ukraine, Ursula von der Leyen told the hall, recalling that the EU and its member states have committed around €200 billion since the start of the full-scale Russian invasion. The determination of the Ukrainian people, she added, has shown the world that "their European choice cannot be broken."

The United Kingdom joined the list of donors. Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper announced a package worth nearly £290 million (more than €330 million) for energy and critical infrastructure, business support, and programmes in education and justice – funding, she said, to "power Ukraine's homes and critical infrastructure" and help the country rebuild for the long term.

A cargo question, not just a political one

Although the conference centres on energy, critical infrastructure and logistics, its infrastructure track speaks directly to the maritime sector. The cross-cutting Infrastructure Platform rests on the rebuilding and modernisation of roads, railways, ports and future airports, aligned with the trans-European transport network (TEN-T). Ukraine's proposals include the development of logistics corridors, modernisation of border infrastructure and the further build-out of the Solidarity Lanes – the routes that have carried Ukraine's exports and imports since the start of the war.

The maritime theme surfaced again in the address of Bulgaria's representative, Rumen Radev – a politician with a military background, a major general, and now the country's prime minister. Among three areas of regional cooperation with Ukraine he named, alongside energy diversification and security cooperation, Black Sea connectivity. As a key energy project he pointed to the expansion of the Vertical Gas Corridor, linking the transmission networks of Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, Moldova and Ukraine.

Every one of those hundreds of billions is, first and foremost, a flow of cargo – steel, cement, prefabricated elements, equipment, fuel – that has to enter the continent somewhere and travel east. For the ports of the Tricity (Gdańsk, Gdynia, Sopot) and the wider Pomeranian logistics hinterland, that means the prospect of years of rising throughput and a new role for the Baltic corridor as a supply gateway to a post-war Ukraine. The region holds more than one card: the bulk and container terminals of Gdańsk and Gdynia, shipbuilding and repair capacity, experience in handling bulk and project cargo, and a growing defence-industry cluster. These are threads worth watching regardless of the political headlines – because real contracts will land where relationships and capacity were built first.

Security, drones and the eastern flank

This year's edition introduced something new: a security and defence dimension proposed by Poland and built into URC 2026 as an integral part. The programme is divided into five pillars – business, security and defence, EU integration, regional development and human capital – with stronger Ukrainian defence treated as a precondition for reconstruction in the broadest sense.

The most striking note was the promise of ever-closer integration between the European and Ukrainian defence industries. Von der Leyen cited concrete examples: Ukrainian drones built in Germany, and fuel for Ukraine's Flamingo missiles soon to be produced in Denmark. Ukraine's battlefield experience, she argued, is unmatched, and the country is becoming not only a consumer but a provider of security for Europe. The integration of Ukrainian industry with the European defence base was discussed by, among others, Polish deputy defence minister Cezary Tomczyk and EU defence commissioner Andrius Kubilius. Drones, artificial intelligence and the protection of critical infrastructure are among the hottest topics of the entire forum.

Security also dominated the side events. On the margins of the conference, an Eastern Flank summit – a working lunch – brought together, alongside the Commission president, the leaders of Poland, Bulgaria, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania (with President Gitanas Nausėda), Romania and Sweden. For the Baltic and front-line states, Ukraine's recovery and their own security are two sides of the same equation.

One hall, different tempos

The Gdańsk summit also showed that European unity has its shades. The main stage was dominated by a tone of unconditional support, but not every guest spoke with exactly the same voice.

The most memorable lines came from Albania's prime minister, Edi Rama. "Reconstruction is not charity, it is strategy," he argued, adding that it is not only about repairing what has been destroyed, but about building a democratic, European, resilient Ukraine. Rama described Ukraine's reconstruction and the Western Balkans' European integration as mutually reinforcing processes, and rounded it off with: "Ukraine is rebuilding Europe's courage. Europe must help rebuild Ukraine's future."

A different note came from leaders of Central Europe and the Black Sea. Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babiš, while not questioning Ukraine's right to defend itself, called for more active diplomacy to end the war rather than a focus solely on rearmament. "Every sovereign nation has the right to defend itself," he said, but framed the main challenge as finding a path to end the war and restore the conditions for a peace that is "just, stable and lasting." Radev struck a similar chord, putting an end to hostilities first. "This war of attrition, destruction and devastation must end," he said, arguing for a lasting peace achieved through diplomacy and in line with the UN Charter. That tension – between "support until victory" and "end the war first" – was one of the most interesting subtexts of the whole conference.

Gdańsk: politics and symbolism

The summit is taking place under the shadow of strained Polish-Ukrainian relations. Neither President Karol Nawrocki nor President Volodymyr Zelensky appeared at AmberExpo; Ukraine's delegation, by Kyiv's decision, is led by Prime Minister Svyrydenko. Tusk argued that this shifts the conference's centre of gravity towards the economy and the practical. On the eve of the talks he also met, among others, the World Bank president, Chancellor Merz, Moldovan Prime Minister Alexandru Munteanu and the chairman of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Denis Bećirović – a sign that the recovery agenda also draws in the Western Balkan states aspiring to the EU.

Setting his prepared speech aside, Tusk spoke personally, telling the audience that the future "can be built only on truth, on mutual respect, on an understanding of history." Reconstruction, he said, is not only about buildings, power plants and schools, but also about a readiness for reconciliation, without which there can be no full unification of Europe.

Chancellor Merz's words carried weight in this context. Recalling Tusk's reminder that the Second World War began nearby, the German chancellor marked the 35th anniversary of the Polish-German good-neighbourliness treaty and acknowledged openly that Germany had committed "monstrous crimes" against Poles in 1939–45, thanking Poland that, despite them, peace and friendship had become possible. It was not a formal apology, but against the backdrop of earlier controversy over his remarks on the war's length, it was a clear gesture. Europe, he said, stands "shoulder to shoulder" in defence of freedom – and therefore with Ukraine – and it is becoming clear that Russia will not win this war.

Opening her own remarks, Svyrydenko turned directly to Poles, thanking them for the help they gave when it was needed most, and for their willingness to build a shared future within the EU. Von der Leyen, for her part, recalled that at the start of the invasion Gdańsk lived up to its reputation as a city of freedom: 5,000 families took in Ukrainian refugees and schools began teaching in Ukrainian.

Recovery starts now

On the second day in Gdańsk, more signatures will follow, and the sector forums – from transport to public-private partnerships – will translate high politics into concrete contracts. In the background runs the accession process: on 15 June, EU member states unanimously opened the first negotiating cluster with Ukraine, and Brussels is promising to open the rest quickly. For the first time the conference also brings together three strands that until now ran separately – business, recovery and security – and the 2027 edition is due to be hosted by Estonia. For companies across shipping, ports, logistics and defence, the Gdańsk summit is a signal that Ukraine's reconstruction is not a mirage of the future, but a process that starts here and now.

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Ukraine Recovery Conference 2026 odbudowa Ukrainy fundusze UE dla Ukrainy Ajay Banga Julija Swyrydenko

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