Ukraine's coal mines welcome hundreds of female workers amid male workforce off fighting

Ukraine's coal mining enterprises have experienced a drastic change in recent months as hundreds of women joined their workforce in light of thousands of male workers gone to fight at the frontline.

As reported the TVP News, one such mine, owned by the country's largest private energy company DTEK has disclosed that nearly 3,000 of its 20,000 mine workers are fighting in the war against the Russian troops, hence the company announced the hiring of a female workforce to which hundreds of citizens reacted.

Ukraine’s coal industry, once one of the largest in Europe, has suffered decades of decline since the collapse of the Soviet Union. The centrally managed internal market that it supplied suddenly ceased to exist.

The Russia-backed militias in eastern Ukraine took over many coal-rich regions in 2014, which increased even more after the 2022 outbreak of conflict.