Money down the drain: The Ministry of Culture of Ukraine spent tens of millions on an unknown English-language website

Four months ago, as part of an effort to introduce Western audiences to Ukrainian culture and society, as well as the countries of the new Europe, the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine launched the English-language platform known as The Gaze. However, despite expenditures exceeding 60 million hryvnias, the project has failed to gain popularity beyond Ukraine, unlike other English-language Ukrainian media outlets.

This information comes from an investigation by NGL.media.

It is reported that out of the mentioned sum, 11.6 million hryvnias were spent on the development and technical maintenance of the platform, while the majority of the funds went towards content creation. The cost of video production amounted to 35 million hryvnias, and textual materials cost 11 million hryvnias.

It is also known that The Gaze platform and its YouTube channel feature seven programs, including the puppet show “Hidden Angle,” the political program “Talk For More,” the cooking show “Chefs Next Door,” and the humor show “European Edge.”

The cooking show proved to be particularly expensive, with the production cost of one episode amounting to 261,000 hryvnias, despite an average YouTube view count of only 900.

The investigation also points out that the cost of producing one news material is 4,000 hryvnias, and articles cost 8,500 hryvnias, which is significantly higher than the average market rates in Ukraine, where simple text content is typically paid at around 250 hryvnias per thousand characters.

All the content for The Gaze is developed by private contractors, whose services are paid for through the state-owned enterprise “Multimedia Platform of Ukrainian Innovation Broadcasting” on behalf of the Ministry of Culture.