Large-scale Russian aggression against Ukraine has led to the fact that physical and food security are now on everyone’s ears. Within the it@war project this time, our interlocutors were representatives of ASTARTA-Kyiv, Director of the Information Technology Development Department, Oleksandr Voynalovich, and Natalia Bogacheva, Director of AgriChain Company. They told a lot of interesting about approaches to working in a team and interacting with clients in the conditions of war.

Business before war

“Astarta-Kyiv” is one of Ukraine’s largest public vertically integrated agro-industrial holdings. Since 2006, the company’s shares have been placed on the Warsaw Stock Exchange. In its management, there are 220 thousand hectares of agricultural land.

Astarta`s agricultural companies process to land in seven regions of Ukraine. The company is growing sugar beets, grain and oil crops: winter wheat, winter rape, soya, sunflower, and maize. Since 2017 organic farming has been developing, and there are corresponding certificates.

ASTARTA, a leading sugar producer in Ukraine, owns six factories that can process 36 thousand tons of sugar beet a day. The company is also one of the leaders in the Ukrainian market of grain and oil crops production and storage. The company owns eight elevator complexes with a volume of more than 550 thousand tons.

Holding is the leading producer of industrial milk in Ukraine. The total number of heads is 22 thousand cows. Also at a high level in “Astarta” is the processing of soya. The capacity of production per year – is 230 thousand tons. The biogas complex works.

In addition, ASTARTA-Kyiv includes the company AgriChain. AgriChain is an in-house IT company, that was founded in 2017. The company is engaged in developing and implementing specialized IT solutions.

In particular, a multifunctional platform that combines automation of business processes and efficient management of all enterprise business activities.

War and business

At the beginning of the full-scale Russian aggression, Astarta managed to save the team and ensure continuity of production processes. It is very important, because the agro-sector, especially animal husbandry, is sensitive to this. This was the most vulnerable area because the company did not stop milking, although not all milk-processing enterprises worked and logistics were very complicated.

Despite all the difficulties caused by the Russian military aggression, Astarta conducted a seed campaign at the optimal time.  After fields were demining, we even sowed the fields in the Chernihiv region, which was under temporary occupation until early April.

In the crop structure of agricultural holding, there were changes in favor of crops that can be processed in Ukraine. In particular, the sowing area of maize has been reduced. Sowing areas of oil crops, such as sunflower and soy increased.

Currently, the primary tasks of the team in the company are to collect the harvest in all areas and to ensure the storage and processing of these products.

On the contrary, in the first days of russia’s invasion, all employees were paid wages in advance, because everyone needed to have a “financial cushion”.

All workers who lived in the territories, which were subjected to massive military attacks in the first days after February 24 and expressed a desire to move, were evacuated to safer areas. “Astarta” has taken the decision of this question on itself and now helps all those who need it.

Social responsibility and humanitarian front

In a military situation, when some enterprises have partially or even completely stopped their activity, the fulfillment of tax obligations by working business is a manifestation of social responsibility and civic consciousness. Astarta understands that paying taxes is a particularly important financial support for local budgets. Therefore, the company pays taxes in full and on time. In particular, over UAH 285 million of taxes and fees were paid by enterprises of the agro-industrial holding during the first quarter.

From the first days of war agro holding “Astarta” and charitable foundation “Believe in yourself” became on the protection of the native country, Ukrainians, and the humanitarian front, having created the project Common Help UA.

The contribution to the win in this war is $10 million or more than 14 thousand tonnes of humanitarian aid.

Products, baby food, means of individual protection, medicines, and water, more than 660 thousand Ukrainians in 14 regions received the equipment. Support from “Astarta” and the “Believe in yourself” Foundation has already been received in 212 social and medical institutions, which serve more than a million Ukrainians. The work continues 24/7. Go to Victory!

IT before and after 24.02

From the end of 2021 to February 24, the Information Technology Development Department, together with other business units, processed the initiatives that were developed during the strategic sessions. The strategic sessions were held at every production enterprise “Astarta”. Of course, the IT department and AgriChain company with their digital products were important participants in these strategic sessions. All the developments began to form into complex strategy blocks of the business and short-term strategy blocks of IT direction. We approved serious modernization of IT infrastructure during the year and a projected budget for 2022, which takes into account the developed strategies planned.

A few hours after the war, an emergency IT department meeting was gathered. At this meeting, together with the heads of departments discussed the safety of the team and the possibility of moving workers with families to safer places.

We tested all the remote communication tools, trying not only to provide the backup channels but also to think about what to do in the worsted case – if there is no mobile or Internet connection.

“Intuition told me, that the war will still begin. Two weeks before its beginning, I offered the team to think about moving to the West of Ukraine, and advised them to look for housing so that we could transport the team there. But it happened as it happened, – tells Natalia Bogacheva, the directory of AgriChain company. – Already at 5:30 in the morning of February 24, I started calling all managers of the company. We spoke about where and who is better to evacuate. That is the process of moving and placing workers in safe places began. Thanks to this, our team was very quick to find a way out and almost all of them were evacuated quickly.”

Priority tasks

In the first weeks, the IT department solved operational tasks: whether all colleagues have computers, tools for work, and communication. They found out whether everything was necessary to continue the activity in the form allowed by the circumstances.

“There were days when our employees came to the office to connect their colleagues to the network, risking their own lives, or to send a computer to you personally or by mail. We also received constant requests for computers or printers at the request of the Armed Forces and organized everything as quickly as possible,” says Alexander Voynalovich.

Already about a week from the beginning of the war employees AgriChain began to return to the usual mode of work. Even in previous days, traditional daily stands were held and working tasks were performed.

“We have continued to deal with the projects we have already had and have fulfilled all our obligations to external clients. It was important for me not only to resume work but also to make the whole team involved in the process. For colleagues to have less time to read news and plunge into destructive conditions”, – says Natalia Bogachev.

Labor resources were distributed: Specialists who worked with external clients focused on internal projects – “SpivDiya”, @Common Help UA@, and Astarta`s project, where the AgriChain team was needed.

IT, which helps

First of all, Microsoft Teams became useful. This is the second critical situation, which showed the importance of this service for the company. The first occurrence took place in 2020 during Kovanda: Then everyone went together in Teams and felt the advantages of remote work and uninterrupted communication with each other. The second occurrence is war, but with grave circumstances. Periodically, meetings and communications have to be interrupted through air anxiety, and explosions in some of the participants.

Also very well showed itself the system of electronic document circulation. Since 2021, most documents and all agreements have been approved. That is why this service was very actual.

All “Astarta” IT infrastructure is distributed between several cloud sites and the data center. Currently, 80% of all company data is stored in the cloud. In the first days of the full-scale war, steps were developed to quickly transfer the remaining 20%, but there is no need for this.

“Our experience with cloud services has also been useful. Since we have specialists in this field, our partners have approached us for consultations. To help us move their infrastructure to the cloud. Of course, it was friendly to help, not commercial cooperation. We need to support each other. We also had a lot of requests for satellite monitoring of objects (especially in the occupied territories). And we also received requests for remote monitoring and blocking of field equipment, which was stolen in southern Ukraine. That is, we have “closed” a lot of unusual but possible questions for us that appeared in our clients since the beginning of the war,” Bogacheva says.

Immediate questions

Astarta IT infrastructure was ready for autonomous work, but thanks to the efforts of mobile operators and Internet service providers the connection was almost uninterrupted. Later, through the organization of UCAB, the company received 21 Starlink devices, which were distributed among production units for the development of redundant communication channels.

According to Ms. Natalia, even before the war AgriChain Company started working on the transition to the status of resident “action city”, and after February 24 this process was continued: A thorough analysis of compliance with requirements, financial consequences, potential risks, and finally the decision on the application was taken.

“It was important for us. Since we had no legal grounds to submit proposals for booking our key it specialists. This is necessary for
ensuring uninterrupted work of program complexes, because they worked with them on the terms of the contract. After the introduction of specialized staff and passing of appropriate procedures at the level of ministries of agrarian policy and defense, this issue has been solved positively, – says the head of AgriChain. – Thanks to joining “Diya City”, our specialists who became regular employees received more guarantees in case of convocation to the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Now, when they are mobilized, wages and jobs will be retained. While such options are not available for contractors according to the legislation of Ukraine. So now all our guys who fight our land, as well as their families, have guarantees of financial compensation.”

Refusal of products from the russian federation

“The need for refusal from Russian software and services arose back in 2014. It is important to emphasize the use of 1C, which is one of the main systems in our company. We do not pay any hryvnias to russia. We use this software product in a version localized for Ukraine and support its work by our resources. The costs of supporting this decision are paid by developers and analysts who are citizens of Ukraine or Ukrainian entrepreneurs,” says Oleksandr Voynalovich.

Personnel

“Here I will answer not just as the director of the IT department, but as a member of the management of the holding. This issue was discussed at the Directorate’s meeting and the leadership’s principled position that we do not reduce our personnel. Because for us every person is valuable. By reducing the person now, we will need to look for motivation and arguments to return it back to the company after the victory. And it would be very difficult. That is why we have fully preserved the team and tried those workers who were not burdened with their main function, to involve in volunteer and humanitarian projects,” says Alexander Voynalovich.

For example, the command of the “Astarta” IT department has joined to support the humanitarian object Common Help UA. In just three weeks from scratch, a software product was developed to account for humanitarian aid balances. It allows to form applications for “shipment” to a specific recipient, to distribute product balances to the recipients, and to show the documentation of the write-off from the warehouse of goods items: Medicines, products, etc. At the final stage, a document was developed which records the process of shipment, and based on which the TNT and the act of acceptance and transfer of the goods are formed. Also worked on reports that help users to get information: In terms of suppliers and recipients. In addition, the possibility of loading data into which regions provided humanitarian assistance was provided. All this work was carried out to make the volunteer activity of the common help UA site as transparent and organized and efficient as possible.

“Two specialists of the company were called to the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The functions they performed were shared by other colleagues. We have an interesting case. AgriChain employs a man and wife. He is a project manager, she is the head of the marketing and sales department. His wife fully “picked up” the work of his husband when he was called to the ranks of the Armed Forces. The time spent on the commercial external activity of the head of the marketing department, we have redistributed to the function that she can perform, – says Natalia Bogachev. – Our team also supported the humanitarian project Common Help UA. For the project, we developed a website that became the project’s face and voice. On the site, you can find information about the project and its partners, get acquainted with the reports, and make your contribution in support of Ukraine. We also developed a mobile application in which a volunteer could scan a barcode on the packaging, take a few photos of the medicines, and give them a name. This information has been downloaded to Google-table. We had an agreement with a volunteer pharmacy that could group these medicines in a calm environment for the substance in force and also correctly specify the commodity group, which allowed without the presence of a provisor in the warehouse to identify all medicines.

The AgriChain team also helped to automate the process of working with donors, both current and potential donors. In order not to lose time in the development of the solution for this task, we have contacted Terrasoft, the developer of the Creatio platform for the automation of different types of business processes. They announced on a free-of-charge basis to transfer a pool of licenses for volunteers of the Common Help UA humanitarian facility. This tool allowed to automate work with donors in a few days and make it more effective”.

Current projects

The Astarta IT department concentrated on operational work. Those global objects that were budgeted were suspended. All budgets were released to redirect them to sowing and support the operational activities of enterprises. Of course, part of the funds for the implementation of humanitarian initiatives.

One of the priority directions of work is logistics: Transport, field, warehouse, and commercial. For this purpose, a common portfolio of projects was created to comprehensively re-think all the questions concerning logistics, as it is one of the most urgent problems that should be solved here and now. It is also about the plan of placing of products, automation of currents to “dissolve” all stocks of grain and to place last year and the future harvest if “Astarta” will not have enough elevator capacity. Also today we are preparing a material base for the logistics of a new harvest.

If previously, the holding companies kept the course on the folding of currents and storage premises, because it was considered irrational. Now their automation is taking place in the turbo-mode. This is one of the examples of new challenges that came to the team with the beginning of the war.

We also started cooperation with American company Planet Labs. This company has revolutionized the Earth observation industry. Thanks to the high accuracy of satellite images. Today AgriChain is in the process of integration with Planet so that clients get the highest quality satellite indices with high resolution (this is about 3-4 meters).

Already today, ASTARTA is implementing a pilot project of the AgriChain Plan decision for planning a seasonal production program in the plant industry. Close to the autumn it is planned to complete the pilot project and offer this market decision. In addition, there are global plans and partners to sell AgriChain Plan abroad.

IT security

This is a very important question. So, on July 1, “Astarta” created the Cybersecurity department. The company is well aware of the importance of this front, where constant attacks are taking place. The information war is also a war, with its achievements and, unfortunately, with losses. People do not die on this front, but one can lose important information for the country or business.

“Our cybersecurity service was operating in mode 24/7 and is now actively working on the company’s information perimeter. It should be noted separately that we had a task, without reducing the protection of our information systems, to find a solution to deploy the corporate infrastructure on a personal home computer for those workers who were forced to move quickly from home without working computers. This task was successfully solved,” says Alexander Voynalovich.

IT Strategy

IT strategy should have a constant process of coordination with business strategy. In our case, the strategy is to ensure food security in Ukraine. For the first time, it is important to ensure the security of the company’s information perimeter so that all means of communication work constantly – mobile and online communication, the Internet.

It was also important to ensure that all accounting systems, financial management, and AgriChain digital modules were functioning so that our business units could not experience any changes in the operational field.

We can say that in late March IT department and AgriChain company came to pre-war working hours. Of course, “the site” was a little easier because they are accustomed to remote work. A large number of objects were taken into work to provide operational activities, and development of process management systems in logistics, and procurement. Now, after approval of the road map of the development of these objects, their implementation continues without reducing the pace.

The working mood in the team

“Every person is just a person. With their psychological condition, fears, fears for themselves and family. All of us were certainly shocked and needed psychological support. My recipe, probably, is not new – it is communication. Here it was more, and it was daily. We are also organizing meetings with the whole IT department team twice a month, except for working time. Be sure to have cameras turned on to see each other. We tell you how everyone feels about what he is doing outside work, where he goes with children, and what he does on Sunday. We communicate and listen to each other, we allow being in the office, in the team, though virtual. Here there is a place for jokes, personal Stories – here you can speak, – tells Alexander Voynalovich. – I am a happy manager, who was very pleased to have a team that was United. Therefore, some additional means or methods of management do not need to be used to motivate people to work. Everyone was so well aware of the high level of responsibility placed on our company – food security of the country.

I will say more that the members of the Directorate refused a part of their salary in favor of the humanitarian object Common Help UA. And with all the employees who cooperate with us on the terms of the contract (FOP), we agreed that they will not indicate the overtime hours in the work reports, but only the fixed part. We work with the same enthusiasm as before, and it is not exactly 8 hours a day.”

What was the plan?

“At the Directorate, this issue was discussed and different plans for the development of events were made. The highest priority for us was to take care of the safety of people, to protect them from possible attacks, and raids, to think about the ways of evacuation, – says Alexander Voynalovich. – I will say frankly that I was a bit naive because I did not believe that such a full-scale invasion will start all this. Therefore, I set up the team for serious work. on February 23 in the evening, the issues of where the next strategic session will take place to form a final strategy were settled.

At the same time, I knew that the infrastructure is ready. We prepared a Disaster Recovery Protocol action plan 2,5 years ago. Yes, the protocol was, but I was convinced that we would not have to apply it. It turned out that we were partially applying… fortunately now we are all in relative security and working, approaching victory”!