For over 35 years, The HALO Trust (HALO), a UK-based charity, has worked to protect lives and restore the livelihoods of those affected by conflict. HALO began work in Ukraine in 2015, first establishing humanitarian mine action activities in Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, operating from a base in Kramatorsk.
The conflict in Ukraine in 2022 forced HALO to relocate its staff and equipment from Kramatorsk to central Ukraine. When Kyiv oblast was liberated, HALO secured permission to resume operations, setting up a new base in Brovary, just northeast of the capital. From there, the programme grew rapidly, expanding east and south to meet the urgent needs of communities living among landmines and other explosive ordnance (EO).
HALO Ukraine at Scale
Today, HALO Ukraine is the largest international mine action operator in the country, with close to 1,350 total staff. Its teams maintain an operational presence in Kyiv, Chernihiv, Sumy, Kharkiv, Mykolaiv and Kherson oblasts, while risk education programming also reaches Poltava, Zhytomyr, and Rivne oblasts, as well as Dnipro and Odesa cities.
HALO Ukraine conducts several activities ranging from clearance of contaminated land, non-technical survey (NTS) to identify hazardous areas, explosive ordnance disposal (EOD), and explosive ordnance risk education (EORE) to teach communities about the risks posed by EO. Recognising that many areas in Ukraine remain inaccessible due to ongoing hostilities, HALO’s risk education teams also deliver online sessions remotely to reach vulnerable populations and support aid organisations working in areas closer to the frontlines. Since February 2022, HALO Ukraine has released 19,141,844 square metres of land back to Ukrainian communities, surveyed 63,203,192 square metres of potentially hazardous land, identified 62,170 devices for subsequent disposal and delivered 51,286 EORE sessions.
Following a period of expansion over the four years since the full-scale invasion, HALO Ukraine’s operations have now stabilised at a scale that allows for widespread coverage. The programme’s strategic focus has shifted from growth to optimisation, enhancing efficiency, investing in long-term national capacity, and deepening alignment with Ukraine’s national mine action and recovery plans.
For HALO Ukraine, advancing mechanisation has become a central priority towards enhancing operational efficiency by tackling what remains the most hazardous and labour-intensive step of the demining process: excavation. Excavation involves digging into the ground to investigate signals identified by detection methods and is especially challenging in areas with high levels of metal contamination where detectors register numerous signals that may each need to be manually excavated. Manual excavation is an especially slow process, and complete reliance on it may hinder timely release of land back to communities.
Enhancing Mechanical Clearance with ALLU
Accordingly, to improve efficiency, HALO Ukraine is integrating mechanical assets such as excavators, tillers and skid steers into clearance operations. These machines can either soften ground, easing the physical burden of manual clearance, or can mechanically clear large areas which reduces the time manual teams spend on excavation. Smaller assets like mini excavators are particularly valuable, as they can manoeuvre around obstacles such as trees or rubble where larger machines cannot easily operate.
Crucial to HALO’s mechanical operations are processing buckets fitted as attachments on these machines, which can separate soil from potentially hazardous items. HALO has found the ALLU bucket to be highly effective in sifting contaminated soil with accuracy and speed. HALO has successfully used ALLU buckets across the world, including in Sri Lanka and the West Bank, underscoring their versatility and suitability in different operational environments. The ALLU bucket is uniquely advantageous as it can identify very small hazards and is durable in hard ground conditions, common in Ukraine.
HALO Ukraine’s teams rely on this versatility and have used the ALLU bucket to support mechanical clearance across the country. This approach is evident at “Mykolaivske-2”, an agricultural field belonging to a farmer about 20 minutes outside Mykolaiv city, where teams are clearing the task using an ALLU bucket. HALO has worked on this Battle Area Clearance (BAC) task, since October 2025 and when cleared, this valuable farmland will return to use and directly benefit 55 community members.
The contamination at Mykolaivske-2 stems from hostilities that began on 5 March 2022. The conflict left behind widespread contamination across the area, with small arms ammunition, artillery shells, fragmentation, and other unexploded ordnance scattered throughout surrounding farmland. Powerful blast waves spread debris from destroyed vehicles and weapons across the field and neighbouring plots. When the local farmer returned to the area after the fighting had ended, his land was littered with damaged military equipment. Although much of the visible wreckage was later removed, the hidden danger of unexploded ordnance remained, leaving the land unsafe and unusable.
Returning Farmland to Productive Use
As of late April, HALO’s teams have cleared 45,000 of the task’s 47,423 square meters, bringing the field close to being fully cleared. This progress has been made through a combination of methods, including the Scorpion detection system, manual demining, and now a large excavator fitted with a screening bucket to complete clearance of the final section of the task. Because the remaining section of the task is heavily contaminated with metal, standard metal detectors are not suitable for use. Instead, a large excavator with an ALLU bucket allows teams to avoid the slow and physically demanding process of manual excavation.
Clearance of this task is expected to be completed by the end of June, from when the local farmer owning the field will resume planting and cultivating crops. Mykolaivske-2 is just one example of how, by combining proven tools like the ALLU bucket with other mechanical assets, HALO is strengthening its capacity to release contaminated land efficiently and safely, ensuring that communities across Ukraine can rebuild livelihoods on ground free from the dangers of explosive ordnance.
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