Kakhovka, Kherson Oblast, Ukraine

🇺🇦 Kakhovka (Каховка) is a port city on the Dnieper River in Kakhovka Raion, Kherson Oblast, of southern Ukraine. It hosts the administration of the Kakhovka urban hromada, one of the hromadas of Ukraine. Kakhovka has been under Russian occupation since February 2022. It is home to the KZEZO (Electro-Welding Equipment Plant) and the Tavria Games festival. Kakhovka gives its name to the Soviet-built Kakhovka Dam, which was destroyed in June 2023 during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and the reservoir that had until then flooded the Great Meadow.

Geography: Administrative status In 1972, the Verkhovna Rada of the Ukrainian SSR gave the city the rank of city of oblast significance within Kherson Oblast. Until 18 July 2020, Kakhovka served as the administrative centre of Kakhovka Raion though it did not belong to the raion. In July 2020, as part of the administrative reform of Ukraine, which reduced the number of raions of Kherson Oblast to five, the city of Kakhovka was merged into Kakhovka Raion. Simultaneously, the raion centre was moved to Nova Kakhovka.

History Soon after the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Empire, in 1791 the Russian Colonel D.M. Kulikovsky built in place of former Crimean fortress the trade town of Kakhovka. It was named in honor of the Taurida Oblast governor Vasiliy Kakhovsky. In 1848 the town obtained city rights. In the 1870s–90s the town was renowned for having a huge population of low-income contractors (batraki). According to N.J. Tjezjakov, a Russian economist, between 20,000 and 40,000 batraki would gather in the city at the one time, 80% of them males.

In December 1918, by the decision of the administration of the Dnipro povit (uyezd), Kakhovka was declared a city. In August 1920, during the final push in the Russian Civil War to drive the Whites under Wrangel out of the Crimea, Ieronim Uborevich established a bridgehead as part of the Northern Taurida Operation at Kakhovka, which became the site of fierce battles, which Evan Mawdsley described as "probably the closest the Civil War came to world war trench fighting".

During World War II, Kakhovka was captured by the Wehrmacht on August 30, 1941, as part of Operation Barbarossa. The Germans operated a Nazi prison in the town. It was retaken by the 4th Ukrainian Front during the Melitopol Offensive in the Battle of the Dnieper on November 2, 1943.

The city was captured on 24 February 2022 by Russian troops during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. They later pushed on to Mykolaiv, searching for way to cross the Southern Bug river.

Economy Today, Kakhovka is one of the industrial centres of the Kherson Oblast. The leader of industrial production is the Kakhovka Electric Welding Equipment Plant, a joint-stock company. Before the Russian occupation of the city in 2022, the plant produced modern electric welding equipment that was supplied to almost 80 countries, and on 24 December 2022, its premises were damaged by Russian mortar fire.

The industrial face of the city is also shaped by the Experimental Mechanical Plant, which specialises in the production of experimental machinery and equipment for the processing and food industries, the Silhospahrehat plant for the repair of diesel engines and the production of spare parts for agricultural machinery, and the flagship of the food industry, Chumak PrJSC.

The Kakhovka branch of Cargill is one of Ukraine's largest sunflower oil processing plants. In 2008-2009, Mykolaiv-based Sudnoservice built a powerful grain and oilseed storage facility in the city. The city ranks first in Ukraine in terms of foreign investment per capita.

In total, the city has more than 550 enterprises of various forms of ownership, including small businesses. This economic complex employs three quarters of the city's working population. In the total volume of production, works performed and services rendered, one fifth of the city's industrial enterprises, almost 60 per cent of small and medium-sized enterprises and businesses, about 10 per cent of service enterprises, more than 10 per cent of trade enterprises and more than 5 per cent of construction organisations contribute.

Small and medium-sized businesses are gaining ground in Kakhovka. It currently concentrates more than 60 per cent of its assets in working capital. This is three times more than large enterprises. Small and medium-sized businesses are developing dynamically, exploring the market space and creating jobs for the city's population.

Business structures annually attract over UAH 12 million and over USD 2 million in foreign investments to develop production. Such enterprises as Petroplast, Metaldizayn, Stav, Paritet, Tornadoplast, Globart, May, Khimtekhnologiya, and OPENTEK are consistently supplying the market with products, increasing their output and expanding their product range, the latter of which was destroyed by Russian bombardment on 18 October 2023. The construction industry is represented by business structures and construction organisations. The most powerful of them are the joint-stock company Road Construction Department No. 12 and BudMayster LLC.

Transport The M14E58 Odesa-Melitopol-Novoazovsk motorway runs along the southern outskirts of the city.

The cargo and passenger railway station Kakhovka of the Kherson Railway Directorate is located near the town of Tavriysk.

Education There are 7 general secondary education institutions in the city (including two specialised ones with in-depth study of foreign languages) with almost 4,000 students.

More than 1,500 children are educated in eight pre-school institutions.

The out-of-school education system is represented by the Young Technicians' Station, the Young Naturalists' Station, the Children's Creativity Centre, the Children's and Youth Sports School and the Interschool Training and Production Complex.

Since 1969, the State Vocational Educational Institution "Kakhovka Vocational Lyceum of the Service Sector" has been operating in the city, training skilled workers in the professions of "Hairdresser", "Hairdresser-Makeup Artist", "Tailor", "Manicurist-Pedicurist". It ceased to exist in 2021.

Cultural influence The 1935 film Three Friends (Три товарища) included the song "Kakhovka" (words by Mikhail Svetlov and music by Isaak Dunayevsky), which became very well known, especially the refrain "Мы мирные люди, но наш бронепоезд/ Стоит на запасном пути" ("We are peaceful people, but our armored train/ Stands [ready] on the siding"). Svetlov chose the site of the little-known Civil War battle for his song because he had grown up nearby and had known the town during the war.

The Tavria Games are a popular open air music festival that take place in the town each year.