The Ukrainian defence industry is facing a shortage of human resources and the speed of drone innovation is threatened

According to foreign media reports, Ukraine ' s front-line forces may need a completely new drone design in a few weeks, but the country ' s defence industry is facing a severe shortage of manpower, which may prevent it from maintaining this innovation. Yurii Faraponov, Chief Operator of BlueBird Tech, stated that the company was unable to meet some of the demand from the front line owing to a lack of enough engineers. Sergii Vysotskyi, Vice-President of the Ukrainian Defence Industry Association, stated that some enterprises were even looking for retired professionals to ask them to return to work. The working-age population of Ukraine has been declining for decades, and this trend has increased since 2022. In the field of defence science and technology, the shortage of human resources has a direct impact on Ukraine ' s strategy of relying on technology to compensate for the disadvantages of the battlefield population. As weapons systems become more complex and require more expertise, many practitioners have indicated that the shortage of talent is particularly damaging to innovation。