Mr. President,
We have an exiting year ahead of us! Through the adoption of the Strategic Plan for 2008-2011, we are setting the stage for UNDP’s contribution to the implementation of the MDG's in this vital phase leading up to the year 2015. With this plan, we will also take measures to enhance UNDP’s role as manager of the Resident Coordinator System, which will provide the framework for a more effective contribution by the entire UN system towards the MDG’s. I would like to thank the Administrator for his leadership in this regard and his focus on accelerating efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals.
Well aware of the preliminary status of the Strategic Plan before us, I would at this stage like to convey the following three main observations:
1. The promotion of gender equality and empowerment of women should be an important goal for UNDP’s work. We have tried various solutions to the gender issue in previous strategic frameworks within UNDP but impact at field level has been dismal. UNDP’s work on gender equality has lacked focus and adequate human and financial resources. In the Strategic Plan gender equality is suggested to be an “operational principle”, a new concept that we only have a vague understanding of. We would recommend that MDG 3, to promote gender equality and empower women, should be an explicit goal also for UNDP and that financial resources are allocated towards this goal through the programming arrangement.
In our view, the particular challenge of overcoming inequalities and injustice between men and women needs serious engagement by all relevant actors, including UNDP, as well as a new reinforced gender structure within the UN, building on UNIFEM, the Department on the Advancement of Women and the Special Adviser, as proposed by the High-level Panel on System-wide coherence. The pending decisions on this proposal should however not be an excuse for not moving ahead by and within UNDP. A strengthened UN gender architecture will have to rely on strengthened gender work also within UNDP.
2. The Strategic Plan should establish a clear and logic relationship between goals, focus areas, core functions, allocated resources and expected results, and include an accountability framework, including monitoring and reporting, to follow progress and assess contributions by UNDP.The Strategic Plan should work as results-based management tool and we would recommend UNDP to define a logical framework for the Plan with a clear link between the allocation of resources and the strategic goals of the organization. The current outline does not use well defined terminology, is open for interpretation and therefore gives the impression of an unclear conceptual structure. We would also encourage UNDP to work closely with UNFPA and other UN agencies to harmonize the approaches to strategic planning to enable comparability and simplify follow-up on results. The recent proposal of a Medium Term Strategic Plan by WHO could be a useful source of inspiration for other members in the UN Development Group. As for WHO, we welcome the approach by UNDP to include the total envelope of resources, both core and non-core resources, as part of the Plan.
We can support the suggested four focus areas of UNDP’ operations, namely: (i) Poverty reduction and the MDG’s, (ii) Democratic governance,(iii) Crises prevention and recovery, and (iv) Environment and sustainable development, but would like to emphasize that the functions UNDP will play in each area will differ. For example, UNEP should be the leading advocate and global policymaker in the field of environment, while UNDP should take on this role in democratic governance. In crises prevention and recovery UNDP should both perform a reinforced leadership function for the UN-system, building on the RC-system, and at the same time be a center of excellence in approaches and programmatic work in prevention and recovery. Although HIV/AIDS will not longer be a special focus area, UNDP has important contributions to make on HIV/AIDS in the other focus areas in many countries.
The approach, functions and value added of UNDP will also vary between countries, depending for instance on their income level. We support a continued high share of the resources allocated to the poorest countries and would like to see that emphasized in the Strategic Plan. UNDP most likely will also play an important role in middle income countries, but the functions and comparative advantage of UNDP there needs further clarification. We would also like to understand better what the function “development services” implies, as currently reflected in the document it gives a rather imprecise mandate.
Finally on this point, we would like to see an accountability framework included in the Plan, including monitoring and reporting results.
3. The Strategic Plans needs to include a strategic, clear and shared vision for the RC-system.The outline includes some indications of what is described as a “comprehensive package of measures to further enhance UNDP’s role as a manager of the Resident Coordinator System”. Some of them seem to relate more to UNDP’s operational work, than to the coordination function. In the next stage of this consultative process, these measures have to be more clearly defined and placed within an overall strategy for the Resident Coordinator system, that is shared by the entire UN system. We would urge UNDP to continue to consult closely with other UN agencies, funds and programmes and present the shared vision in the Draft Strategic Plan to be presented to the Board in June.
Finally, we would like to emphasize that we need to draw lessons from the old. The Board has asked for an assessment of both the current Multi-year Funding Framework and the programming arrangements as part of the exercise in determining the new Strategic Plan. Are there any initial findings that you can share with us at this moment?
We appreciate this opportunity to comment on the outline of the Strategic Plan and look forward to the continued consultations envisioned. I can assure you of Sweden’s constructive engagement in that process.
Thank you Mr. Chairman.