Within the framework of its Development Account Project on “Strengthening capacities of the public sector in least developed countries to deliver quality services equitably through the transfer and adaptation of innovative practices”, DPADM/UNDESA is organizing a study visit in order to expose the interested participants from the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) to the Bahrain’s National E-Government Programme.
The main purpose of the study tour, that will take place from 26 January to 1 February 2014 in the Kingdom of Bahrain, is to support the adaptation and implementation of e-government practices in LDCs through in-depth practical and hands-on learning experience.
While during the study tour participants will be familiarized with the entire E-Government strategy and programme of Bahrain, a special effort will be made to address specific interest of those LDCs which are particularly interested in some modules, such as e-procurement, payroll administration, health or education services, etc.
The International Workshop on e-Government Best Practices to be hosted by the Jordanian Ministry of ICT and jointly organized by UN DESA and UNESCWA will aim to provide a platform for senior level official from Arab region and across the world to disseminate best practices and discuss trends, achievement and challenges in implementing e-government initiatives. The event will take place in Amman, Jordan on 3-5 December.
Information and Communication technologies have had a significant impact on modernization of public administration and governance. Government electronic services have been developed not only to simplify government procedures and improve interaction with citizens, but also to create new governance models that would empower citizens and involve them in the decision-making process as well as increase transparency and accountability of governance.
Arab countries have all realized the importance of a well-conceived e-government strategy and have launched national e-government initiatives. They have placed a high priority on the development of e-government programs and mobilized human and financial resources for their implementation. In some Arab countries, the focus of e-government initiatives has shifted from the provision of services through one-stop-shop portals to more advanced concepts such as open data initiatives.
Recognizing the important role of UN DESA in advancing e-government agendas at the global and regional levels and building upon a successful cooperation on the organization of the UN Workshop on “Promoting Governance through Innovation and ICT” during the UNPSA 2013 in Manama, Kingdom of Bahrain, the ICT Division of the UN Economic Commission for Western Asia (UNESCWA) requested the cooperation of eGB/DPADM/UN DESA to jointly organize this “International Workshop in Promoting e-Government Best Practices”.
The event will be hosted by the Jordanian Ministry of ICT and organized jointly by UN DESA and UNESCWA. It will take place on 3-5 December, 2013 at UNESCWA Technology Center in Amman with over 60 participants expected to attend. The International Workshop will explore achievements and challenges faced by Arab countries in designing and implementing e-government best practices as they relate to the role of institutions and leaders, identify leadership capacity building needs and develop partnership for capacity building in the region.
It will run for three days and include 16 working sessions aiming at building capacities of funded and non-funded participants on the mechanisms to design, implement and ensure sustainability of online public service delivery through the exchange of ideas, experiences and best practices amongst and between Arab countries and other regions of the world. The end goal is to improve public service delivery, achieve the increased understanding and technical capacities of decision makers on the improvements in institutional framework needed to increase the level of e-government readiness. It will do so through the facilitation of an active dialogue between UN DESA, UNESCWA, invited experts, high level officials, representatives of international organizations, the business community and other stakeholders.
The “Expert Group Meeting for the Global Sustainable Development Report 2013 – Engaging National Assessments” will take place from 12 to 13 December in Beijing. It is co-sponsored by UN DESA and the Ministry of Science and Technology of the People’s Republic of China.
The meeting will open with statements by Under-Secretary-General Wu-Hongbo and the host country’s Vice Minister of Science and Technology, among others.
One of the functions of the High Level Political Forum on sustainable development (HLPF), which was inaugurated on 24 September 2013, is to strengthen the science-policy interface. This is to be done, among other things, by bringing together dispersed information and assessments, including in the form of a global sustainable development report, building on existing assessments, and enhancing evidence-based decision-making at all levels.
The Expert Group Meeting is intended to contribute to the work of the HLPF on the above issues. It will bring together leading scientists and experts involved in preparing national reports or related sustainable development assessments, in order to ensure that their research findings and analytical perspectives will be featured in the Global Sustainable Development Report. The modality of future collaboration among the experts will also be discussed during the meeting.
The 2013 ECOSOC Presidential Expert Meeting took place on 15-16 November at the Greentree Foundation in Manhasset, New York. The theme of the event was “The ECOSOC We Want: Renewing commitment, confronting new challenges”. The Meeting was convened by H.E. Néstor Osorio, President of ECOSOC, and organized by UN DESA’s Office for ECOSOC Support and Coordination.
The event brought together over 60 participants, including former ECOSOC Presidents, the current ECOSOC Bureau, Permanent Representatives, other representatives from Member States and experts, to discuss the way forward for ECOSOC after the adoption by the General Assembly of resolutions 67/290 on the High-level Political Forum and 68/1 on strengthening ECOSOC.
The opening session was devoted to defining the pressing development challenges to sustainable development in the social, economic and environment areas that would need to address, such as geo-political and geo-economic shifts, climate change, youth, women, the communications revolution, urbanization and migration, science and technology and inequality.
A number of key messages emerged from the four separate working groups:
Furthering engagements with national stakeholders
Discussions underlined that ECOSOC has to play a leading role in choosing relevant and attractive topics to a broad range of stakeholders, and that could attract participation from country capitals. The Council’s working methods and proceedings should therefore also be opened to include national stakeholders and move away from the current model that limits the participation of private sector, the scientific community, parliamentarians and civil society organizations.
Enhancing the integration of the three dimensions of sustainable development
Emphasis was placed on the critical role the newly created integration segment of the Council is to play in bringing better understanding on how daunting challenges can be addressed from all the three dimensions of sustainable development and making concrete recommendations for action. In this connection, the role of all stakeholders, including ECOSOC’s subsidiary bodies should be augmented. The two transition years of 2014-2015 represent an opportunity to gather experience that will be relevant for the post-2015 architecture and implementation.
Strengthening the links between normative and operational activities
There was a broad agreement that the operational activities role of ECOSOC should go beyond its conventional role by enhancing dialogue on issues of system-wide concerns such as the responsiveness of the United Nations Development Assistance Frameworks (UNDAFs), national ownership, effective utilization of funds and the functioning of the Resident Coordinator system. Participants stressed that ECOSOC could also provide space for dialogue on overall guidance of operational activities and thus give voice to Member States that may have difficulties effectively influencing discussions at the governing body level, and/or in regional groups.
Enhancing the Council’s monitoring capacity to promote greater accountability
Monitoring and accountability mechanisms for the post-2015 development agenda should be built into the design of the new development framework. They should engage a wide range of stakeholders, especially parliaments, in order to better link global to national accountability. Broad-based participation will also be critical in defining the scope of such accountability – for what and to whom – both at the global and national levels. National reviews should continue to be carried out in the medium and long term to allow sufficient time to measure and monitor implementation.
The way forward
The new institutional architecture for this vision built on the Council, the General Assembly and the high-level political forum, all acting in unison, offers a historical opportunity. It is imperative to bring to them the relevant policymakers and experts so that their outcomes can become more effective. Working through the transition in 2014-2015, as the transformative development agenda beyond 2015 is finalized, requires moving beyond the process – to action and implementation. Systems can be modified as necessary to ensure that they remain fit and effective.
For more information on the work of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), browse the Council’s website.
New e-Government platforms and networks are dramatically changing the decision-making systems, business models and public service delivery mechanisms in both developed and developing countries. All this growing demand for ICT goods and services in the public and private sectors can potentially leverage the consolidation of improved governance, thus becoming the backbone of sustainable development through efficient public administration. On 26-27 November, the E-xperience Conference was held in Bogotá, Colombia, also featuring the launch of the Centre for Innovation on e-Government Development.
The Ministry of Information and Communication Technologies of Colombia (MINTIC) has signed a Project Document with UNDP, having the e-Government Branch, Division for Public Administration and Development Management of UN DESA providing substantive support and implementing over 70% of all activities. The Project is the result of a specific request from the Colombian Government to UN DESA, having a budget of more than US$ 800,000 a year provided by Colombia.
The Project has been designed to benefit other countries in the region and globally, based on the principles created and disseminated by the UN e-Government Survey prepared by UN DESA. It also represents a new reference for innovative cooperation between Colombia, UN DESA and UNDP, having benefitted from significant constructive support from the UN Office of Legal Affairs (OLA) and the Capacity Development Office (CDO) of UN DESA.
The first major output of this partnership was the E-xperience Conference held in Bogotá on 26-27 November. The Conference launched the Centre for Innovation on e-Government Development, a pioneer initiative on a global scale. E-xperience will also discuss knowledge management aspects on how to leapfrog advancements in e-Government development to modernize government in terms of effectiveness, efficiency, transparency and inclusiveness. A series of countries already confirmed their presence and support to E-xperience, including Azerbaijan, Brazil, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Egypt, El Salvador, Guatemala, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, among others.
Following Russia ICT Day, organized by the World Bank in cooperation with Russia in Washington DC, a delegation of 42 high-level officials from the Russian Federation visited UN DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) on 15 November, for a presentation on the United Nations e-Government Development Index (EGDI).
The Russian Federation has made significant progress in e-government development since 2010, both in absolute terms and relative to other countries, with a notable jump in its global ranking between 2010 (59th place) and 2012 (27th place). The gain can be attributed to: (a) a doubling in availability of government e-services; and (b) an increase in the number of Internet users (from 21% to 43% of the population) and fixed broadband subscriptions (from 3% to 11% of the population).
According to the World Bank, Russia has 76 million Internet users and an e-commerce turnover of $13 billion a year. The country’s e-government performance has reached the EU average, despite the challenges of a large population and vast geography. Its ICT industry boasts world-leading brands in the IT sector, fuelled by over 60,000 graduates in Science, Engineering and Mathematics each year.
To some extent, Russia has struggled with e-government development. The “Electronic Russia” programme (2002-2012) was an ambitious 9-year effort deemed by some observers to have been unsuccessful. Currently, Russia is pursuing an “Information Society State Programme” (2011-2020) with the aim of providing Russians with enhanced access to broadband Internet, developing the ICT sector, promoting Internet safety, and simplifying interaction between citizens and the State through e-government.
DPADM gave several presentations on the 2014 e-Government Survey, Capacity Development, Open Government Data, Public Service Awards and Forum, and Innovation Transfer followed by Q& As on the ways to improve e-Government performance on federal and local levels in the country and bring the benefits of the information society to all citizens.
Within the margins of the visit, Thomas Gass, DESA’s Assistant Secretary-General for Policy Coordination and Inter-Agency Affairs, met with the Minister of Communications and Mass Media of the Russian Federation, Mr. Nikolai Nikiforov, Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation to the United Nations, Mr. Vitaly Churkin and other high level officials and DPADM staff members.
Discussions were held on the future cooperation of UN DESA and Russian Government in the field of ICT and its use to enhance service delivery for public administration. It was agreed that Russian Government will invite DPADM Advisors to assess e-Government performance and provide guidance and recommendations on how the Government can overall improve public service delivery, bridge the digital divide, implement whole-of-government approach, greater use of social media and open government.
UN DESA’s Division for Social Policy and Development (UN Focal Point on Ageing) will convene an Expert Group Meeting (EGM) on Neglect, Abuse and Violence of Older Women on 5-7 November 2013 in New York.
One of the key areas for further action identified by Member States in the recent review and appraisal of the Madrid International Plan of Action on Ageing in 2012 was violence and abuse against older persons. While this issue affects all older persons, the particular vulnerability of older women is apparent in prevalence rates. Indeed, research paints a bleak global picture on the human rights of older women, who suffer from multiple discrimination based on age and gender. In addition, research points to inadequate legal protections at both the national and international levels where older women are often invisible and hence, overlooked.
In this context, the meeting aims to inform the debate on neglect, abuse and violence against older women by addressing urgent and relevant issues in assessment and current prevention measures, as well as consideration of possible new identification and prevention measures.
The EGM will also explore the various definitions, forms, prevalence and risk factors of neglect, abuse and violence against older women and explore the institutional and societal attitudes that lead to the lack of inclusion of older women in policies, programmes and debates on violence against women.
The Office of National Statistics and the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs of the United Kingdom will host the 19th meeting of the London Group on Environmental Economic Accounting on 12-14 November in London, UK.
Experts in environmental economic accounts and supporting statistics from countries and international/regional organizations will review and discuss training and compilation materials for the implementation of the System of Environmental Economic Accounting (SEEA). Topics to be discussed include, among others, water accounts, energy accounts, air emission accounts, forest accounts and, land and ecosystem accounts.
UN DESA’s Statistics Division will convene an Expert Group Meeting on Modelling Approaches and Tools for Testing of the SEEA Experimental Ecosystem Accounting from 18 to 20 November in New York City.
During the meeting experts in measuring, modeling and mapping characteristics of ecosystem condition as well as ecosystem services will discuss models and tools to be used in pilot research and testing of the SEEA Experimental Ecosystem Accounting (EEA) framework. The meeting is aimed to bring together technical experts, pilot country representatives from national statistical offices and environmental agencies as well as international agencies to discuss the approaches available for quantifying ecosystem condition and ecosystem services at a national level. It will focus on models and tools for accounting for biodiversity, carbon, and water ecosystems (quality characteristics as well as quantity considerations). Tools and models will be reviewed based on criteria for their applicability in the context of national policy priorities and the SEEA EEA, with the objective of selecting some of these models for use in the pilot country research and testing.
UN DESA’s Statistics Division will convene an Expert Group Meeting on the Guidelines for the Compilation of Water Accounts and Statistics from 20 to 22 November in New York.
Experts in environmental-economic accounts for water and water statistics from countries and international/regional organizations will meet to review and discuss the guidelines, which will provide country experts and trainers with a comprehensive and reliable set of materials for assisting the staff of national statistics offices, water ministries, and agencies and other stakeholders in countries, with the process of implementation of water accounts and statistics for developing a monitoring system for water policies.
The UN Forum on Forests (UNFF) Secretariat is holding the first screening of the 5 winning films of the Forests Short Films Contest “Forest for People” at UN Headquarters on 1 October. They feature stories of forests and people from Peru to South Africa.
The UNFF Secretariat partnered with the Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival to honor the creative efforts of film makers who capture dynamic and unique relationship between forests and the people who depend on them. This year’s Film Festival was for short films of five minutes or less. The winning films present a vision of forests through the eyes of Amazonian animals, young children and veteran charcoal burners.
In total, 128 entries from 38 countries competed to win at the prestigious Festival. Each entry shared a unique story of how forests inspire and contribute to our lives. An international jury, consisting of lauded practitioners and UN experts awarded 5 films.
As discussions of the priorities of the next development agenda take root, the International Forests Short Film Festival hopes to serve as inspiration for transformational change with Sustainable Development at its heart.
The screening will take place in UN Headquarters, room S-2723, from 1:15-2:15 pm. Seats are limited. To attend, please RSVP by sending an e-mail to forests@un.org
DESA’s Statistics Division will convene the 24th meeting of Interagency and Expert Group Meeting on MDG indicators (IAEG-MDG), in Geneva, Switzerland, from 16 to 19 October 2013.
The IAEG-MDG has been responsible for data development, compilation and analysis for the assessment of trends in MDG indicators. The Group includes the UN Secretariat, a number of UN agencies, as well as national experts from statistical offices concerned with the development of data for MDGs. The 24th meeting will review the on-going and planned activities related to MDG monitoring by various UN agencies, and discuss the plans for the upcoming MDG reports. The group will also explore the lessons learned from MDG monitoring at national and regional levels.
The ninth session of the Committee of Experts on International Cooperation in Tax Matters will be held from 21 to 25 October at the Palais des Nations in Geneva.
The meeting will discuss, inter alia, issues related to the next update of the United Nations Model Double Taxation Convention between Developed and Developing Countries, including various issues related to the concept of “permanent establishment” (Article 5), the meaning of “auxiliary activities” under Article 8 (Transportation), the “force of attraction” principle in Article 7, the Commentary to Article 9 (Associated Enterprises), Article 12 on Royalties, and Exchange of Information (Article 26). The Committee will also discuss cross-cutting issues under the UN Model, such as taxation of services and interaction of the Model with climate change mechanisms.
Other issues on the agenda of the session include work towards the next update of the United Nations Practical Manual on Transfer Pricing for Developing Countries, foreign direct investment issues and corporate taxation, including resource taxation issues for developing countries, and capacity development.
As this will be the first session of the new Membership of the Committee, a Chairperson and other Officers will be elected at the beginning of the session. Establishment of Subcommittees and appointment of their Coordinators will also be decided on during the course of the session.
DESA’s Statistics Division is organising the UN Expert Group Meeting on Revising the Principles and Recommendations for Population and Housing Censuses. It will be held from 29 October – 1 November in New York.
The main purpose of the meeting is to lay down the framework for the revised set of international principles and recommendations for population and housing censuses in the 2020 round censuses, that will take place from 2015 to 2024, The experts will take stock of the experiences in conducting population and housing censuses in the 2010 round and adopt an outline for the revision, as well as distributing specific tasks related to the preparation of the content of the recommendations among themselves. The revised Principles and Recommendations for Population and Housing Censuses: the 2020 Round will be the major international statistical standard guiding the work on population and housing censuses in 2020 round.
Wednesday, Sept 4 the Development Strategy and Policy Analysis (DSP) unit of UN DESA-DPAD organised a seminar in the Development Policy Seminar series, during which Mr. Syed Nazrul Islam, PhD Harvard, Senior Economic Affairs Officer with DSP, presented a recent paper on China.
The paper asked whether or not China can successfully overcome the ‘middle-income trap’. Mr Pingfan Hong, the Acting Director of UN DESA-DPAD was the discussant and Mr. Willem van der Geest, Chief of DSP moderated.
With per capita income of $ 5445 in 2011 China has confirmed its place among the middle income group of countries with ranges from $1,026 to $12,475 in 2011. Some analysts have expressed a concern that factors like the high level of income inequality, China’s household registration system known as “Hukou” and others may ‘trap’ China from transcending from the middle income category. Mr. Islam discussed different perspectives on the middle income trap. He contrasted Kharas and Kohli’s (2011) perspectives with that of Lin (2012) and noted that these authors agree on the necessity of a more equitable income distribution as a pre-condition for avoidance of the middle income trap.
Mr. Islam also contrasted China’s record regarding inequality with that of Japan, South Korea, and others. Mr. Islam further questioned whether, “Is it the only thing we want from China – to follow the route of previously developed countries? Should we be so hung up on this middle- to high-income transition or should we apply to a different paradigm?” In his discussion Mr. Hong pointed out the need to explore further the causes of the high income inequality in China. He observed the heterogeneity of the countries in the middle income group – some natural resource rich, others with large labour resources. He noted the technology gap. For China, he emphasised the importance of continued economic, social and institutional reforms as well as making sure that the price of environmental resources reflect their true costs.
An expert group meeting is convened in New York on 10-11 September in preparation for the 52nd session of the Commission for Social Development. This meeting should provide suggestions on how to advance the empowerment of people.
In its resolution 2012/7, the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations decided that the priority theme for the 2013-2014 review and policy cycle of the Commission for Social Development would be “Promoting empowerment of people in achieving poverty eradication, social integration and full employment and decent work for all”. The 52nd session of the Commission will take place in February 2014 and should agree on a policy outcome (i.e. a resolution) on this priority theme
The outcomes of the expert group meeting will constitute an important input for the work of the Commission, particularly by providing concrete, evidence-based suggestions for the formulation of strategies that have been shown to advance the empowerment of people. The expert group meeting will also be of use to suggest topics that the Commission, within its mandate, should take up in the years ahead. Taking into account that the international community is in the process of defining its future development agenda, the outcomes of the meeting should inform such process of the implications of empowerment for the design of the agenda.
The expert group meeting aims to facilitate the deliberations of the Commission for Social Development on a policy outcome on the promotion of the empowerment of people by undertaking a comprehensive review of policies and strategies that create an enabling environment for the empowerment of individuals and social groups and that enhance their capacity to effectively participate in all spheres of life, including in decision-making. It will highlight challenges, good practices and lessons learned. It should further put forth concrete, evidence-based recommendations for the formulation of policies at the national, regional and international levels.
The DESA Statistics Division (UNSD) is organizing the 7th meeting of the Inter-agency and Expert Group on Gender Statistics (IAEG-GS) in New York from 12 to 13 September.
The meeting will bring together representatives from national statistical offices, international agencies and Regional Commissions to review global work on gender statistics. The objectives of the meeting are to review the work of the Advisory Group on Emerging Issues, discuss the Minimum Set of Gender Indicators and update the members on capacity building efforts in gender statistics through a continued dialogue on the coordination of gender statistics activities.
The 8th meeting of the Oslo Group will be held in Baku, Azerbaijan, on 24-27 September and will be hosted by the State Statistical Committee of Azerbaijan.
The meeting will gather experts in energy statistics from countries and international/regional organizations to discuss issues in energy statistics and advance concepts and methods. This meeting of the Oslo Group will focus on the review of the complete draft of the Energy Statistics Compilers Manual (ESCM) which is being prepared to support the implementation of the International Recommendations for Energy Statistics (IRES) and the System of Environmental-Economic Accounting for Energy (SEEA-Energy). It will also discuss future directions of the city group.
The fourth working session of the working group took place from 12-15 August, and saw an increased number of Member States taking part and offering perspectives and positions. Also noteworthy was the level and quality of interventions.
There is some consensus amongst Member States of the shortcomings that exist when it comes to the enjoyment by older persons of their human rights, and broad agreement on the overall analysis of the situation of the human rights of older persons and the urgent need for improvement. Member States hold a range of views on how to address these shortcomings. Some are of the view that there the existing international normative framework provides adequate protection of older persons, but implementation, monitoring and accountability fall short of delivering these rights. Others hold the view that a legally binding instrument which would consolidate and provide clarity on the application of all existing rights to older persons is necessary to collate and is a necessary to achieve their economic and social integration and protect them from abuse and discrimination.
The Fourth Working Session revisited some specific rights such as the right to social protection, the right to health, the right to work as well as various dimensions of age discrimination.
The Session also discussed the regional findings of the second review and appraisal of the Madrid International Plan of Action on Ageing (2012) on the promotion and protection of human rights and dignity of older.
An update was provided on three ongoing regional processes: the drafting of a Protocol to the African Charter on the Rights of Older Persons; the elaboration of a Council of Europe recommendation on the human rights of older persons and; the project of a Pan-American convention on the promotion an protection of the rights of older persons.
For the first time, the Open-ended Working Group on ageing also held an interactive dialogue with representatives of civil society in attendance.
Member States put forward a number of proposals for consideration by, and in support of the work of the Working Group. The formation of a cross-regional Group of Friends of Older Persons was announced during the closing debate. It aims at building on discussions of the Working Group and transforming them into concrete actions. The Group of Friends also intends to focus discussions to further the dignity and rights of older persons beyond the annual session of the Working Group by generating dialogue across the UN system including agencies and subsidiary bodies among others.
The Open-ended Working Group on Ageing, established to strengthen the protection of the human rights of older persons, will hold its fourth session on 12-15 August 2013 in New York.
The working group, established by the General Assembly in its resolution 65/182 aims at considering the existing international framework of the human rights of older persons and identify possible gaps and how to best address them, including by considering, as appropriate, the feasibility of further instruments and measures.
The fourth session is open to representatives of Member States of the United Nations, representatives of organizations of the United Nations system and observers of intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations, which have been accredited.
A programme of work, an agenda and a list of speakers will be posted on the Open-ended Working Group’s website before the meeting commences. In addition, a compilation of existing international legal instruments, documents and programmes that address the human rights situation of older persons, inputs from Member States, the UN system and civil society organizations as well as modalities for participation of NGOs can be found on the website.
The Open-ended Working Group’s session will be in a similar format than the previous sessions. Interactive expert panel discussions will be followed by an interactive dialogue. It will take place at UN headquarters in conference room 3.
The 10th UN Regional Cartographic Conference for the Americas (UNRCC-A) will be held from 19 to 23 August at the United Nations Headquarters in New York
The theme of this conference will be “United Nations Global Geospatial Information Management and the Americas, addressing global challenges through geospatial information”. This meeting provides a regional forum where government officials, planners, scientists and experts from the Americas and other regions meet to address their common needs, problems and experiences in the field of surveying and mapping, cartography, hydrography, remote sensing, land and geospatial information systems.
The objectives of this conference are numerous. First, it aims at receiving reports on the work being done to advance geospatial information management and assess the status of the resolutions adopted at the Ninth United Nations Regional Cartographic Conference for the Americas. It is also an opportunity for conference delegates to share experiences, knowledge and best practices on geospatial information management (GIM) at all levels. It will allow representatives from Member States to gain greater understanding of the relevance and work of the United Nations Global Geospatial Information Management (UN-GGIM) Committee of Experts, GIM issues being addressed in addition to the strategic direction and related program of work. Finally, it will help Member States and supporting stakeholders to identify existing and new opportunities for increased regional and global collaborations aimed at advancing GIM for sustained economic development of the Americas.
Speakers from 16 Member States and eight international geospatial information organizations will be addressing the following topics: strategy, policy, economic and institutional issues; spatially enabling government; geospatial data collection, management and dissemination; best practices and applications; and climate change and disaster risk reduction.
The Intergovernmental committee of experts on sustainable development financing will hold its first meeting from 28-30 August at UN Headquarters in New York.
At the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (or Rio+20) in June 2012, Heads of State and Government recognized the need for significant mobilization of resources from a variety of sources and the effective use of financing, in order to give strong support to developing countries in their efforts to promote sustainable development.
They agreed to establish an intergovernmental process under the auspices of the General Assembly, to assess financing needs, consider the effectiveness, consistency and synergies of existing instruments and frameworks, and evaluate additional initiatives, with a view to preparing a report proposing options on an effective sustainable development financing strategy. The strategy is to facilitate the mobilization of resources and their effective use in achieving sustainable development objectives.
An intergovernmental committee, comprising 30 experts nominated by regional groups, with equitable geographical representation, has been tasked to implement this process, concluding its work by 2014. The committee is expected to draw on technical support from the UN system, and to conduct its work in open and broad consultation with relevant international and regional financial institutions and other relevant stakeholders.
The committee was established on 21 June 2013 with the adoption of General Assembly decision 67/559 which defines the membership of the committee.
In partnership with the Center for Electronic Governance at UN University IIST (UNU), DESA is organizing a 3-days Expert Group Meeting (EGM) from 3-5 July 2013 in Geneva on Governance, Public Administration and Information & Communication Technologies for Post 2015 Development.
The objective of the Meeting is to widen the United Nations’ thinking on governance as an enabler for Post-2015 development by exploring and identifying issues and challenges facing both governments and citizens in their quest towards sustainable development. The EGM will invite experts in a variety of disciplines to explore state-of-the-art approaches to governance and public administration which, underpinned by effective, transparent, accountable and responsive institutions, can contribute to the integrated governance framework for pursuing sustainable development by the world community. In doing so, the EGM will also focus on how technology-enabled governance can be leveraged by the public sector to add value to the functioning of institutions for the achievement of the Post-2015 Development Agenda.
The Meeting will review governance and public administration paradigms, and assess conceptual and methodological approaches to better understand the key dimensions of governance to support sustainable development during the Post-2015 era. The EGM discussions will pave the way forward for integrating governance and technology-enabled governance in the discussions of the UN Post-2015 Development Agenda, and inform the work of UNDESA on the Post-2015 UN Development Agenda.
A Technical Meeting on Measuring Asset Ownership from a Gender Perspective will take place from 30 July – 2 August in Bangkok, Thailand
Organized by the Evidence and Data for Gender Equality (EDGE) project, DESA’s Statistics Division (UNSD) and UN Women, this meeting will bring together around 30 experts including survey statisticians and gender specialists from selected countries, partner agencies and regional commissions to discuss how to measure asset ownership at the individual level. More precisely, participants will: (a) review and discuss the draft Technical Report on Collecting Sex-Disaggregated Asset Data presenting the proposed methodology to collect individual-level asset data through a dedicated module attached to a multi-purpose national household survey; (b) share national practices on measuring asset ownership; and (c) discuss the project implementation strategy in selected pilot countries.
The Eighth Meeting of the United Nations Committee of Experts on Environmental-Economic Accounting (UNCEEA) will be held in New York on 20-21 June
The United Nations Committee of Experts on Environmental-Economic Accounting (UNCEEA) is composed of representatives from national statistical offices and international agencies, and provides strategic vision and direction to environmental-economic accounting and related statistics.
The Eighth UNCEEA meeting will discuss proposals leading to a medium-term programme of work for the UNCEEA, which would envisage two main streams of work: one focusing on the implementation of the SEEA Central Framework and the process to advance its research agenda; the second focusing on the testing and experimentation of the SEEA Experimental Ecosystem Accounting and advancing the related research agenda.
The meeting will also discuss the role of the UNCEEA in the process of the post-2015 development agenda, the SEEA communication strategy, emerging issues related to the SEEA, and be informed on the international initiatives on indicators and progress made in SEEA Agriculture and environment statistics.
The United Nations Public Service Forum, Day and Awards Ceremony will take place in Manama, the Kingdom of Bahrain on 24-27 June
Focusing on the theme of “Transformative e-Government and Innovation: Creating a Better Future for All”, the Forum is organized by DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) in partnership with the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), and the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (UN ESCWA), in collaboration with the hosting Government of the Kingdom of Bahrain.
Within the theme of the forum, a number of workshops will be arranged as outlined below.
“Fostering Participation in the Context of The Post-2015 Development Agenda”
This workshop is jointly organized by DESA and the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) and it will explore the challenges, trends, innovative practices, and capacity development tools to foster participatory governance with a particular focus on the Arab region.
The goal of the workshop is to enhance knowledge and build a shared understanding among governance actors of what strategies, practices and tools Member States can adopt to conduct a self-assessment with respect to the engagement of citizen in managing development in their respective countries.
These tools will also assist in fostering participation to accelerate the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals and meet the challenges of sustainable development in the post 2015 context including disparities and inequalities, extreme poverty, food security, governance and climate change. To this end, the UN Secretariat has developed a citizen engagement self-assessment questionnaire (CESAQ) that will be shared with Workshop participants.
Expert Group Meeting on the “Transformative Power of e-Government: Innovative Ideas and Practical Tools for the Post-2015 Development Agenda”
The e-Government Branch of DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) is organizing an Expert Group Meeting on the “Transformative Power of e-Government: Innovative Ideas and Practical Tools for the Post-2015 Development Agenda”.
The purpose of the meeting, gathering some 15 experts from around the world, is to provide a forum for discussion to allow them to provide recommendations for DPADM on the formulation of a e-government self-assessment Toolkit.
The purpose of the Toolkit is to help Member States (a) self-identify the steps they need to take to enhance their e-government and hence to transform their government so as that it is more efficient, effective, transparent and open, accountable, participatory and citizen-centric, and (b) provide guidance on how to effectively design and implement an e-governance strategy and roadmap to promote economic, social and sustainable development through progress in key e-governance areas.
“Promoting Collaborative eGovernance through Innovation and ICTs”
The UN Capacity Development Workshop on “Promoting Collaborative eGovernance through Innovation and ICTs” will aim to provide a platform for senior level official from Arab region and across the world, to discuss trends and challenges in e-government of 21st century.
Through an integrated approach of academic overview and in practice implementation, coupled with sharing of experiences and in depth discussions, it will aim to provide guidance on how the government can be enabled to tackle the issues and provide better public services to their citizens through collaborative governance systems in an open and participatory manner.
The main objectives will be to (i) share experiences and lessons learned, (ii) debate emerging issues of e-government development as defined in our flagship publication of UN e-government Survey 2012 focused on whole of government approach (iii) discuss the institutional framework models (iv) provide recommendations on institutional capacity building for e-government officials to respond to an ever changing and challenging environment of innovations in technology.
In this regard, the workshop will focus on two inter-linking issues: (i) the challenges and opportunities of whole of government collaborative approaches and (ii) the challenges of public administration across the world to increase their level of interoperability by leveraging on new technologies and innovation.
“Transforming public service delivery to advance gender equality”
In a context where austerity measures, conflict and development challenges of various natures threaten to stall or reverse progress on gender equality, it is critical to safeguard investment in gender equality, enhance efforts in promoting gender-responsive service delivery, and strengthen accountability and capacity for gender equality commitments.
The UN Women workshop on “Transforming public service delivery to advance gender equality” will provide a platform for dialogue and experience sharing among civil servants. Over a 2-day meeting representatives of Finance Ministries, planning ministries, sector ministries, local governments and civil society organizations will examine good practices, gaps and challenges in women’s access to public services and make recommendations for the way forward.
Capacity-Building Workshop “Transfer and adaptation of innovative practices for improved public service delivery in LDCs”
The Public Administration Capacity Building Branch of DESA is organizing, within the framework of the 2013 United Nations Public Service Forum, a capacity-building workshop on “Transfer and adaptation of innovative practices for improved public service delivery in LDCs”.
The workshop brings together some 25 -30 trainees from interested least developed countries and will offer a platform for selected public sector managers to increase awareness of the innovations available for important areas of service delivery.
Specifically, the workshop will serve as a working space for networking and for exchanging ideas, knowledge and strategies on the ways to design and implement efficient, equitable and responsive delivery systems. It is expected to make recommendations, what specific innovations are to be transferred and adapted, as well as what countries would participate in the subsequent practitioner-to-practitioner knowledge transfer workshops.
The 12th session of the UN Committee of Experts on Public Administration will be held at United Nations Headquarters from 15 to 19 April
At UN Headquarters recently, DESA’s Under-Secretary-General Wu Hongbo highlighted the crucial role of public administration in reaching the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and the post 2015 development agenda. “We want to acknowledge the significant task of public administration, which is vital for sustainable development”, Mr. Wu said.
His statement to the 12th Session of the United Nations Committee of Experts on Public Administration (CEPA), which took place on 15 to 19 April, on the theme “The role of responsive and accountable public governance in achieving the Millennium Development Goals and the post-2015 development agenda”, highlighted the relevance of challenges facing public administration, especially in the creation of a favorable environment to foster economic growth, social cohesion and environmental protection – the three pillars of sustainable development.
He also acknowledged the work of the 24 experts of the Committee, who had gathered from more than 20 countries to participate in the session. Mr. Wu said that DESA wanted to highlight the efforts of those serving in the UN Public Service, and “looks forward to further collaboration in building pathways to reach the internationally agreed development goals”.
Opening the Committee’s session a few days earlier, ECOSOC President Néstor Osorio also underscored the importance of a citizen-centric approach and the vital role of public administration in these efforts. He emphasized the possibilities brought on by rapid technological advancements. “We are given an opportunity to listen to people and to partner in sustainable development on an unprecedented scale,” he said, mentioning initiatives promoting e-participation, e-governance and e-services.
“Governments are increasing efficiency and transparency by providing more information online, simplifying administrative procedures, and streamlining bureaucratic functions. As of today, some 25 per cent of the 193 United Nations Member States have embarked on Open Government Data initiatives,” Mr. Osorio said.
Established by the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), CEPA is responsible for supporting the work of ECOSOC concerning the promotion and development of public administration and governance among Member States, in advancing the United Nations Development Agenda. Meeting once a year, it also provides guidance to DESA’s Division of Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM), through an annual review of its work programme.
In connection with the recent ECOSOC Youth Forum, UN Youth Envoy Ahmad Alhendawi, Mashable’s Chief Marketing Officer Stacy Martinet and Founder of boo-box Marco Gomes, shared their thoughts on how to empower youth to be future innovators
“Everyone has a share in making the world a better place,” said the Secretary-General’s Envoy on Youth Ahmad Alhendawi, as he spoke with DESA in connection with ECOSOC’s Youth Forum held on 27 March. Mr. Alhendawi also described the close connection between young people and science, technology and social media, saying “young people are not just the consumers of these applications, they are the innovators and they are the people that are paving the way for more innovations to come”.
When talking about some of the measures young people can take to change the world, Mr. Alhendawi pointed to the possibilities of new technologies, enabling us to connect. He also underscored the importance of moving from virtual to real. “I think young people hold the potential to do that, and they should really believe in themselves and believe that it is not about changing everything always. It is about starting something new, small ventures, a new enterprise,” he said.
“The opportunities are endless,” said Mashable’s Chief Marketing Officer Stacy Martinet, sharing her advice for today’s youth and describing the prospects brought on by the age of digital media and the rapid pace of innovations in technology. “They should take their ideas and creativity and start working on things that are important,” she said, also underscoring the power of social media as a way to connect, collaborate and to help transform societies.
“To use science and technology to change the world, the most important thing is prepare yourself, educate yourself,” said Marco Gomes, Founder of boo-box, emphasizing the need to be very well prepared before starting on such an endeavor. “Pay attention to what’s around you. Your community, your city, your country – they are full of opportunities,” Mr. Gomes said, adding encouragingly, “the world needs true innovation that improves people’s lives.”
Highlighting the role of the United Nations, Ms. Martinet said, “places like the UN and national and local governments are really also empowered to support young people who want to get involved (…) I think this is an exciting moment to do more for young people.” This is something which was also echoed by the UN’s newly appointed Youth Envoy Ahmad Alhendawi. “I am very much optimistic that in my office and with my mandate, I will be able to use and leverage all different tools that we have to reach out to young people and make them closer to the United Nations,” Mr. Alhendawi said.
Mr. Alhendawi, Ms. Martinet and Mr. Gomes are all supporting the work of ECOSOC, bringing the voices of youth into the important discussions and decisions of the Council ahead of its annual meeting in Geneva in July, as well as its major online campaign, “Innovate Your Future”, on Facebook and Thunderclap. The campaign seeks worldwide support to help empower youth and shape future innovators.
Share ideas with ECOSOC on how to leverage science, technology and culture to create a better world: http://bit.ly/InnovateYourFuture
DESA’s Financing for Development Office (FfDO) is organizing an expert group meeting on the taxation of the extractive industry on 28 May
Taking place at UN Headquarters, the event is organized with the view to identifying pressing issues for developing countries in this area and to informing the work of the Committee of Experts on International Cooperation in Tax Matters during its next annual session (Geneva, 21-25 October 2013).
The meeting will bring together invited representatives from national tax authorities, experts from international financial organizations, as well as representatives from non-governmental organizations and the private sector.
Together they will discuss the impact of the extractive industry on national and international tax policy and administration. In light of the upcoming launch of the UN Practical Manual on Transfer Pricing for Developing Countries, there will also be discussions on the nexus between transfer pricing and the taxation of the extractive industries. The final session will focus on lessons learned in building capability in resource tax policy and administration.
8th Meeting of the Advisory Expert Group on National Accounts will take place in Luxembourg on 28-31 May
The Advisory Expert Group on National Accounts (AEG) has been established to assist the Inter-secretariat Working Group on National Accounts (ISWGNA) in resolving issues on the research agenda of the System of National Accounts (SNA), identifying emerging research issues, and assisting the ISWGNA in the review of the SNA implementation programme.
The composition of the AEG reflects the global community representing all regions in the world and comprises 16 members (not including the five representatives of the members of the ISWGNA, Eurostat, IMF, OECD, UN and WB). The main purpose of this meeting is to consider guidance on issues related to the implementation of the SNA, such as financial output, global production, delineation of head offices, holding companies and special purpose entities, pension entitlements, stability fees, treatment of freight and insurance in the 2008 SNA, and the SDMX initiative.
Google+ Hangout arranged on 26 March highlights successes of the Major Groups and other stakeholders at the Rio+20 Conference
As part of the ongoing follow-up of the Rio+20 UN Conference on Sustainable Development, DESA’s Division for Sustainable Development hosted a Google+ Hangout on 26 March that highlighted the successes of the Major Groups and other stakeholders at the Rio+20 Conference.
The hangout explored the views of civil society on the positive and concrete outcomes of the conference, and the Major Groups’ ongoing follow up of the conference.
Panellists featured Corinne Woods, Director of the UN Millennium Campaign; Chantal Line Carpentier, Major Groups Programme Coordinator at DESA’s Division for Sustainable Development; Farooq Ullah, Director of Stakeholder Forum for a Sustainable Future; Maruxa Cardama, Former Secretary General of the Network of Regional Governments for Sustainable Development (NRG4SD); Jeffery Huffines, Organizing Partner of the NGO Major Group. The discussion was moderated by John Romano, Social Media Focal Point for DESA’s Division for Sustainable Development.
The UN System Task Team on the Post-2015 UN Development Agenda just released its second report ‘A renewed global partnership for development’ and a Facebook chat will be arranged on 4 April, providing an opportunity to discuss and engage with the authors of the report
Following its first report ‘Realizing the future we want for all’, which provided initial thinking on potential dimensions and contours of a renewed global development agenda, the UN System Task Team on the Post-2015 UN Development Agenda just published its second report.
Focusing on the global partnership, the report ‘A renewed global partnership for development’, provides a set of recommendations on the potential format and dimensions of a global partnership for the post-2015 era, including the establishment of robust mutual accountability systems.
The global partnership for development, as crystallized in Millennium Development Goal 8 has played a crucial role in galvanizing international support for development. But the world is not the same as it was in 2000. Many pressing issues of a global nature have emerged in recent years, which require true collective action from all countries to create an enabling environment for development.
Such a renewed global partnership for development to underpin any post-2015 development agenda must be broader in scope and deeper than the current one. While existing commitments, as reflected in MDG 8 remain highly relevant, new thinking is needed on how to reflect pressing development challenges and the increasing importance of a large array of stakeholders engaged in development cooperation. In order to ensure coherence and effective coordination a robust mutual accountability mechanism will be needed all levels.
A Facebook chat on 4 April will offer the opportunity to discuss key findings of the report directly with the authors. It will also provide a chance to learn more about the future global partnership for development. Ask UN experts your questions and sign up to join the event on 4 April from 9:00 – 11:00 am EDT.
The United Nations Committee of Experts on Public Administration (CEPA) will meet in New York on 15-19 April
Established by the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), the Committee is comprised of 24 members who meet annually at UN Headquarters in New York. It is responsible for supporting the work of ECOSOC concerning the promotion and development of public administration and governance among Member States, in connection with the UN Millennium Development Goals.
In addition, the Committee also provides programmatic guidance to DESA’s Division of Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM), including the annual review of its work programme.
Since its conversion from a Group into a full-fledged Committee in 2001, CEPA has been meeting annually to provide guidelines on public administration issues related to the implementation of the internationally agreed development goals (IADGs), including the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
It has also reported to ECOSOC on the governance and public administration dimensions of sustainable socio-economic development, particularly focusing on the themes of human capital development, participatory governance, capacity development in crisis and post-conflict countries, and innovations in public administration and governance, among others.
A Development Cooperation Forum Special Policy Dialogue will take place on 23 April to discuss how the post-2015 development agenda can best draw upon the important contributions of philanthropic organizations to development
In collaboration with UNDP, the OECD Global Network of Foundations Working for Development (netFWD) and the Worldwide Initiative for Grantmaker Support (WINGS), DESA is organizing this special ECOSOC event on the role of philanthropy in development cooperation.
Building on the first such meeting held in preparation for the 2012 DCF, the Dialogue will identify ways to scale up innovative approaches to philanthropic engagement in development cooperation through strategic partnerships with governments and other development actors.
The one-day meeting aims to generate inputs for the ongoing preparations for a post-2015 development agenda and for the 2014 Development Cooperation Forum. It will specifically inform DCF High-level Symposia on the renewed global partnership for development and on the future of international development cooperation in the post-2015 setting. A global e-discussion will precede the event.
The policy dialogue will bring practitioners from philanthropic organizations together with senior representatives from United Nations Member States, as part of an ongoing effort to encourage strategic partnerships and collaboration. All are invited to participate on 23 April.
The Special Policy Dialogue will take place one the day prior to the ECOSOC Partnerships event on “Partnering for innovation solutions for sustainable development” on 24 April, geared towards the theme of the 2013 annual ministerial review.
In preparation for its 12th session, members and the Secretariat of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues met in Brazzaville, Republic of Congo on 11 – 15 March
Hosted by the Government of Congo and opened with a statement from the President, H.E. Mr. Denis Sassou Nguesso, delivered by the State Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation, the meeting provided an opportunity for Permanent Forum members to meet with local ministries, diplomatic missions, the UN Country Team, as well as indigenous peoples organizations and civil society organizations.
During their consultations with indigenous peoples, Forum members were informed on the continuing problems of discrimination and marginalization. Indigenous representatives described the problems they face in accessing schools and universities and getting jobs. Indigenous women spoke of the lack of maternal and child care, and difficulties encountered while giving birth in forests.
The Forum members met with parliamentarians, and with government officials, including the Minister of Forests, and offered different examples to overcome the persistent challenges faced by the indigenous peoples.
They also met with UN agencies and other partners who provided information on various projects and programmes developed within the framework of the national action plan on the improvement of the quality of life of indigenous peoples.
The Forum members also highlighted the upcoming World Conference on Indigenous Peoples, to be organized by the UN General Assembly in September 2014, as an opportunity to define a global action plan to implement the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. They encouraged the Republic of Congo to be engaged in this process.
“The Republic of Congo has taken a key step in adopting Law No 5-2011 on the Promotion and Protection of the Rights of Indigenous Populations”, said Grand Chief Edward John, UNPFII Chair, ”your country is a leader in Africa on indigenous peoples’ rights. We hope other countries will be inspired to follow this good practice.” The key challenge now is to implement the law, he added.
The 12th session will take place on 20 – 31 May 2013.
As part of the 2013 UN World Youth Report consultation process, the UN Focal Point on Youth organized a Google+ Hangout on 6 March with a panel of experts and youth representatives to discuss the theme of “Youth Migration and Development: Towards Sustainable Solutions”
The Hangout explored practical strategies on realizing youth migrants’ potential, protecting their human rights, and promoting their social inclusion — and how these can be achieved through collaborative efforts with youth organizations and other relevant stakeholders.
Harnessing the human development potential of youth migrants
Migrants can be productive members of transit and destination countries as well as contribute to the sustainable development of their countries of origin. They can provide financial as well as social remittances, including innovative ideas, practices, identities and social capital.
Young migrants, especially those in irregular situations and females face multiple challenges throughout the migration process – from pre-departure, in transit, post-arrival and then also in return and reintegration. They are often ill-advised and susceptible to abuse and exploitation. “Information is protection,” remarked Jo Rispoli of the International Organization for Migration (IOM), who stated that migrant youth and youth organizations need to be involved in the three “E’s – engagement by giving them a voice/platform at meetings; enablement through skills and vocation training; and empowerment.”
Youth participation in addressing migration’s challenges can be extremely important. Another panelist, Dynka Amorim, a young migrant himself and coordinator of Bué Fixe, described his organization’s initiative in promoting young migrants access to health care in Portugal. “Regular and irregular migrants are sometimes unaware of their right to health, so we work to inform and engage them on a wide range of HIV/AIDS and sexual reproductive health issues using media platforms like radio and social media,” Dynka added.
Partnerships: From grassroot level to the global arena
In addition to grassroots projects, the panel emphasized the importance of collaboration amongst relevant state and non-state actors to promote the social inclusion and rights of migrants.
Social inclusion is critical to promoting community cohesion and integration of young migrants. “The Swedish government works with civil society partners to promote young migrants’ access to health care and social services for youth. Activities are undertaken to combat racism, xenophobia and social exclusion,” stated Daniel Pettersson of the Swedish Mission to the United Nations.
As migration affects all countries, a Global Forum on Migration and Development has been created for policymakers to understand and discuss migration’s multiple dimensions, its complex impact on global development, and how challenges can be mitigated. Bela Hovy, Chief of DESA’s Population Division, encouraged youth to participate in civil society consultations that are scheduled to take place in July 2013 prior to the 2nd High Level Dialogue on Migration and Development.
Youth civil society representatives can provide contributions during global and national level consultation processes, where they will be able to voice their most pressing issues, priorities and diverse experiences. “Migrant is such a broad concept. We have all different backgrounds and different reasons and ways to migrate. Our needs are different. So it is not going to be a standard success formula for all the migrants,” stated Lonneke van Zundert, a youth representative panelist.
Migration and the post-2015 agenda
With a lot more evidence on the scope, scale and impact of migration on development, there was also discussion on whether migration should be included in the post 2015 agenda.
Migration is seen as an enabler of equitable and sustainable development. The question remains as to how the issue can be integrated into the post 2015 agenda. Reducing the cost of remittances and recruitment fees as well as reducing barriers to migration and protecting the rights of migrants are some of the ways of considering migration within the post 2015 agenda. “We have to think collectively in terms of how these will be phrased, either in terms of goals or as an enabler of the development goals,” remarked Bela Hovy.
In collaboration with the International Organization of Supreme Audit Institution (INTOSAI), DPADM organized the 22nd UN/INTOSAI Symposium in Vienna, Austria from 5 to 7 March
The theme of the Expert Group Meeting (EGM) was “Audit and Advisory Activities by Supreme Audit Institutions (SAIs): Risks and Opportunities, as well as Possibilities for Engaging Citizens”.
In attendance were more than 150 participants, including more than 40 heads of SAIs, from more than 60 countries and representatives from international organizations. Mr. Wu, DESA’s Under-Secretary-General, made an opening statement on citizen engagement in public accountability in the post-2015 UN development framework. He emphasized the importance of good governance as the fourth pillar of sustainable development, which is the core of the post-2015 development agenda:
“The United Nations and the international community recognize that economic growth, social development and environmental protection form the three pillars of sustainable development. Cross-cutting, effective and efficient public administration is also critical in supporting the three pillars. Some experts suggest that good governance is the fourth pillar of sustainable development. I agree. Good governance strengthens and reinforces the inter-linkages of the social, economic and environmental pillars, and ensures that the future we want is translated into reality.”
The meeting concluded that by using advisory approaches in addition to traditional government audits, SAIs can contribute to the effective and efficient achievement of the Millennium Development Goals and influence the post-2015 Development Agenda. The participants recommended that INTOSAI, through a working group, monitor measures to mitigate the risks of waste and loss of public funds in order to give technical advice to the international community.
They also encouraged UN Member States and relevant UN agencies to implement the resolution on Promoting the efficiency, accountability, effectiveness and transparency of public administration by strengthening Supreme Audit Institutions (A/RES/66/209).
DPADM and the Government of the United Arab Emirates co-organized the Government Summit, the first meeting on governance held in the Gulf Region, on 11-12 February in Dubai under the overall theme “Leading Government Services”
The Summit included a Ministerial Roundtable on “Innovation in Public Governance, a Ministerial Perspective” and three parallel workshops focusing on “Innovation in Public Governance: Perspectives from United Nations Public Service Awards (UNPSA) Winners” and on the sub themes of; (i) innovation in regulatory reform and administrative simplification for effective service delivery; (ii) innovation in public governance through networks and partnerships; and (iii) innovation in e-services. Each workshop featured a speaker from DPADM and a past UNPSA winner.
Prior to the Summit, which was attended by over 2500 government officials from the Arabic Region, both parties organized a capacity-building workshop on Innovation in Public Governance to showcase and discuss the work and ideas of the Division on the United Nations E-Government Survey, United Nations Public Administration Network (UNPAN), United Nations Public Administration Country Studies (UNPACS) and the UNPSA. The pre-Summit workshop was attended by over 250 government officials from the UAE.
At the close of the summit, the DPADM team, led by Mr. Vincenzo Aquaro, Chief of the eGovernment Branch, was invited to meet with the Minister of Cabinet Affairs, Prime Minister’s Office of the Government of the UAE who expressed appreciation for their substantive contribution towards the overall organization of the event, and requested further support from DESA and DPADM in upcoming activities.
As part of the preparatory process for the ECOSOC 2013 Annual Ministerial Review, DESA is holding an e-discussion from 18 February to 19 March
Arranged in partnership with UNDP and UNESCO, the e-discussion serves as an open, multi-stakeholder forum for practitioners, experts and researchers to share new ideas and formulate critical policy messages to the UN intergovernmental negotiations on the potential of STI and culture for sustainable development solutions.
This year, expert moderators from UNDP, UNESCO and the MDG Achievement Fund will facilitate the e-discussion. The outcome will feed directly into the Annual Ministerial Review being held in Geneva during the Substantive Session of ECOSOC in July 2013.
If you are not a member of UNDG’s MDG-Net, UNDP Poverty Reduction Network, Gender or Human Development Report Networks, please visit https://one.unteamworks.org/AMR2013 to request an invite and participate in this e-discussion.
As part of on-going activities for the forthcoming UN World Youth Report 2013, the UN Focal Point on Youth is organizing a Google+ Hangout on 6 March at 11:00 am EST on the UN Google+ Account, featuring key experts on youth migration and development.
Under the overarching theme “Youth migration and development: towards sustainable solutions”, the web-based event will offer an opportunity for youth, the UN and Member States to discuss the issue of youth migration and development.
Youth will have the opportunity to ask questions related to strategies for enhancing the development potential of youth migration while mitigating associated risk in the migration process (i.e. pre-departure/departure, in-transit, arrival, post arrival, return or no return).
It also aims to explore the nexus between youth migration and key issues such as access to basic social services, social integration, remittances, migrant rights, the post-2015 development agenda and environmental change.
“The phenomenon of migration has profound impact on young people as well as origin, transit and destination countries. We need to work together to enhance the development potential of youth migration while mitigating its risk. I encourage young people and other relevant stakeholders to participate and submit questions for the panellists to answer live in this upcoming Google+ Hangout,” said Mr. Ahmad Alhendawi, the UN Secretary-General’s Envoy on Youth.
The Google+ Hangout will also feature a 20-minute live Q&A session with the panelists. Tweet your questions for panelists to @UN4Youth using #youthmigration, post your questions on the UNyouthyear Facebook page or submit your questions on the UN World Youth Report web platform.
This particular Google+ Hangout is aimed at young people (15-35 years of age), as well as members of Permanent Missions, UN staff, the private sector, academia and civil society organizations, interested and working in the field of youth migration and development.
For further information on the UN World Youth Report Google+ Hangout, please visit: www.unworldyouthreport.org or email the UN Focal Point on Youth at youth@un.org with the subject line: Youth Migration Google+ Hangout.
The international NGO conference on the post-2015 sustainable development agenda will take place on 20–22 March in Bonn, Germany
This event, focusing on reconfirming rights, recognizing limits and redefining goals, will bring together about 250 civil society activists and stakeholder representatives to gather inputs into the sustainable development and post-2015 discussions.
At present, a multitude of discussions and consultation processes are taking place worldwide. Some in the context of the Rio+20 process, others preparing for the post-2015 agenda. Some with a specific sector focus, others on national or regional level. While wide-ranging and participatory processes are welcome, we need to gain a better overview on civil society perspectives and demands in order to advocate more effectively for their implementation.
The event aims at providing such an overview by bringing together key actors and helping them to exchange information, learn from each other, benefit from our sector’s diversity and agree on joint demands and strategies where this is possible.
Supported by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and DESA, the conference is being shaped by a Steering Committee composed of many of the major international civil society networks such as CIVICUS, Beyond 2015, Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era (DAWN), Global Call to Action against Poverty (GCAP), Global Campaign for Climate Action (GCCA), Social Watch, VENRO and the Baltic Sea Forum.
“Indigenous Youth: Identity, Challenges and Hope: Articles 14, 17, 21 and 25 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples” was in focus for an expert group meeting in New York on 29-31 January
The world has never faced such a large youth population as the one inhabiting the globe today, with about 40 per cent of the world population under the age of 25. With the recent economic crisis and high unemployment rates, there are many challenges facing today’s young generation. The world’s 67 million indigenous youth face even greater challenges, but have big hopes.
To address these issues, indigenous youth experts from around the world gathered for an expert group meeting in New York focusing on “Indigenous Youth: Identity, Challenges and Hope: Articles 14, 17, 21 and 25 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples” on 29-31 January.
Ms. Shamshad Akhtar, Assistant Secretary-General for Economic Affairs in DESA, outlined some of the main challenges as she addressed the meeting. “They face higher levels of illiteracy rates, drop out rates and other indicators and they tend to experience lower enrollment ratios, higher unemployment rates and lower incomes. Indigenous youth struggle to develop and define their identities, maintain their cultures and preserve and revitalize their languages,” Ms. Akhtar said.
With youth representatives from countries including Australia, Canada, Finland, Peru and Uganda, the meeting looked closer at issues of identity, challenges and hope. The meeting also analyzed how international human rights standards and policies can be more responsive to advancing the rights of indigenous youth. Vast documentation is available online from seven indigenous youth experts examining these topics.
Meenakshi Munda, who is an indigenous youth from the Munda community of Jharkhand, India, attended the meeting in her role as President of the Asia Pacific Indigenous Youth Network (APIYN). Speaking with UN Radio, Ms. Munda underscored the importance of rejuvenating indigenous languages to protect the identity of indigenous communities and the rich culture and wisdom preserved in this way.
Describing the knowledge the elders in her community has in medicine and plants she said, “this knowledge is intact in mother tongue. If we want to learn that, we have to learn indigenous language. Also, our oral history is intact in mother tongue, so if we want to know our own history, we have to know our own culture, our own language”, she explained.
“It is of course important that the UN now puts more focus on indigenous youth because if we look at indigenous peoples as a whole, the youth are the most important group. It is our responsibility to continue our language, traditions and cultures,” said Tuomas Aslak Juuso, President of the National Finnish Sámi Youths, as he spoke with UN Radio. Mr. Juuso, who has been promoting the rights of the Sámi in Finland over the past decade and who is also the co-chair of the Global Indigenous Youth Caucus, emphasized the importance of being able to use your own language and to continue traditional livelihoods.
At the meeting, Ms. Akhtar described youth as “our global asset” and their role as critical for both social and economic stability. She further stated that a “younger generation of indigenous population can be promising for their community if their vitality and vigor is appropriately unleashed and they can transform the overall indigenous community’s destiny. Youth drives idealism, creativity, entrepreneurship and with appropriate support can help make the world a better place”.
As part of the preparations for the 2013 UN World Youth Report (WYR) on Youth Migration and Development, the UN Focal Point on Youth launched a four-week online discussion platform on 23 January
Newly available estimates of international migrants by age produced by the Population Division of DESA indicated that by mid-2010, globally, there were 27 million international migrants aged 15 to 24, constituting about one-eighth of the global migrant stock of 214 million.
While considerable attention is given to the issue of migration and its potential economic and social impacts on origin, transit and destination countries, to date, very little attention has been given to understanding the livelihood struggles and opportunities that migration presents for young migrants themselves.
The forum therefore aims at bringing together young people, who have experienced or been affected by migration, to share their personal stories and perspectives.
“We need to listen to what youth have to say about their migration experiences or how migration affects their human development. The World Youth Report which is expected to be launched on International Youth Day, 12 August 2013, will offer youth, youth-led organizations, policymakers and the general public, youthful perspectives that could influence the development potential of migration for young people while mitigating risks. The report will highlight the “voices of youth” on the opportunities and challenges migration presents in origin, transit, and destination countries under various types of migration – regular, involuntary and undocumented. This is particularly relevant in the lead up to the 2nd UN High Level Dialogue on Migration and Development in October 2013,” said Daniela Bas, Director of the Division for Social Policy and Development of DESA.
To highlight some of these concerns, challenges and successes, the UN World Youth Report 2013 will attempt to offer a multidimensional account and perspective on youth migrant life experiences. Besides the e-consultation, the UN Focal Point on Youth has been organizing a number of interactive activities such as an online survey and a Google+ Hangout with young people and experts.
To ensure that the World Youth Report is based on the perspectives of those young people, DESA is inviting the participation of young individuals aged between 15 to 35 years and representatives of youth-led organizations, to share their perspectives and experiences on youth and migration.
Efforts will also be made to target young people who have no or limited access to the Internet or online platforms to facilitate their participation in the consultative process, mainly through youth migrant networks and other relevant youth organizations.
DESA’s Population Division will be organizing the Eleventh Annual Coordination Meeting on International Migration in New York on 21-22 February
The meeting is being held in response to a General Assembly resolution from 2004, which requests the Secretary-General to continue convening meetings to coordinate international migration activities.
The meeting has four main objectives. First, in response to recent General Assembly resolutions, the meeting will review preparations for the second High-level Dialogue on International Migration and Development, which will be organized by the General Assembly on 3 and 4 October 2013. Second, the meeting will discuss how the Global Forum on Migration and Development, which was created as a result of the first High-level Dialogue held in 2006, has advanced the global dialogue on international migration and development. Third, the meeting will be briefed on recent contributions to the migration evidence base. Fourth, the meeting will allow international organizations to exchange information on current migration activities and to present new initiatives.
By bringing together entities of the UN system, other relevant intergovernmental organizations and civil society, the coordination meeting provides a unique opportunity to enhance interagency coherence and cooperation on migration in maximizing the benefits and addressing the negative impacts of migration for development.
The outcomes of the meeting will contribute to the report of the Secretary-General on international migration and development to be prepared for the 2013 High-level Dialogue.
Seminar on “Big Data for Policy, Development and Official Statistics” will be held on 22 February in New York ahead of the opening of the UN Statistical Commission
The arrival of the Internet, mobile devices and other technologies has caused a fundamental change to the nature of data. Big Data has important, distinct qualities that differentiate it from “traditional” institutional data, in particular its timeliness. If governments wanted to, they could already let Big Data play a role in providing information on topics that are currently under the purview of national statistical offices (NSOs).
Traditionally, data processing for analytic purposes followed a fairly static blueprint, with modest amounts of structured data created with stable data models, loaded into an enterprise data warehouse. Non-expert users could then perform basic data visualization and limited analytics via front-end business intelligence tools. With recent developments, data are no longer centralized, highly structured and easily manageable, but are highly distributed, loosely structured and increasingly large in volume. The volume, type and the speed at which new data is created has thus changed and it is also generated by a range of sources, including mobile devices, Internet transactions, networked devices and sensors, social networking and media.
National Statistical Offices have started to explore how best to harness this phenomenon of Big Data in their mission to supply quality statistics for improving economic performance, social well-being and environmental sustainability. The attraction lies in the sheer amount of data which could be available in, or near, real time. Potentially, Big Data could be used as intelligence to better solve emergency situations and it also presents an opportunity for the official statistical community to better meet its mission of disseminating timely and quality statistics.
Should NSOs change their business operations to take on the opportunities of using Big Data for official government purposes? What will be the consequences of using Big Data for policy and development and how secure is a cloud environment for storing confidential data? These and other questions will be addressed during this seminar gathering participants from NSOs, UN Global Pulse and OECD, and corporations including representatives from Google, Amazon Web Services, and SAS.
In order for Big Data to truly gain mainstream adoption and achieve its full potential for official statistical purposes, it is critical that the statistical community does not ignore Big Data, but recognizes the use of it as part of their information management model, prepares an inventory of the state of play and formulates the implications for official statistics.
The UN Forum on Forests held the second meeting of the ad hoc expert group on forest financing (AHEG2) on 14-18 January in Vienna, Austria
More than 150 experts from 75 countries and 23 regional and international organizations and processes, as well as major groups and independent experts attended the event.
Experts heard several presentations on the findings of the 2012 Advisory Group on Finance study on forest financing, the Organization-Led Initiative Co-Chairs Summary, the Facilitative Process meetings on forest financing, the study on the impacts of the price of carbon on forest financing, and private sector financing for forests as well as other relevant input including the background studies on forests and economic development. Two key note speakers also provided their views on the feasible and realistic strategies on forest financing.
These presentations and related interactive discussions led to identification of some actions and measures that should be taken to mobilize financing for forests at all levels and from all sources.
AHEG2 participants highlighted the fact that new global trends such as increased urbanization, as well as ongoing deliberations on the post 2015 UN development agenda and the sustainable development goals have affected the discussion on forest financing. They also discussed data, geographic and thematic gaps in regard to financing forests, as well as the means to address these gaps. Regarding data, participants highlighted the need to broaden the basis for data collection from multiple sources, as well as ensuring systematic efforts at all levels to generate accurate, consistent and reliable data.
Actions necessary to improve an enabling environment, capacity development activities, involvement of various stakeholders in mobilizing financing for forests were also discussed, as well as measures to increase financing for forests at all levels. Moreover, various options and measures for mobilizing forest financing at the national, regional and international levels were addressed.
The role of national forest programmes, as an effective policy tool for such purpose, as well as other options such as development of national forest financing strategies, and establishment of national forest funds were highlighted.
The pros and cons of establishing a voluntary global fund to finance sustainable forest management were also deliberated. A number of additional ideas were suggested such as “identifying brokering intermediary institutions” to mobilize funding for forests or having an umbrella structure to coordinate the existing multilateral funds related to forests.
The Co-Chairs prepared a summary of the meeting in which they also provided a set of proposals and options on forest financing. Experts attending AHEG2 adopted the report of the meeting and took note of the Co-Chairs Summary which is annexed to the AHEG2 report.
Second meeting of the Open-Ended Intergovernmental Ad Hoc Expert Group on Forest Financing (AHEG2), 14-18 January, Vienna
In October 2009, the Special Session of the ninth session of the United Nations Forum on Forests (UNFF) adopted the Resolution on Means of Implementation for Sustainable Forest Management. This Resolution provided a specific mandate and designed a strategic road map to address forest finance within UNFF. Member States also agreed that the tenth session of UNFF should make decision on forest financing.
The Resolution established the Open-ended Intergovernmental Ad Hoc Expert Group on Forest Financing (AHEG) to make proposals on strategies to mobilize resources from all sources to support the implementation of sustainable forest management, the achievement of the global objectives on forests and the implementation of the non-legally binding instrument on all types of forests (forest instrument), including, inter alia, strengthening and improving access to funds and establishing a voluntary global forest fund.
The Resolution also established a Facilitative Process. According to this Resolution, the AHEG should hold two meetings, one before the ninth session and one before the tenth session of the United Nations Forum on Forests. The Expert Group should submit a preliminary report at the ninth session and final recommendations at the tenth session for the Forum’s consideration and decision.
Based on the outcome of AHEG1 which was held in September 2010 in Nairobi, Kenya, UNFF9 adopted in its Resolution on Forests for People adopted in February 2011. Resolution of the UNFF9 called for intensive intersessional activities on forest finance. A wide spectrum of inputs on forest financing was requested from governments, CPF members, regional processes and major groups, in preparation for AHEG2 and UNFF10.
Member States are also expected to develop and implement national forest policy and policy instruments on all types of forests and trees outside forests, and to report their progress, experiences and lessons to AHEG2.
The main inputs to AHEG2 include the 2012 study on Forest Financing by the Advisory Group on Finance of the Collaborative Partnership on Forests (AGF/CPF), reports of the Facilitative Process Workshops on Forest Financing in LFCCs/SIDS, and Afrcia/LDCs, compilation of substantive submissions on forest financing by countries, as well as other relevant inputs.
The outcome of AHEG2 is a critical component for a decision on forest financing in UNFF10 in April 2013 in Istanbul-Turkey, and also for the decision on the future of the international arrangement on forests in UNFF11 in 2015.
International Expert Group Meeting on Indigenous Youth will take place at UN Headquarters in New York on 29-31 January
The Division for Social Policy and Development will be organizing an International Expert Group Meeting entitled “Indigenous youth: Identity, challenges and hope: articles 14, 17, 21 and 25 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples”. The meeting will be arranged in accordance with a decision by ECOSOC made at the recommendation of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.
Some of the challenges that indigenous youth face across the globe will be explored and policy and programmatic proposals will be proposed and be addressed at the twelfth session of the Permanent Forum in May 2013.
International Experts of the three UN mechanisms on Indigenous Peoples’ Rights met to prepare for the 2014 World Conference on Indigenous Peoples on 17-21 December in Guatemala
On the occasion of the commemoration of the Oxlajuj B’aqtun held in Tikal, Guatemala, the UN Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues met to discuss the preparation of the World Conference on Indigenous Peoples in 2014.
Assisted by staff from the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (SPFII), members of the forum also met with government officials, the UN country team, indigenous peoples’ organizations as well as journalist and the academia.
Expert Group Meeting on “New Trends in Migration: Demographic Aspects” will take place in New York on 3 December
Organized by DESA’s Population Division, the meeting will focus on internal and international migration trends and their relevance for development. It is held in preparation for the forty-sixth session of the Commission on Population and Development to be held in New York in April 2013.
The meeting will also inform the preparations for the 2013 High-level Dialogue on International Migration and Development and the follow-up to the implementation of the Programme of Action of the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development, to be held in 2014.
Expert Group Meeting on “2014 UN E-Government Survey: E-Government as an Enabler of Collaborative Governance” will be held at UN Headquarters in New York on 4-5 December
The Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) of DESA is organizing an Expert Group Meeting (EGM) on the topic “United Nations E-Government Survey: E-Government as an Enabler of Collaborative Governance”.
The purpose of the meeting is to provide a forum for discussion to allow high-level world-wide experts to (a) exchange views on emerging trends and issues related to the thematic areas of 2014 UN E-Government Survey, with reference to the overall UN development agenda, (b) review and examine the Survey’s methodology, as well as (c) review and update the questionnaire. The experts will provide advice and recommendations on how to integrate these issues into the next edition of the UN e-Government Survey, which is a flagship publication of DESA.
Indeed, this publication is among the top ten most viewed publications among over four hundred produced every year by the Department; has been translated in Chinese and is currently being translated in Arabic and Spanish. The Survey provides unique, global and up-to-date information about the e-government ranking of 193 Member States and highlights major emerging trends and issues, as well as good practices in the area of e-government development across the globe.
The Survey has become a major reference publication for decision-makers world-wide, and for numerous international and regional institutions working in this area. It is an important tool for capacity-building as Governments utilize the Survey in order to gauge information about their ranking and, based on their own needs, request DESA’s advisory services to support them in further building their own capacity. As a result of DESA’s capacity building activities in this area, several Governments have been able to perform better and deliver services in more efficient, accountable, transparent and citizen-centric manner, thus progressing towards the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.
According to the UN e-Government Survey 2012, progress in online service delivery continues in most countries around the world. The United Nations E-Government Survey 2012 finds that many have put in place e-government initiatives and information and communication technologies applications for the people to further enhance public sector efficiencies and streamline governance systems to support sustainable development. Among the e-government leaders, innovative technology solutions have gained special recognition as the means to revitalize lagging economic and social sectors.
The overall conclusion that emerges from the 2012 Survey in today’s recessionary world climate is that while it is important to continue with service delivery, governments must increasingly begin to rethink in terms of e-government – and e-governance – placing greater emphasis on institutional linkages between and among the tiered government structures in a bid to create synergy for inclusive sustainable development. An important aspect of this approach is to widen the scope of e-government for a transformative role of the government towards cohesive, coordinated, and integrated processes and institutions through which such sustainable development takes place.
More than 1,630 onsite participants from over 128 countries convened at the 7th Internet Governance Forum (IGF) in Baku, Azerbaijan on 6-9 November, while more than 3800 unique visitors connected remotely
There were 429 government representatives, 161 representatives from the technical and academia community, 268 representatives from the private sector, 541 from the civil society, 96 representatives from international organisations, and 123 accredited journalists.
Remote participation has become a major strength of the IGF process as this feature enables unprecedented access to and interaction with experts for any individual with an Internet connection. It also significantly increases knowledge sharing, information dissemination, partnership building and capacity building in a way that makes the IGF meetings unique. Forty-nine remote experts and panelists participated via video and audio during the week. Fifty-two different remote ‘hubs’ allowed over 3,800 IGF enthusiasts to gather together to follow the proceedings in Baku.
The event held a record number of workshops, best practice forums, dynamic coalition meetings and open forums. The theme for this year’s IGF was “Internet Governance for Sustainable Human, Economic and Social Development”.
These sessions allowed participants to delve into both complicated and oftentimes controversial issues in an open and intimate manner. Topics at the workshops and other meetings ranged from issues related to cyber-security and child protection online, the rise of social networks, the use of “big data”, and various aspects of human rights as they relate to the Internet, among many others.
DPI has so far gathered over 1,000 articles published in 30 countries in English, German, Azerbaijani, Turkish and Russian. The bulk of the coverage has been in the United States, Germany, India and in the host country,Azerbaijan.
DESA’s Under-Secretary-General Wu Hongbo took part in the opening of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF).
The 8th session of the Committee of Experts on International Cooperation in Tax Matters (the Committee) was held on 15-19 October in Geneva
This was the last meeting of the current Membership of the Committee, expiring in June 2013. A new Membership will be selected by the Secretary-General, following nominations by Member States next year and will take up their 4-year term on 1 July 2013. While nominated by countries, Members of the Committee act in their personal capacities.
United Nations Model Tax Convention update
The Committee took note of the publication by the Secretariat of the updated English version of the UN Model Double Taxation Convention between Developed and Developing Countries (the UN Model). It also reiterated the importance of the update for developing countries as the UN Model forms the basis of the double tax treaty practice of many of them and its revised and expanded version will better fulfill that purpose. The Committee also reaffirmed the importance of translation of the UN Model into all the official UN languages. It also expressed support for more frequent updates of the Model.
Transfer Pricing: Practical Manual for Developing Countries and related issues
In a major development, the Committee adopted its Practical Transfer Pricing Manual for Developing Countries subject to editing and formatting by the Secretariat working with the Coordinator of the Transfer Pricing Subcommittee, Mr. Stig Sollund of Norway. The assistance of the European Commission and Norway in completing the project was acknowledged.
Transfer pricing addresses the pricing of transactions within multinational enterprises (MNEs), which must set prices for such transactions for their own purposes. This also creates opportunities for profits to be booked in low or no tax jurisdictions and losses to be booked in higher tax countries, including developing countries. Payments for the use of MNE “brands” or intra-group services often require special scrutiny to see if they have these sorts of tax avoidance consequences.
The standard under the UN Model Double Taxation Convention, and its OECD counterpart, is that such pricing can be adjusted by countries where it is not at an “arm’s length” rate – in other words if it is not at market rates. Establishing “arm’s length prices” for complex MNE transactions is notoriously difficult because of the lack of direct market comparables for intellectual property and other MNE transactions, which often comprise unique assets, complex set-offs and linked arrangements.
The Manual seeks to assist developing countries in addressing these issues, including in developing and retaining the skills needed, establishing a suitable legislative framework, and identifying and accessing relevant information. It is the first UN “product” to address this important aspect of taxation of MNEs and it was recognized by the Committee that to fully achieve its goals it will need to be regularly updated.
Now that the Manual has been approved, the way has been opened for a thorough discussion of the approach taken to transfer pricing in the UN Model, and its relationship to the OECD work in that area. This is likely to be a key and contentious issue for the first meeting of the new Membership of the Committee in October 2013.
Tax treatment of services
As services become an increasingly important and valuable component of global trade, the issue of how profits on services transactions should be taxed is an increasingly urgent one. While there is agreement that it would dampen such trade if both the country of the provider of the services and the country where the services are provided doubly-taxed the profits on the services, there is disagreement on which of those countries should be allowed to exercise the taxing jurisdiction for services transactions under tax treaties, and whether such a taxing right should be limited.
Work on seeking a coherent framework for distributing taxing rights over services between countries will no doubt continue as a high priority for the Committee. The key outcome of the 8th session was an agreement that there should be a special provision in the next version of the UN Model for countries wishing to include in their treaties a right of countries wherein advisory services are provided to tax such payments.
Inclusion of the “fees for technical services” provision will be a very useful practical addition for developing countries, offering stronger guidance and support for such proposals in treaty negotiations and in implementing such treaties. It will also sharply differentiate the UN Model from the counterpart OECD Model Tax Convention.
UN Model Convention and climate change mechanisms
A detailed paper on the taxation of profits from emissions trading under the UN Model was discussed and suggestions were made for finalizing the paper. This will help clarify the issues in terms of avoiding double taxation of profits that could dampen such trading, but also ensuring that developing countries receive their appropriate taxing rights over such profits. While profits in this area are not immediately likely, it was considered important to consider the issues at an early stage and to show leadership on the issue. This is also an important landmark for the UN Tax Committee as it represents the first sustained consideration of taxation issues related to the environment.
Building capacities
The need for greater UN capacity building on tax cooperation issues was noted, as was the need to, as far as possible, work cooperatively with others active in the area. The Secretariat provided an update on relevant developments within its new Capacity Development Programme in International Tax Cooperation, aimed at strengthening the capacity of the ministries of finance and national tax authorities in developing countries to develop more effective and efficient tax systems, which support the desired levels of investment, and to combat tax evasion. These included: the new mandate contained in ECOSOC resolution 2012/33, progress of work on developing the “UN Course on Double Tax Treaties” based on the 2011 Update of the UN Model Double Taxation Convention and other capacity development initiatives.
Value added tax issues
The Committee heard a presentation on some international tax issues relevant to value added taxes, especially as they relate to the interaction of value added taxes and income taxes addressed by the UN Model This was the first Committee consideration of VAT issues, as it has previously focused on direct taxes, and therefore an important landmark in light of the importance of VATs to most developing countries and some of the abuses that occur in that field. The Committee responded positively to the proposal that it consider international tax issues in that area and the relevant work will continue over the coming year.
Foreign direct investment
Some of the policy issues driving country approaches to taxation of economic rents were explored in a presentation by one of the Committee Members, and the Committee agreed to examine the issues further and to create a Working Group to consider extractive industries taxation issues for developing countries and some possible approaches.
The next meeting of the Committee, with its new Membership, will be held on 21-25 October 2013. The provisional agenda was set for approval by ECOSOC. Key issues will include transfer pricing policy and practice, discussion of a proposed provision on fees for technical services, taxation and climate change issues, capacity building, international VAT issues, and taxation of extractive industries.
The Nineteenth United Nations Regional Cartographic Conference for Asia and the Pacific (UNRCC-AP) was held at the ESCAP facilities in Bangkok on 29 October – 1 November
DESA’s Statistics Division organized the event titled “UN-GGIM Vision for Asia and the Pacific Region”. The main subject themes to be discussed are the geodetic reference framework for sustainable development; data sharing and integration for disaster management; and place-based information management for economic growth.
This is the first regional conference after the establishment of the global mechanism of Global Geospatial Information Management (GGIM), which will lead the region to discuss its new role as the GGIM-Asia/Pacific arm. Strong guidance from Member States on this GGIM vision for the region is expected.
Governments, business and civil society will examine IG4D at the seventh annual meeting of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF), to be held on 6-9 November in Baku, Azerbaijan
Over 1,500 delegates from over 100 countries, representing Governments, the private sector, civil society, the Internet community, international organizations and the media are expected to convene to examine cross-border Internet governance challenges. DESA’s Under-Secretary-General Wu Hongbo, will open the Forum.
This year’s meeting will have as its main theme: ‘Internet Governance for Sustainable Human, Economic and Social Development.’ Internet governance for development (IG4D) is high on the agenda of the IGF 2012 meeting. Delegates will look at examples of global Internet governance issues with particular relevance to development, and how Internet governance can be integrated into development approaches, at the national and international levels.
Debates will focus on issues such as diffusion and use of IPv6 (critical Internet resources) and how innovative policies for access and diversity can ensure the potential of the Internet to become a reality for all. Other workshops will look at the issues of Security, Openness and Privacy – a uniquely IGF perspective which links these core policy concerns.
An important focus of the IGF this year will be on capacity building in the field of Internet governance. Participants will also discuss the possibility for the IGF to include well structured and coordinated capacity building events meant to attract and inform new stakeholders, especially from developing countries.
Dialogue that informs policy
The Internet Governance Forum (IGF) is not a decision-making body, but rather a space for dialogue where all participants are equal in discussions on public policy issues relating to the Internet. While there is no negotiated outcome, the IGF informs and inspires those with policy-making power in both the public and private sectors. DESA manages the IGF Secretariat, located in Geneva.
The Internet Governance Forum is an outcome of the Tunis phase of the World Summit on the Information Society, which took place in 2005. In the Tunis Agenda for the Information Society, Governments asked the United Nations Secretary-General to convene a new forum for policy dialogue to discuss issues related to key elements of Internet governance in order to foster the Internet’s sustainability, robustness, security, stability and development. The IGF’s initial mandate was for five years, this was renewed for a further five years by United Nations General Assembly in 2010.
The IGF is also a space that gives developing countries the same opportunity as wealthier nations to engage in the debate on Internet governance and to facilitate their participation in existing institutions and arrangements. Ultimately, according to the Tunis Agenda, the involvement of all stakeholders, from developed as well as developing countries, is necessary for the future advancement of the Internet.
Six previous meetings of the Forum have been held, in Athens, Greece (2006); Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (2007); Hyderabad, India (2008); Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt (2009); Vilnius, Lithuania (2010) and Nairobi, Kenya (2011).
A Regional Workshop on International Trade Statistics: Implementation of IMTS 2010 and a new vision for trade statistics will be held on 1-5 October in San Jose, Costa Rica
This workshop is organized by DESA’s Statistics Division in cooperation with the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) and the Instituto Nacional de Estadísticas y Censos (INEC) of Costa Rica which is hosting this event.
The focus of the workshop will be on the updated and new recommendations for International Merchandise Trade Statistics (IMTS) as contained in International Merchandise Trade Statistics: Concepts and Definitions 2010 (IMTS 2010) and their implementation within the countries of Latin America. Particular attention will be given to the elements of the recommendations that provide additional information and that aim at the further development of the merchandise trade statistics in countries (or areas).
Eighth Session of the Committee of Experts on International Cooperation in Tax Matters will be held on 15-19 October at the Palais des Nations in Geneva
The main focus of the session will be the Practical Manual on Transfer Pricing for Developing Countries, which will be presented for adoption by the Committee. The session will also address other important areas, such as tax treatment of services, revision of the Manual for the Negotiation of Bilateral Tax Treaties between Developed and Developing Countries and capacity building in national tax systems.
Seminar on developing a programme for the implementation of the 2008 System of National Accounts (SNA) and supporting statistics in Southern Africa will take place in Pretoria, South Africa on 17-19 October
DESA’s Statistics Division in collaboration with the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UN-ECA) and the Southern African Development Community (SADC), is organizing a seminar on “Developing a programme for the implementation of the 2008 SNA and supporting statistics in Southern Africa”.
The objective of the seminar is to assist Southern African countries with initiating the formulation of a national strategy and implementation programme for the 2008 SNA and supporting system-wide socio-economic statistics with the objective of strengthening the national statistical system in support of improved policy-making. It is expected that this initiative would lead to a multi-year statistical programme to move the countries over to the 2008 SNA and to establish a minimum common data set of annual and high frequency statistics.
The 22nd Inter-agency and Expert Group Meeting on MDG Indicators will be held in Geneva, Switzerland, on 31 October
The meeting is part of the yearly consultation with national experts and international agencies to review and discuss issues related to the global MDG monitoring. This IAEG meeting will focus on: lessons learned from MDG monitoring in the last decade, options to exchange data/metadata to update the MDG global database, and MDG-related statistical capacity needs at the country level.
The World e-Parliament Conference 2012, co-organized by the United Nations and the Inter-Parliamentary Union through the Global Centre for ICT in Parliament, took place in Rome at the Chamber of Deputies of Italy in Rome on 13 – 15 September
The meeting was the fifth of a series of conferences that were previously held in Geneva (2007), Brussels (2008), Washington D.C. (2009) and Johannesburg (2010). More than 110 parliamentary delegations from 90 countries attended the event where good practices were analysed and latest trends and institutional developments discussed by Speakers, members of parliament, parliamentary staff and experts.
During the Conference the high-level Board of the Global Centre for ICT in Parliament convened its sixth meeting. The Board acknowledged the significant role that the Global Centre for ICT in Parliament has played since its creation in 2006.
“We want to see the Global Centre extend its efforts to gather and share the latest knowledge on the use of ICT in parliaments. We would like the Global Centre to reinforce its role as a hub for parliaments, working in partnership with other organizations, to build ICT capacity. To achieve this, however, the Global Centre will require financial and other resources. We therefore call on countries and partners to provide continued support and cooperation to the Global Centre. For its part, the Board will strengthen its representativeness, visibility and leadership in advancing the objectives of the Global Centre.” (ref: excerpt from the Board Proceedings).
The conference also provided the opportunity to officially present the World e-Parliament Report 2012, which draws attention to the newest technology trends and the persistent digital divide between parliaments in countries according to income and infrastructure level, and calls upon parliaments that have developed advanced use of technology to continue to share their know-how and tools with other parliaments.
It was highly symbolic that the closing day of the World e-Parliament Conference coincided with the International Day of Democracy as over the last six years the Global Centre for ICT in Parliament demonstrated the natural link between democracy, parliaments and new technologies.
The observance was celebrated by the formal launch of a ‘Declaration on Parliamentary Openness’ and by a concluding session on “tolerance and peace” to which participated the President of the IPU, the Speakers of the National Assembly of Niger, the Council of States of Sudan, the National Assembly of Suriname, the House of Representatives of Malaysia and the Senate of Trinidad and Tobago, together with the Vice Presidents of the Senate of Italy, the Chamber of Deputies of Italy, the House of Representatives of Nigeria, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Italy and the ASG of DESA.
On the second day of the expert group meeting on empowerment taking place in New York on 10-12 September, it was time for the experts to answer questions from DESA’s online community
“The questions were sound, they were provocative, they reflected concerns,” said John Mathiason of Cornell University, commending the engagement and participation on Facebook and Twitter. “This is actually quite precedent setting. The UN has not done this before. One interesting thing about empowerment is that you got to engage participation. When people both looked at Facebook and made their presentations on Facebook, Twitter and the survey, they were actually demonstrating that you can have empowerment of people who are far away,” Mr. Mathiason added.
More than 20 experts from all over the world gathered in New York this week to focus on how to empower people to eradicate poverty and to promote social integration and decent work for all. They represented various organizations including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Finland, the Institute of Development Studies from the UK, Human Sciences Research Council in South Africa, Youth Development and Civil Society in Jordan, NGO Committee for Social Development, the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, FAO and ILO.
“Empowerment is critical to poverty eradication and to development. Indeed, I would even say that any long-term solution to poverty must start with empowerment,” said DESA’s Under-Secretary-General Mr. Wu Hongbo at the opening of the expert group meeting on 10 September.
Leading up to the meeting, DESA and its Division for Social Policy and Development (DSPD) opened an online forum on Facebook to collect input and questions on empowerment from across the globe. And the engagement level was high.
“How are people aware that they are empowered?” read one of the questions. Mr. Clem McCartney of Club de Madrid, answered, “It is important that we have a sense that we can pursue our aspirations, not necessarily that we can achieve them, but that we can pursue them, with that sense I think we have the beginning of being empowered”, he said, also underscoring the importance of people feeling that they are being listened to.
Ms. Deepa Narayan, Advisor on poverty, gender and development, highlighted the importance of the right to choose and having access to information. “If a woman doesn’t have information about the availability of contraceptives, there is no way she can choose to spread out the birth of her children, or to stop having children”, she said. Ms. Narayan also discussed the right to negotiate. “It is not just a passive receiving of information, but actively using this information to negotiate changes that impact poverty.”
Concerns were raised via the online forum bringing to light the challenge to empower people if social services, budget allocation, in developing countries are cut. Ms. Sylvia Beales from HelpAge International in the UK, responded saying, “people can feel their power by organizing to get information, by organizing to know what exactly is available, and to seek change and to self-help.” She also mentioned that there are many examples around the world of citizens monitoring, which involves people organizing and negotiating for change.
These were only a few examples of the questions answered during the meeting, arranged as part of the preparations for the 51st session of the Commission for Social Development, scheduled to take place in February 2013. For the full question and answer session with the experts, check out the video posted with this story and the social media Q&A.
It is clear judging from the online engagement level that the question of empowerment is close to peoples’ hearts. Mr. Wu Hongbo also underscored its significance as he addressed the meeting, “going forward, let us be very clear: Empowerment is a key means to achieving sustainable development and other vital goals. But it also has a value in and of itself. We must not lose sight of the need to empower all individuals and groups on our shared planet.”
What does empowerment mean to you? The Division for Social Policy and Development of DESA (DSPD/DESA) has launched an online survey from 8 August to 5 September and wants to hear from you
Take the survey now and make sure that your recommendations are heard by the Commission for Social Development (CSocD).
Empowerment is not new to the United Nations. But what does empowerment mean? There is a growing consensus that it involves two things: active participation and the institutional structure that makes this happen. But when we say active participation, we mean something very specific. People who are not free to participate in their economies and do not receive equal benefits nor control their own destinies. What we mean by empowerment is participation of people in decision-making, about their futures, their current conditions and the environment in which they live.
Because of its importance, the Commission for Social Development (CSocD) has selected promoting empowerment of people in achieving poverty eradication, social integration and full employment and decent work for all as its priority theme for 2013-2014.
To promote and support this theme, DSPD/DESA has launched an online survey until 5 September 2012 for you to make recommendations to the work of the 51st session of the Commission for Social Development (CSocD).
More details on the survey, an upcoming expert group meeting and related online events on empowerment are also highlighted in the DESA News story Empowering people to advance development
A high-level expert group meeting on “Promoting people’s empowerment in achieving poverty eradication, social integration and full employment and decent work for all” will be arranged in New York on 10-12 September
Organized by DESA’s Division for Social Policy and Development (DSPD), the meeting is part of the preparations for the 51st session of the Commission for Social Development, scheduled to take place in New York in February 2013.
The meeting is convened in the context of draft Resolution 1 in the Report of the Commission for Social Development in which the Economic and Social Council decided that the priority theme for the 2013-2014 review and policy cycle should be “Promoting empowerment of people in achieving poverty eradication, social integration and full employment and decent work for all”.
The outcomes of the meeting will provide important inputs to the work of the Commission, in particular contributing to the formulation of policies that have been shown to have a major impact on efforts to promote people’s empowerment.
On 26 July, DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) hosted an in-house seminar on Open Government Data (OGD)
Andrew Nicklin and Girish Chhugani from New York City’s Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications in charge of the NYC Open Data portal, presented how open datasets are used in the city and the benefits of open data competitions for residents. They also gave an indication of some future projects about open data in the city.
NYC Open Data Portal collects public data generated by New York City agencies and makes it available for public use. Most recently, at the 2012 UN Public Service Awards, Open data was cited as having contributed to NYC311, the City of New York’s customer service, which was awarded the first place in Category 2: “Improving the Delivery of Public Services”.
The Annual Conference of the International Association of Schools and Institutes of Administration (IASIA) took place in Bangkok, Thailand on 16-21 July
As part of an agreed program and outputs of its work, DESA and IASIA joined the International Task Force on “Strengthening public administration at local level for the achievement of the development agendas” and agreed to carry out regional research on the status of public administration in local governments.
The report on the research will initially be presented and discussed during the Commonwealth Local Governments Forum in Kampala, Uganda, in 2013 and thereafter in June 2013, at the IASIA conference in Bahrain. In Bahrain, the task force will further discuss and consolidate the report, also including input from the Kampala meeting.
This was agreed after the task force met during the annual conference of the IASIA in Bangkok.
The Second Session of the United Nations Committee of Experts on Global Geospatial Information Management (GGIM) will be held at UN Headquarters in New York on 13-15 August
The official announcement of the second session has been communicated to all the Permanent Missions to the United Nations. It will bring together government experts from all Member States to consult and deliberate on a number of substantive activities.
Issues to be addressed include the implications of the Rio+20 Conferance, the strategic considerations of future trends in geospatial information management (the five-to-ten-year vision) and the drafting of a statement of ethics for the global geospatial information community. The session is also expected to discuss the development of a knowledge base for geospatial information and to study the status of mapping in the world.
The UN Forum on Forests Secretariat (UNFF) has launched a short film contest together with Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival and leading nature filmmakers to highlight vital role of forests (Deadline: 15 December 2012)
Everyone is invited to take part in this first-ever global multimedia initiative. One that will unite 200 million people in 193 countries to remind all of us just how vital forests are.
Forests for People is a short film contest that invites people from every part of the world, to create and share a personal film about their own relationship to the forest. How it inspires you. Shelters you. Nurtures you. Contributes to your life, or even makes life possible.
The contest was launched with a campaign film featuring Oscar-winning director Nick Park, Emmy winners Dereck and Beverly Joubert, acclaimed photographer Cristina Mittermeier, distinguished nature director Alastair Fothergill, pioneering cinematographers Louis Schwartzberg and S. Nallamuthu, renowned director/photographer and GoodPlanet founder Yann Arthus-Bertrand, and British film icon John Boorman with his son Charley, who is also a UNICEF ambassador.
How you make your film is entirely up to you. Use whatever you have to tell your story in 90 seconds or less. Every type of media, from video cameras to mobile footage, animation to photos, is welcome. You don’t have to be a professional filmmaker. The more stories that are told, the richer and more diverse our portrait will be.
How to enter
Once you’ve created your film, entering it is easy. Just upload your film to YouTube, then complete the short entry form, which will ask you for the YouTube link to your film. Each film entry will open a unique window on our diverse human connections to the forest. Together, they will help everyone see the forests in a compelling new light.
Judging and finalists
After the contest ends on 15 December 2012, an international jury will select 15 semi-finalist and five finalist films to be premiered at the April 2013 meeting of the United Nations Forum on Forests in Istanbul, and at the 2013 Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival. Ther five finalists will also be invited to attend the film premiere at the United Nations Forum on Forests meeting in Istanbul, with travel support to be provided. All semi-finalists and finalists will be contacted after the judging is complete.
The Tenth UN Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names (UNCSGN) will be held at UN Headquarters in New York on 31 July-9 August
In conjunction with the 10th UNCSGN, the 27th Session of the UN Group of Experts on Geographical Names (UNGEGN) will be held on 30 July-10 August, one day prior and one day after the Tenth United Nations Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names.
The UNCSGN is held every five years, and UNGEGN meets between the Conferences to follow up the implementation of resolutions adopted and to ensure continuity of activities between Conferences.
The primary objective of the Conference is to encourage national and international geographical names standardization, to promote the international dissemination of nationally standardized geographical names information, and to adopt single Romanization systems for the conversion of each non-Roman writing system to the Roman alphabet.
A panel discussion entitled “Cooperatives and the Role of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs)” was arranged on 6 June
The event was hosted by DESA’s Division for Social Policy and Development (DSPD), as part of the 2012 UN International Year of Cooperatives, highlighting the contribution cooperatives make to poverty reduction, employment generation and social integration.
Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are defined as technologies that facilitate communication and the processing of information by electronic means, and include everything from: radio, satellite, television to telephones, computers and the Internet.
The panel discussion examined the role of ICTs in improving efficiency in the cooperative movement and themes surrounding the impact ICTs have on cooperatives and the challenges associated with ICT implementation.
Ms. Felice Llamas, from DSPD moderated the discussions and said, “ICT’s are transforming co-operatives by expanding the scope of potential networks and deepening existing networks through more consistent communication.”
The 8th working level meeting of the UN Group on the Information Society (UNGIS) took place on 15 May in Geneva
The meeting was chaired by UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) with attendance of representatives from International Telecommunication Union (ITU), UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), UN Development Programme (UNDP), DESA, UN Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), UN regional economic and social development commission in Western Asia (UN-ESCWA), UNWOMEN, World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), and the World Bank.
The participants reviewed the implementation of the work plan for 2011-2012 and discussed coordination mechanisms to improve the efficiency of UNGIS. The full report and presentation is available on the UNGIS website.
The work plan 2012-2013 was adopted with the focus on coordination, monitoring and facilitation of information sharing and promotion the UN role in building the Information Society.
The next high-level UNGIS meeting will be organized by UNESCO in Paris on 25-27 February 2013. DPADM through DESA was elected the Vice-chair of UNGIS for a second term until December 2013.
An expert group meeting will take place in New York from 11-13 June to finalize the Trial International Classification of Activities for Time-Use Statistics (ICATUS).
The purpose of the trial classification is to assist countries interested in embarking on time-use studies by providing the structure of a classification which could be adapted to national circumstances and facilitate international comparisons. This trial international classification can be used by both developing and developed countries in their time-use surveys.
Classification of activities for time-use statistics was first flagged at the 28th session of the Statistical Commission in 1995. By 1997, the UN Statistics Division had convened its first expert group meeting to prepare a draft classification.
Based on the experience of countries who used or adapted this classification, as well as on recommendations from a second expert group meeting organized in 2000, a revised version was issued and published in the ‘Guide to Producing Statistics on Time Use: Measuring Paid and Unpaid Work (United Nations, 2005’) entitled ‘UN Trial International Classification of Activities for Time-Use Statistics (ICATUS)’.
This June expert group meeting, organized by the UN DESA’s Statistics Division, will bring together around 20 national and international experts to discuss and agree on several topics including:
the updates of the current categories;
the consistency of ICATUS with the new international standards classification;
the treatment of more complex aspects (categories such as “looking for work” or “waiting”);
the mapping (correspondence tables) between ICATUS and other existing classifications.
The final agreed classification will be presented to the UN Statistical Commission for endorsement in 2013, after review by the Expert Group on International Economic and Social Classifications.
An expert group meeting centered on the gaps in the human rights of the elderly will be held in New York from 29-31 May.
The meeting, hosted by UN DESA Social Policy and Development Division and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, will debate the nature of gaps in international human rights provisions relating to the rights of older persons and identify the protection measures required to address them.
Attended not only by the expert delegates themselves, the meeting is open to representatives of Member States and civil society organizations as observers and aims at informing the debate from a substantive human rights perspective by addressing urgent and relevant gaps in the respect, protection and fulfillment of human rights of older persons. More specifically, the meeting aims to debate the nature of gaps in international human rights instruments as they relate to the rights of older persons, in particular normative gaps, and to identify protection measures required to address them.
Outcomes from the expert group meeting will feed into the third working session of the General Assembly open-ended working group on ageing. The third working session will continue to focus on strengthening the protection of human rights for the elderly and will be held from 21-24 August 2012.
The first Youth Forum took place on 4 May under the theme “Creating a Sustainable Future: Empowering Youth with Better Job Opportunities”.
“Young people are the future of our societies. As such, they should also be part of solutions,” the Vice President of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), Luis Alfonso de Alba, told participants at the first YouthForum, hosted by ECOSOC. “Creating a sustainable future means empowering youth with better job opportunities – and it means giving young people a voice.”
The forum, whose theme is “Empowering Youth with Better Job Opportunities,” brought together young delegates and entrepreneurs, students and representatives of youth non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Participants took part in two interactive dialogues, the first one focusing on education and training, and the second on the creation of green jobs and the conditions needed to create them. In her address to participants, Deputy Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro stressed that youth are mobilizing like never before and that their ideas can help countries achieve their sustainable development objectives.
Currently, young people are three times as likely as adults to be unemployed. In Europe nearly one in four young people are out of a job, and in North Africa and the Middle East youth unemployment is almost 30 per cent, the highest worldwide. Mr. de Alba highlighted that in addition to a high rate of unemployment, it is important to look at underemployment and vulnerable employment, as many young people are on precarious short-term contracts, or trapped in low-skill and poorly paid jobs.
The Forum was attended by youth representatives from around the world as well as Member States, representatives from the private sector, the academic community, and civil society organizations that are engaged in youth issues. Key messages and recommendations arising from the Forum will be presented at the Rio+20 Conference in June, and the Council’s own High-Level Segment in July.
The event was organized by DESA (Office for ECOSOC Support and Coordination in collaboration with Division for Social Policy and Development) and the Department of Public Information (UN Academic Impact).
A Seminar on the Economist Democracy Index methodology took place 24 April with Mr. Robert Wood, Senior Editor of the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU).
The Economist Intelligence Unit offers forecasting and advisory services to its clients. It provides country, industry and management analysis worldwide. It is particularly well known for its monthly country reports, five-year country economic forecasts, country risk service reports, and industry reports.
In this event, hosted by the UN DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM), Robert Wood presented the main features of the methodologies used by the EIU team for assessing and rating country risks and economic forecasts. He also explained how the political factors are taken into consideration on country analysis. This event was a great opportunity for the participants from the Division and other UN agencies to ask questions and exchange ideas. Mr. Wood expressed his intentions to further collaborate with the Division on public governance and also invited the EIU’s team to consider e-government aspects in EIU’s future analysis in regards to participatory governance and transparency.
DESA collaborated in a research project on citizen engagement of the oversight work of parliaments of Ghana, India and South Africa.
The research aims to explore how committees of parliaments utilize formal mechanisms of civil engagement to monitor public service delivery and strengthen accountability on public spending. It is conducted by the New York University’s Wagner School of Public Service in collaboration with the Division of Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM). Three teams of graduate students made field research in these countries in January 2012, and they shared their findings with the Division.
Research findings common to the three countries are:
Public engagement often occurs through informal or ad-hoc channels and
although principles of inclusion are enshrined in the countries’ constitutions and laws, citizen engagement is difficult to track in public service oversight mechanisms.
The research also highlighted the role of civil society organization in bridging the gap between citizens and government, and how the Public Account Committees of Parliaments have very little interaction with the citizens.
The next steps in the DPADM /Wagner School collaboration will be the publication of a report of the findings and the launch of a new phase of research, an expanded research to include the countries with systems of government other than the Prim Minister-parliament, and an expanded research to include the representative function of parliaments, and focus on specific regions, including the Arab region.
An Expert Group Meeting on “Good Practices in Family Policy Making”, will be held in New York from 15 to 17 May 2012.
This expert Group Meeting is entitled “Good Practices in Family Policy Making: Family Policy Development, Monitoring and Implementation: Lessons Learnt”. The main issues to be discussed will be family policy making, work-family balance, recent trends in family poverty and social exclusion, anti-poverty family-focused policies, as well as social integration and intergenerational solidarity. The meeting is convened as part of preparations for the twentieth anniversary of the International Year of the Family in 2014.
Strategies promoting social integration and intergenerational solidarity are critical for families and societies. They promote social cohesion and shared responsibility and contribute to developing positive relationships across age groups and have been shown to strengthen the quality of ties between family members. In times of economic crises, intergenerational ties grow in importance, with family members shielding one another from the consequences of the loss of employment or housing.
Flexible working arrangements result in better health outcomes for parents. At a company level, they have also been associated with employee productivity, organizational commitment, retention, moral, job satisfaction and reductions in absenteeism. Investments in early childhood education and care are another form of support for parents with young children to help them remain engaged in paid work. In addition, other policy objectives such as gender equality and fair distribution of family responsibilities between both parents help achieve work-life balance for all family members.
The Internet Governance Forum (IGF) will hold Open Consultations and a meeting of the Multistakeholder Advisory Group (MAG) from 15 to 17 May 2012 in Geneva, Switzerland.
Today we see a growing emphasis on technical measures to address concerns about the online market for counterfeit goods and digital copyright infringement, as well as ever stronger demands to enlist Internet intermediaries as the instrument of law enforcement. These trends are emerging in States of all political persuasions, and are paralleled by longer-standing efforts to limit or control free speech in the political and social realms. All stakeholders have responsibility to ensure that everyone has the right to create, access, use and share information and knowledge in the digital realm. The IGF 2012 should look at the impacts of all topics on the free flow of information in a cross-cutting way while engaging participants on the various dimensions of the issues.
The Open Consultations and the meeting of the Multistakeholder Advisory Group (MAG) will focus on discussions on the programme, workshops and schedule of the 2012 IGF meeting that will take place in Baku, Azerbaijan on “Internet Governance for Sustainable Human, Economic and Social Development”. Mr. Elmir Velizadeh, Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Communication and Information Technologies of the Republic of Azerbaijan will chair the meetings. The MAG currently consists of 56 Members from governments, the private sector and civil society, intergovernmental organisations including representatives from the academic and technical communities
The 7th Facilitation Meeting on implementing the outcomes of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) will be held on 17 May 2012 in Geneva.
Participants will exchange information and discuss progress in implementing three of the 11 WSIS Action Lines: the role of public governance authorities and all stakeholders in the promotion of ICT for development (Action Line C1); ICT applications – e-government (action Line C7); and international and regional cooperation (Action Line C11).
The purpose of the Seventh Facilitation Meeting, which is open to all stakeholders from the public and private sectors, the civil society, the international organizations, is to provide a platform for participants to exchange information and experiences; to identify the propriety areas for implementation within the Action Lines; and to create synergies among different stakeholders for more effective knowledge sharing and collaboration in order to ensure the implementation of WSIS at the international, regional and national levels. The Division of Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) is organising this Facilitation Meeting.
The 7th Meeting of the Advisory Expert Group on National Accounts will be held from 23 to 25 April in New York.
The System of National Accounts (SNA) is the internationally agreed standard set of recommendations on how to compile measures of economic activity. This meeting aims to resolve issues on the research agenda of SNA and to review documents and tools for the SNA implementation programme. The United Nations Statistical Commission established the Advisory Expert Group on National Accounts (AEG) to support the Inter Secretariat Working Group on National Accounts (ISWGNA) in carrying out its work programme.
At its 7th meeting, the AEG will consider issues such as the ISWGNA programme of work for the period up to 2014, current research issues and the provision of further guidance on the implementation of the 2008 SNA, review of the SNA research agenda, review of compilation guidance drafted by ISWGNA members, the development of training material on the SNA, issues related to the implementation of the System of National Accounts and the ongoing work in the broader remits of national accounts.
As part of the preparatory process for the 2012 ECOSOC Annual Ministerial Review, UNDESA held an e-discussion on “Jobs, Decent Work and Inclusive Growth”
The e-discussion, held from 8 February to 14 March in collaboration with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and International Labour Organization (ILO) served as an open, multi-stakeholder forum for practitioners, academic experts and policy-makers to share new ideas and formulate critical policy messages to the UN intergovernmental decision-making process in response to the global jobs crisis.
This year, Mr. Stephen Pursey (ILO) and Mr. Selim Jahan (UNDP) facilitated the e-discussion as expert moderators, guiding participants through a range of issues including (1) the role of decent work in recovering from the recent crises, (2) successful micro, small and medium enterprise (MSME) development, and (3) inclusive employment policies and programmes, specifically for women and youth. Over 140 contributions were submitted during the five-week discussion period. The summary report synthesizing the recommendations and best practices discussed by participants will feed directly into the Annual Ministerial Review being held in New York during ECOSOC’s Substantive Session in July.
The 2012 Annual Ministerial Review (AMR) e-discussion on “Jobs, Decent Work and Inclusive Growth” runs from 8 February to 14 March
UN DESA is currently hosting this e-discussion in partnership with the UN Development Programme (UNDP) and the International Labor Organization (ILO). It is an open, multi-stakeholder space for experts, practitioners and policy-makers to discuss a series of questions pertaining to the AMR theme. Mr. Stephen Pursey (ILO) and Mr. Selim Jahan (UNDP) are serving as expert moderators, leading participants through a discussion of public policies and strategies to support aggregate demand, foster enterprise development, create decent jobs and ensure inclusive growth.
The recommendations that emerge from the e-discussion will feed into the preparations for the 2012 AMR. If you are not already a member of UNDG’s MDG-Net, UNDP Poverty Reduction Network, Gender or Human Development Report Networks and would like to participate, please register by sending a request to support.amr@unteamworks.org.
2012 Annual Ministerial Review (AMR) regional meeting will be arranged in Addis Ababa on 25 March focusing on “Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) as drivers of productive capacity and job creation”
AMR is a function of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) with the purpose of assessing progress made towards the MDGs and the implementation of other goals and targets agreed at major UN conferences and summits, forming the UN development agenda. It also aims at contributing to scaling-up and accelerating action to realize the development agenda, by serving as global high-level forum with broad-based participation, where lessons learned are exchanged and successful practices and approaches that merit scaling-up are identified.
The meeting in Addis Ababa is organized by UN DESA, jointly with the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and the International Labor Organization, within the context of the Fifth Joint Meeting, African Union Conferences of Ministers of Economy and Finance and ECA Conference of African Ministers of Finance, Planning and Economic Development, to be held from 22-27 March.
The outcomes of the meeting will be presented during the ECOSOC high-level segment to be held in New York in July 2012.
The 2012 United Nations Public Service Awards (UNPSA) has seen an unprecedented number of 471 nominations, marking a 58% increase in comparison to 2011 and over 100% growth since 2010
The United Nations Public Service Awards (UNPSA) is the most prestigious international recognition of excellence in public service. It rewards the creative achievements and contributions of public service institutions that lead to a more effective and responsive public administration in countries worldwide. Through an annual competition, the UN Public Service Awards promotes the role, professionalism and visibility of public service.
The 2012 UNPSA has seen a record number of nominations. Member State participation has also increased from 57 in 2011 to 73, including 16 countries partaking for the first time, almost doubling Member State involvement which was 39 in 2008.
The 2012 UNPSA programme has been accepting nominations from 15 September to 31 December 2011 and are now going through the first amongst a series of evaluations which will culminate in the final evaluation to be done by the UN Committee of Experts on Public Administration (CEPA) in April 2012.
The increase in the number of nominations can largely be attributed to the intensive and innovative communication and outreach strategy employed by the UNPSA team which has engaged the Permanent Missions to the UN through three briefing sessions and continuous open communication, prepared material for the delegates, who attended the 66th Session of the General Assembly, and collaborated with multiple partners at regional and national levels to sensitize public institutions in their regions.
On 7 February, the Economic and Social Council with support from UN DESA’s Office for ECOSOC Support and Coordination arranged an “Interactive dialogue on the current economic and financial situation”
“Clouds are particularly dark over developed economies,” remarked Mr. Rob Vos, Director of the Development Policy and Analysis Division of UN DESA while moderating the event featuring distinguished economists sharing their views on the current global economic and financial situation.
At the outset of the discussion, the President of the Council and Chair of the ECOSOC Special Briefing, H.E. Mr. Miloš Koterec (Slovakia) also stated, “With growing inequality within and among countries, it is my view that the current development model needs to be revisited… Studies estimate that the global crisis has caused between 47 million and 84 million persons to fall into or remain trapped in poverty. Furthermore, prolonged unemployment affects medium-term growth prospects due to its impact on workers’ income and skills. I believe that a more inclusive and balanced growth strategy should be adopted in order to address these challenges.”
The objective of the event was to allow UN Member States to better understand the systemic and other challenges facing the global economy and explore possible policy responses. The panellists addressed three main topical subjects: what major structural fragilities still exist in the global economy and their implications for recovery; what alternative development models there are for sustainable, equitable and inclusive growth and job creation; and what are the most appropriate arrangements are for effective global policy coordination to mitigate uncertainties.
The panellists included Peter Diamond, Institute Professor and Professor of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and 2010 Nobel Economics Laureate, and Carmen Reinhart, Senior Fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics.
A special event was arranged within the Fiftieth session of the Commission for Social Development on 3 February
The event was jointly organized by UN DESA’s divisions Financing for Development Office (FfDO) and the Division for Social Policy and Development in line with the General Assembly resolution “Follow-up to the International Conference on Financing for Development”. The panel discussion was chaired by the Vice-Chair of the Commission, Mr. Mohamed Ibrahim Elbahi (Sudan) and moderated by Mr. Alex Trepelkov, Director of FfDO.
Emphasis was placed on the importance of resource mobilization for social development, as sufficient financial resources are critical to achieve progress in such key social areas as poverty eradication, job creation, education, health, social inclusion, food security and reduction of inequalities. In order to strengthen financing of social development, challenges resulting from the recent global financial and economic crisis and the food and energy crises need to be addressed.
It is also necessary to tackle long-term, structural bottlenecks. In this context, enhancing domestic resource mobilization, including through effective tax systems, is of critical importance. At the same time, domestic efforts need to be complemented by international resources, such as ODA, innovative financing mechanisms, FDI, trade, migrant workers’ remittances and debt relief.
The panel discussion featured four panelists. Mr. Elliot Harris, IMF Special Representative to the UN, assessed comparative advantages of various types of financing for social purposes and suggested to use external financing predominantly for finite projects with measureable results.
Ms. Christine Bockstal, Chief, Technical Cooperation and Country Operations Group, Social Security Department, ILO, presented findings of the CEB Social Protection Floor Advisory Group, according to which some degree of basic income security that ensures access to essential goods and services for everybody was affordable at all levels of development.
Ms. Eva-Maria Hanfstaengl, Director, Social Justice in Global Development, stressed the role of domestic resource mobilization, including through progressive taxation, taxes on capital gains, and repatriating stolen assets. Mr. Elias Eljuri Abraham, President, National Institute of Statistics, Venezuela, highlighted experiences from his country in reducing poverty and inequality through public investments in key social areas such as housing, employment, education and health.
In the ensuing discussion, participants followed up on some issues raised by the panelists, including feasibility of social protection floors, introduction of financial transactions tax and policies to reduce inequalities. Some participants also supported the creation of a Commission on Financing for Development and the upgrading of the UN Committee of Experts on International Cooperation in Tax Matters to an intergovernmental body.
In his closing statement, the Chair identified four key messages of the special event:
(i) in the face of multiple crises, both developed and developing countries need to scale up social spending;
(ii) countries need to channel their recent prosperity into a more ambitious social development agenda;
(iii) countries should prioritize social protection financing; and
(iv) it is important to further strengthen financial inclusion and the role of cooperatives.
The Internet Governance Forum (IGF) will hold Open Consultations and a meeting of the Multi-Stakeholder Advisory Group (MAG) on 14-16 February in Geneva, Switzerland
The meetings will take stock of the Nairobi 2011 IGF annual meeting and focus on discussions on the programme and schedule of the 2012 IGF meeting that will take place in Baku, Azerbaijan. Mr. Elmir Velizadeh, Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Communication and Information Technologies of the Republic of Azerbaijan will chair the meetings.
The MAG currently consists of 55 Members from governments, the private sector and civil society, intergovernmental organisations including representatives from the academic and technical communities.
ECOSOC will hold an exclusive event, “Breaking new ground: Partnerships for more and better jobs for young people” on 27 February from 3:00 to 6:00 p.m. at UN Headquarters in New York
This event will serve as part of the preparatory process for the ECOSOC’s 2012 Annual Ministerial Review (AMR) on “Promoting productive capacity, employment and decent work to eradicate poverty in the context of inclusive, sustainable and equitable economic growth at all levels for achieving the MDGs”, and is organized by UN DESA and the International Labour Organization (ILO), in collaboration with the UN Office for Partnerships (UNOP) and the United Nations Global Compact.
The event will seek to strengthen the partnership between governments, the private sector and the philanthropic community in advancing youth employment and decent work. The themes to be explored will include issues affecting policy setting for youth employment and innovations for promoting youth employment. The outcome of the deliberations will be submitted to the Member States during the ECOSOC High-level session in July 2012.
The programme will consist of an opening plenary, to be followed by two leadership dialogues on “Innovations in promoting youth employment” and “Creating a new dynamic for youth at work”. The key outcomes of the exclusive event will be to provide increased focus to issues central to the achievement of promoting youth employment and decent work for all, through:
broadening of the range of stakeholders involved in the work of ECOSOC, as well as increasing the awareness amongst the philanthropic community on the progress made and the challenges faced in achieving MDG 1;
promoting concrete initiatives by the philanthropic community and initiating new partnerships that would accelerate progress in reaching the targets in MDG 1; and
expanding multi-stakeholder engagement in the international community’s efforts to help advance the achievement of the two priority areas mentioned above.
The event has a number of co-convenors dedicated to strengthening multi-stakeholder partnerships in support of youth employment, including UNDP, UNICEF, UNFPA, the World Bank, Committee Encouraging Corporate Philanthropy, Clinton Global Initiative, Princes Youth Business International, United Nations Foundation, Young Americas Business Trust, Youth Employment Network and the Youth Employment Summit.
After a presentation made by Mr. Tomasz Janowski, Senior Research Fellow, UN University – International Institute for Software Technology (UNU-IIST) on 10 January, the Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) and UNU-IIST agreed to collaborate
The presentation introduced the concept of electronic governance for sustainable development (EGOV4SD) by systematically mapping the sustainable development (SD) and EGOV domains and presenting examples from around the world on how EGOV is being applied to advance the social, environmental, economic and transitional SD goals.
It explained the fundamental challenges in realizing the transition from EGOV to EGOV4SD and proposed an international research, development, monitoring and education agenda to address such challenges. Haiyan Qian thanked Mr. Janowski for the presentation, noting that the research findings of UNU-IIST were in line with DPADM’s work in the context of the UN E-Government Survey 2012: E-Government for Sustainable Development.
The collaboration will focus on: (i) strengthening the UN E-Government Survey platform by providing DPADM data as a benchmarking resource specifically for policy makers to carry out selection which will enable the creation of an instrument to reflect local conditions and priorities, and (ii) developing a Global Chief Information Officer (CIO) curriculum for the UN Member States based on the joint research of UNDESA/DPADM and UNU-IIST.
On 22 December 2011, the General Assembly adopted the resolution A/66/437 on “Information and communications technologies for development”, recognizing the important roles of e-government, enhanced cooperation on public policy issues pertaining to the Internet and the Internet Governance Forum (IGF)
The resolution mentions UN DESA particularly, taking note of the department’s work in the area of enhanced cooperation on public policy issues pertaining to the Internet (for the first time for this particular topic). The resolution also acknowledges the positive trends of e-government among others (also for the first time) and stresses the important role of governments in the design of their national public policies and in the provision of public services responsive to national needs and priorities through, inter alia, the effective use of information and communication technologies.
In addition, the resolution appreciates the role of the United Nations Group on the Information Society (UNGIS) as an inter-agency mechanism designed to coordinate the United Nations implementation of the outcomes of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). DESA is currently a Vice–Chair of UNGIS, together with ITU as Chair and UNESCO as another Vice-Chair.
The World Economic Situation and Prospects (WESP) 2012 was launched on multi-city locations on 17, 18 and 19 January, followed by a live Facebook chat on 20 January on the world economy
The world economy is teetering on the brink of another major downturn. As in 2008, economic woes in the major developed economies are weakening economic prospects around the world. This and other findings were presented as DESA’s flagship report the World Economic Situation and Prospects (WESP) 2012 was launched on 17 January in Addis Ababa, Beijing, Geneva, Johannesburg, Moscow and New Delhi. Regional releases of the report followed in Mexico City on 18 January; and in Bangkok and Beirut on 19 January.
There are multiple concerns, but policymakers throughout Europe and the United States are mainly fixated on reducing large fiscal deficits and public debt. The concerns are serious, and the ongoing sovereign debt crises in the euro zone have been a source of continuous turmoil in financial markets.
Unfortunately, the present policy responses are highly inadequate. Most developed economies have phased out stimulus measures and shifted to fiscal austerity. With unemployment rates remaining very high and financial sectors still clogged, this approach is pulling the plug on the recovery by exacerbating the lack of aggregate demand, further weakening the prospects for jobs recovery and economic development in the longer run.
Bleaker medium and long-term growth prospects would also undermine the financial sustainability of health and pension systems over time, thus achieving precisely the opposite of what policymakers are aiming at through fiscal austerity.
Is there an alternative? Yes. As shown in the WESP 2012, many developed countries have more than adequate fiscal space for additional stimulus. If well targeted at job creation and green growth and adequately coordinated internationally, additional stimulus could quicken the recovery and put the global economy on a more balanced and sustainable growth path.
In conjunction with the launch of the report, the Development Policy and Analysis Division (DPAD) of UN DESA organized a live chat on Facebook to answer questions concerning the risks and opportunities for the world economy, as well as the scope for policy action in the year ahead. The online chat was led by Rob Vos, Director of DPAD, and included economists from the Global Economic Monitoring Unit.
A three-day expert group meeting was held in New York on the theme “Combating violence against indigenous women and girls: article 22 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples” on 18-20 January
Throughout the world, indigenous women and girls are exposed to diverse forms of physical, psychological and sexual violence. This is a significant obstacle to the capacity and potential of indigenous women and girls to exercise their rights to participate fully in society.
This pressing reality, as detailed in the concept note prepared by the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous issues, laid the foundation for the three-day international expert group meeting.
Ms. Daniela Bas, Director of DESA’s Division for Social Policy and Development (DSPD) highlighted the fact that this meeting is the “first one addressing the issue of violence against indigenous women and girls.” Ms. Bas went on to say that it “shows that the Permanent Forum is addressing an issue that is critical and resonates with governments, indigenous peoples and the UN system.”
The Expert Group meeting was attended by experts on indigenous issues, members of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, participants from the UN system, Member States, indigenous peoples and other organizations.
The attendees discussed the way in which the UNPFII should address its mandate under Article 22 of the Declaration which ensures that indigenous women and children enjoy the full protection and guarantees against all forms of violence and discrimination.
During the meeting, the “experts will analyze the human rights enshrined within international standards and policies and will indicate how these respond to the challenge of advancing the rights of indigenous women and girls”, said Ms. Chandra Roy-Henriksen, Chief, Secretariat of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.
The results of the meeting will be reported to the Permanent Forum at its eleventh session in May, to the General Assembly at its sixty-seventh session starting in September and to the Commission on the Status of Women at its fifty-sixth session beginning on 27 February.
International expert group meeting will take place at UN Headquarters in New York from 18 to 20 January
This Expert Group Meeting is being organized following a recommendation of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII), approved by ECOSOC and which authorizes a three-day international expert group meeting on the theme “Combating violence against indigenous women and girls: article 22 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples”.
It has been requested that the results of the meeting be reported to the Permanent Forum at its eleventh session, to the General Assembly at its sixty-seventh session and to the Commission on the Status of Women at its fifty-sixth session in 2012. The meeting will discuss the way in which the UNPFII should address its mandate under Article 22 of the Declaration.
It will be attended by indigenous experts and UNPFII members as well as interested Member States, UN Agencies and Indigenous Peoples’ Organizations.
Expert Group Meeting on Strengthening the NVP Process through the Development of an Analytical Framework and Regional Knowledge Networks (RKN) is taking place in New York on 30 November and 1 December
The Office for ECOSOC Support and Coordination (OESC) of DESA will convene this meeting, bringing together experts and policymakers from the NVP community, as well as representatives from governments, civil society, UN regional commissions, and other UN agencies and organizations.
The purpose is to develop and propose a standardized analytical framework for the NVP; discuss implementation arrangements to establish regional knowledge networks in Africa, Asia-Pacific, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Western Asia; strengthen capacity for NVP review and follow-up; and make recommendations to UNDESA on proposals for an NVP analytical framework and establishing Regional Knowledge Networks (RKN).
Regional consultation for Asia and the Pacific in support of the ECOSOC Annual Ministerial Review (AMR), is being arranged in Kyoto, Japan on 7 December
OESC is organizing this first regional consultation in preparation for the 2012 AMR, with the objective of undertaking a review of the overall performance of the region in achieving the development goals related to productive capacity and employment (2012 AMR theme).
Additionally, the consultation will support preparations for and enable countries to engage at an early stage in the process leading to the AMR session to be held during the ECOSOC high-level segment in New York, in July 2012.
The consultation will support the global review by focusing on aspects that could foster productive capacity and employment in the countries of the region. The outcome of this review would contribute to the analysis in support the Council’s deliberations in July, and would also feed into the preparation of the Secretary General’s report on the AMR theme.
The meeting is being held in collaboration with ILO and UNESCAP, in tandem with the ILO Regional Meeting which is taking place on 4-7 December.
Training workshop on productive capacity, employment and decent work, preparing for the 2012 Annual Ministerial Review (AMR), will be held in New York on 14 December
DESA’s Office for Economic and Social Council Support and Coordination (OESC) is organizing this training workshop for DESA staff, which will bring together experts from international organizations, academia, civil society, the private sector and foundations as resource persons.
The main objective of the workshop is to increase staff knowledge of challenges and policy options to accelerate progress towards the achievement of full and productive employment and decent work and sustained, inclusive and equitable growth and to identify key priorities to be addressed in all activities leading up to July 2012 ECOSOC substantive session.
The issues identified at the workshop will help define the focus of the different AMR preparatory events held at the global, regional and national levels. They will also serve as an important input to the report of the Secretary-General on this year’s theme, which will serve as a key input for the Ministerial Declaration to be adopted by ECOSOC at the high-level segment in July 2012.
Expert Group Meeting on the National Transfer Account Manual: Strengthening Capacity in the Production and Use of NTAs will take place in Belo Horizonte, Brazil on 6-7 December
DESA’s Population Division is organizing the meeting in collaboration with ECLAC, ESCAP and ESCWA with the main objective to improve the production and use of national transfer accounts (NTA) by national policy analysts in developing countries.
This gathering of international experts will assess NTAs as a way of addressing the socio-economic consequences of changing population age structures.
The information produced will guide national policies adapt to the changing living conditions of different generational groups, including children and the elderly. The participants will also provide feedback on the NTA manual contents for the final version.
The meeting will be held in conjunction with the 8th Annual Meeting on National Transfer Accounts to discuss intergenerational approaches to social and economic policy.
On 14-15 November, experts gathered in New York to address the mortality crises associated with violence, natural disasters, famine and the growing burden of non-communicable diseases (NCDs)
The main objective of the meeting was to review the state of the art in regard to evidence and understanding of crises that cause significant rises in mortality and to discuss how current knowledge on this issue could inform the preparation of mortality estimates.
Organized by the Population Division of UN DESA, the theme of the meeting was “Mortality Crises: Conflicts, Violence, Famine, Natural Disasters, and the Growing Burden of Non-communicable Diseases”. It brought together scholars from, among others, Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, the Harvard School of Public Health, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, the London School of Economics, John Hopkins University, the International Rescue Committee, the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the World Health Organization.
Challenges in collecting reliable data from areas in conflict and measuring mortality were addressed by Prof. Greenough of the Harvard School of Public Health. Prof. Roberts of Columbia University focused on mortality caused by the conflict in Iraq. Mr. Brunborg from Statistics Norway presented the work carried out by statisticians working for the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia to buttress the case of the prosecutors in proving the commission of genocide. Prof. Dyson of the London School of Economics talked about the effects of famines and underscored that they not only had an effect on mortality but were also related to major drops in the number of births.
Mr. Mathers of WHO presented a review of the approaches that WHO follows in integrating estimates of excess mortality associated with different crises into their overall mortality estimates. Mr. Pedersen, Research Director of FAFO, Norway, discussed the strengths and limitations of the methods presented.
The presentations were followed by a brainstorming session focusing on methodological issues whose purpose was to identify best practices and discuss whether the use of a harmonized approach was possible when the types of crises were so varied, their impact differed markedly not only between countries but also within national populations, and the nature and quality of the data available were also so different.
The major outcome of the brainstorming session was that more work was needed to assess the strengths of the approaches presented and reduce their limitations. A harmonized approach was not yet a possibility.
The meeting also focused on trends in mortality from non-communicable diseases and of the major risk factors associated with non-communicable diseases. Mr. Mathers presented the estimates currently available on trends in the major non-communicable diseases and the methodology used to assess attributable risk to the different causes of death.
There were separate presentations on the impact of cigarette smoking on mortality trends and differentials by sex in developed countries; on the effects of body weight on survivorship, and on the impact of alcohol use. Special presentations on increasing body weight and its impact on disease prevalence in China and on the different countries of Latin America and the Caribbean followed.
A major finding was that the prevalence of cigarette smoking explains the relatively slow increase in life expectancy that has prevailed in the United States in relation to other European countries and that increases in cigarette smoking among women in the United States explain the declining differences between male and female life expectancy at age 50.
The prevalence of tobacco use is also the major cause of the differences in mortality trends by sex after age 50 among European countries. In the United States, the recent success in reducing cigarette smoking is expected to improve the survival chances of people over age 50 in the next few decades.
With respect to body weight, the data presented showed that obesity was associated with higher prevalence of non-communicable disease, especially diabetes. The evidence also showed that higher mortality was associated with underweight. The lowest levels of risk of disease and death were found among the overweight, that is, the category of people with a body mass index in the category just above that considered normal.
These findings imply that there is more uncertainty about the effect that the increasing levels of body mass in developing countries may have on future mortality than there is in ascertaining the detrimental effect on survival of the increasing proportions of people in middle income countries who smoke.
Following five days of intense negotiations in Geneva at the end of October, the Committee of Experts on International Cooperation in Tax Matters adopted the 2011 Update of the UN Model Double Taxation Convention between Developed and Developing Countries
This culminated the work of the Committee over the past 10 years, since the last update of the UN Model in 2001.
This new revision of the UN Model has been long-awaited by the international community, especially by developing countries which seek assistance in negotiating modern bilateral double-tax treaties reflecting their current circumstances and policy priorities.
The UN Model Tax Convention, as well as the OECD Model Tax Convention have had a profound influence on international treaty practice. They form the basis for most of the treaties between countries, aiming at protecting taxpayers against double taxation, with a view to improving the flow of international trade and investment as well as the transfer of technology, while retaining appropriate taxing rights to Governments.
The particular aim of the UN Model is to facilitate entering of bilateral tax treaties by developing countries, which would contribute to attaining their development goals. The similarities between the models of the UN and OECD reflect the importance of achieving consistency, while the important areas of divergence reflect different memberships and priorities of the two organizations.
The UN Model generally preserves a greater share of tax revenue to the “source State”, the country where investment or other activity takes place. While the OECD Model preserves a greater share to the “residence State”, the country of the investor, trader, etc. The UN Model thus normally allows developing countries more taxing rights on income generated by foreign investments in these countries.
The main updates of the UN Model are: (1) it provides for mandatory binding arbitration (for countries wishing so) when a dispute cannot be resolved under the usual Mutual Agreement Procedure, (2) it confirms and clarifies the importance of exchange of information under the UN Model; (3) it provides the rules under which States may assist each other in tax collection; (4) it addresses possible tax evasion related to taxing capital gains; and (5) it deals with income from independent personal services in line with the OECD Model.
The Committee also addressed other important areas of its work, including the Practical Manual on Transfer Pricing for Developing Countries. The complete draft Manual is expected to be adopted at the 2012 session, providing much needed assistance to developing countries in practical application of the arm’s length principle.
It also discussed its future work, including the agenda for its 2012 session. It decided to devote substantial attention to the Manual on Transfer Pricing as well as the Manual for the Negotiation of Bilateral Tax Treaties. The Committee also decided to establish a Working Group on Tax-treaty Issues relating to Climate Change mechanisms, including Emissions Permits and Clean Development Mechanism credit. The next annual session will be held on 15-19 October 2012 in Geneva.
OESC will organize the first regional consultation in preparation for the 2012 AMR, with the objective of undertaking a review of the overall performance of the region in achieving the development goals related to productive capacity and employment (2012 AMR theme). Additionally, the consultation, which will take place on 7 December, will support preparations for and enable countries to engage at an early stage in the process leading to the AMR session to be held during the ECOSOC high-level segment in New York, in July 2012. The consultation will support the global review by focusing on aspects that could foster productive capacity and employment in the countries of the region. The outcome of this review would contribute to the analysis in support the Council’s deliberations in July, and would also feed into the preparation of the Secretary General’s report on the AMR theme. The meeting is being held in collaboration with ILO and UNESCAP, in tandem with the ILO Regional Meeting (4-7 December). (Contact person: Makiko Tagashira – tagashira@un.org tel: 212 – 963 4836)
Expert Group Meeting on Mortality Crises: Conflicts, Violence, Famine, Natural Disasters and the Growing Burden of Non-communicable Diseases will take place in New York on 14-15 November
DESA’s Population Division is organizing the meeting with the main objective to review the state of the art in regard to evidence and understanding of crises that cause significant rises in mortality levels and to initiate a discussion on how current knowledge on this issue can inform the preparation of the UN mortality estimates.
The meeting will also consider trends in mortality from non-communicable diseases with the objective of informing assumptions about future mortality trends. The meeting will consider the following topics:
(a) mortality crises associated with violence, including both outright armed conflict and low-level endemic violence;
(b) mortality crises caused by natural disasters, including tsunamis, earthquakes, floods and hurricanes as well as those caused by famines, and
(c) the growing burden of non-communicable diseases (NCDs), especially when those diseases cause excessive premature mortality or when the burden of NCDs coexists with a sizable burden from communicable diseases.
Inter-Agency Technical Meeting on Broadening Coherence and Collaboration for Rural Development through Employment and Decent Work will be held in Rome on 14-15 November
DESA’s Division for Social Policy and Development (DSPD), in partnership with the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), will organize the event, intended as a continuation and a follow up of the Inter-agency technical meeting on “Building employment and decent work into sustainable recovery and development – the UN contribution” held in Turin in November 2010.
The meeting aims at establishing a broad coherence and collaboration to set “Unleashing of rural development through employment and decent work” as a core element of national and international development strategies.
A set of complementary themes will be discussed and each session will address the following three questions:
(a) What are the relevance/potential and the challenges that need to be addressed?
(b) What are the options for action?
(c) How to build coherence and collaboration among agencies and actors based on comparative advantages?
The outcome of each session will include an identification of specific areas of collaboration, as well as a set of concrete, practical and country-level initiatives to be undertaken jointly (by two or more agencies and other institutions, including donors, participating in the technical meeting). These could be new initiatives, or initiatives building on existing ones, to enrich them or increase their outreach.
In celebration of the International Year of Forests 2011, the UN Forum on Forests Secretariat (UNFFS) is partnering with the Gabarron Foundation to organize the 2011 International Children’s Art Contest
This year’s theme, “Celebrate the Forests,” challenges children to use the power of imagery to raise awareness on the multifaceted values of forests and the role of youth in safeguarding natural resources.
The Gabarron Foundation, along with the Queen Sofia Children’s Art Museum in Spain, has been developing programs aimed at promoting diversity of arts and culture for 20 years. To date, it has collected more than 50,000 works expressing the creative spirit of children internationally.
Children between the ages of 5 and 14 are invited to submit their work through 30 December 2011. An awards ceremony for the winners will be held at the Gabarron Carriage House Center for the Arts in New York sometime in January 2012. Entries can be submitted to the Gabarron Foundation in the US, The Queen Sofia Children’s Art Museum in Spain, or by e-mail to PIRSfcg@gabarron.org
The Rio+20 Secretariat is proud to announce three inter-related initiatives, aiming at raising and mobilizing public awareness of the Rio+20 Conference and Sustainable Development
Rio+20 Messages of the World
At Rio+20, people from all over the world will gather and discuss how to best manage our common future in a sustainable and lasting way. What message would you like to echo to the world? Let us know! Either write your own message, or agree on any of the already published messages. It’s easy! Remember – the strength are in the numbers! Maybe your idea will catch on?
Rio+20 present world leaders the opportunity to create a new paradigm of sustainable lifestyles. Ensuring that our future needs can be met, and balancing our consumption with the environmental limits of the planet, is a collective effort that will impact all levels of society. What aspects of a sustainable lifestyle do you enjoy? Show us in pictures!
The Sixth Internet Governance Forum was held in Nairobi, Kenya on 27- 30 September
The Internet Governance Forum (IGF) is a multi-stakeholder event which brings together the global internet policy making community. Although it has no decision making role it has, over the years, influenced the way other fora and policy making processes have engaged with the policy debate. Thus, for example, the IGF has forged a multifaceted public policy debate around three equal pillars of security, openness and privacy.
At its 6th meeting in Nairobi, organized by DESA through Division for Public Administration & Development Management (DPADM) who provides substantive and administrative support to the IGF, in cooperation with the Government of Kenya and the UN Office, over 2000 badges were issued to participants with delegates attending from around the world; Africa (53%), WEOG (29%), Asia (11%), GRULAC (4%) and Eastern Europe (3%) including representation from 125 governments.
A core feature of any IGF meeting is the thematic workshops which are complemented by the main sessions around each of the core issues, namely Internet Governance for Development, Emerging Issues, Access and Diversity, Security, Openness and Privacy; Critical Internet Resources, Taking Stock and the Way Forward. In Nairobi over 100 of these were organized.
The theme for the sixth meeting was “Internet as a catalyst for change: access, development, freedoms and innovation”. Participants highlighted how the previous year had seen access to the Internet act as a catalyst for development of new freedoms and the delivery of innovative products and services. The debates on Internet governance for development highlighted the importance of emerging countries as centres of Internet innovations of global importance, especially with regard to services and applications, thus, ensuring that policy initiatives fully incorporated Internet governance issues for all countries, was seen as fundamental. Growth in mobile broadband access had accelerated in recent years, coupled with the increasingly pervasive smart phones, Internet access was becoming a reality for development projects across the world.
The constant evolution of Internet technologies and consumer use was seen as creating a myriad of emerging issues. Increasingly, mobile networks were becoming the norm for Internet access, raising new opportunities and challenges. The combination of smart phones, tablets and cloud computing was giving users unprecedented access to content and services, such as social networks, and the ability to communicate and make new associations. The management, allocation and assignment of radio spectrum was becoming a new policy focus area as the continuing growth in the use of mobile networks makes them the access technology for the Internet.
The debates over access and diversity focused not only on the availability, quality and cost of Internet access but also on the ways in which access to the Internet is increasingly seen as a human right. Establishing the rights of users to freedom of expression and freedom of association on the Internet as human rights was seen as one of the recent and fundamental developments in Internet public policy.
One key area of focus was on issues of access and diversity for the disabled, stressing that the need for designing access into products and services for the disabled was fundamental and that ultimately all people benefited from access regimes that addressed those needs; an example being the pioneering use of captioning throughout all sessions at the IGF. What was clear though, was that universal access to the Internet was fundamental to the lives of people worldwide.
The IGF has pioneered work which has inextricably linked the policy debates of security, openness and privacy, and linked these issues in a multi-stakeholder process. Such an approach encourages a debate about the responsibilities and limits to the action of different stakeholders across local, national and international communities, thus individual responsibilities and freedoms can be complemented by actions of other stakeholders and legislative processes.
In the coming months the critical resource that is the Internet will be subject to radical change. Not only will the continued diffusion and adoption of Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) dramatically increase in capacity but also new generic top level domain names (such as by way of illustration .eco) will allow several hundred new ‘registries’ to be created; some of which may well be private. These transformations of Internet resources and the processes by which they had been implemented, especially the new generic top level domain names, provoked a debate about how best to secure open and multi-stakeholder participation across all Internet policy making fora and processes.
The theme of multi-stakeholder participation and the call for open and transparent policy debates underpinned the debates about taking stock and the way forward. The momentum that had launched the IGF, the desire to see all the people of the world enjoy the benefits of the Internet, continued to drive plans for the future of the IGF. As befitting a highly innovative technical system, the innovative approach of the IGF to policy making was seen as critical to its continued success. In the coming year, the IGF can make a significant contribution to DESA’s Rio+20 process as discussions around Internet governance have become ever more crucial in setting the ICT agenda and in solidifying the Internet as a catalyst for positive change and supporting sustainable development.
Ongoing efforts to promoting accountability and transparency will be reviewed at the Expert Group Meeting on Global Mutual Accountability taking place in Luxembourg on October 17
Mutual accountability between donor and programme countries is important to hold each other to account on commitments made regarding aid and aid delivery. Mutual accountability at the global level plays an important role to promote progress on implementing such commitments at the country level. An expert group meeting will be held to exchange ideas on this topic and to prepare for the 2012 United Nations Development Cooperation Forum (DCF).
The meeting will reflect on how the evidence base for decisions by development cooperation actors at country level might be improved by making better use of global-level monitoring initiatives. The efficiency of existing accountability mechanisms in affecting development cooperation behaviors will also be considered as will be the extent to which independent assessments (e.g. by think tanks) are being recognized by national bodies.
Analysis conducted for the DCF shows that information comparing the performance of provider and recipient countries at global level is not sufficiently used in national mutual accountability forums. It has also been recommended that programme countries agree on clear targets for individual donors, as part of national aid policies, which can then be reviewed against ongoing national development efforts.
If information on compliance with commitments made is to be better shared and understood, it appears important that developing countries are able to choose indicators and to design assessment tools and processes.
This expert group meeting stems from the decision of the 2010 DCF to continue to conduct regular assessments of progress in mutual accountability and aid transparency. The DCF will continue to review progress in mutual accountability, placing an emphasis on Least Developed Countries as they have the most to gain from well managed development initiatives.
The twentieth Inter-agency and Expert Group Meeting (IAEG) on MDG Indicators will take place in Manila, Philippines on 17-18 October
The meeting is part of the yearly consultation with national experts and international agencies to review and discuss issues related to the global MDG monitoring. It will focus on identifying technical cooperation needs and defining statistical capacity development strategies to improve MDG monitoring.
The Second International Conference on MDG Statistics will take place in Manila, Philippines, on 19-21 October
DESA’s Statistics Division, in collaboration with the Philippines National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB) is organizing an international conference on Millennium Development Goals statistics. The conference will bring together representatives from national statistical offices, national government agencies, international agencies and civil society to review the MDG monitoring strategies in place and propose recommendations for improved monitoring approaches, aiming at reaching those who are lagging behind in progress towards the MDGs.
The inaugural session of the UN Committee of Experts on Global Geospatial Information Management (GGIM) and the High Level Forum on GGIM will take place in Seoul, Republic of Korea, on 24-26 October
The UN Committee of Experts on Global Geospatial Information Management, established by ECOSOC on 27 July as the official UN consultative mechanism on GGIM, is convening its inaugural session on 26 October. The meeting will bring together experts from Member States and observers from international organizations to adopt the terms of reference of the Committee, review its rules of procedure and discuss its contribution to the Rio+20 Conference as well as an inventory of critical issues to be addressed by the Committee in future sessions.
Immediately preceding this event, the UN is jointly organizing with the National Geographic Information Institute (NGII) of the Republic of Korea, a High Level Forum on Global Geospatial Information Management at the COEX Convention Centre in Seoul on 24-26 October. Arranged for the first time, the Forum will provide an opportunity for in-depth discussions of current critical geospatial information issues and consultations among governments, NGOs and the private sector.
At the opening of the Forum, a Ministerial Segment will be convened in the morning of 24 October. The Under-Secretary-General for DESA Mr. Sha Zukang will deliver the opening address. The Segment will provide a platform for Ministers, representing all the regions of the world, to discuss national policies on geospatial information, to provide direction in evolving common frameworks and methodologies across countries; to promote the use of geospatial information to address key global challenges; and to give guidance on capacity development and enhance technology transfer.
In addition, two thematic side-events will be arranged, namely an ‘Exchange Forum with the Geospatial Industry’ on 23 October; and a ‘Seminar on the Integration of Statistical and Geospatial Information’ on 27 October.
The International Workshop themed “Engaging Citizens to Counter Corruption for Better Public Service Delivery and Achievement of the Millennium Development Goals”, will be arranged in Marrakesh, Morocco, on 26-27 OctoberThe Development Management Branch of DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management in cooperation with the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, is organizing this event. It will be one of several meetings arranged by different UN agencies in the context of the 4th Session of the Conference of the States Parties (CoSP) to the UN Convention against Corruption. The overall conference is expected to be attended by more than 500 persons from around the world. The workshop will take place in the venue of the 4th CoSP, the Palmeraie Golf Palace Complex in Marrakesh and will be attended by approximately 75 corruption prevention and citizens engagement experts and practitioners from around the world. It will address the following issues and themes, along a series of thematic sessions:
overall approaches, trends, best practices and key challenges in the eradication of corruption in public services; concepts and terminology; engaging citizens to eradicate corruption: scope of analysis and rationales; practices and institutions to engage citizens in the eradication of corruption; initiatives from citizens and civil society organizations, including uses of ICT technologies; initiatives from governments, including eGovernment and eParticipation; initiatives from the private sector; public policy and strategy: building capacities and creating enabling conditions; and eradication of corruption in the provision of public services: international cooperation.
The UN is calling for nominations for the UN Public Service Awards 2012. This is an international contest designed to promote and support innovations in public service delivery worldwide. Nominations can be made online until 31 December
The award is open to public organizations of all kinds, including governments and public-private partnerships, involved in delivering services to citizens around the globe. An annual UN event, the Public Service Award is bestowed on those public institutions that have distinguished themselves in the following categories: Preventing and Combating Corruption in the Public Service; Improving the Delivery of Services; Fostering Participation in Policymaking Decisions through Innovative Mechanisms; Advancing Knowledge Management in Government and Promoting Gender-responsive Delivery of Public Services. The award highlights cutting edge innovations and recognizes that democracy and successful governance are built on a competent civil service.
“The United Nations has long recognized that effective governance and efficient public administration are central to the global development agenda, and particularly in achieving the Millennium Development Goals. We need sound public policies and supportive governance structures. We need to respond swiftly and coherently”, said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in his address to the 2009 United Nations Public Service Day.
The United Nations Public Service Day was established by the Economic and Social Council in 2003 to promote better delivery of services by governments and to encourage excellence in the public service. As Mr. Sha Zukang, DESA’s Under-Secretary-General rightly emphasized during the 2010 United Nations Public Service Awards ceremony held in Barcelona, Spain: “The winners have shown great dedication to upholding the values and virtues of excellent public service and have provided examples of efficiency, effectiveness, transparency and accountability. In transmitting their lessons-learned they are assisting all governments in devising ways to improve the lives of citizens everywhere”.
The 2012 Public Service Awards will mark the tenth anniversary of the programme. Selected by the United Nations Committee of Experts on Public Administration, the winners will receive a trophy and a certificate of recognition during the United Nations Public Service Awards Ceremony and Day on 23 June 2012. The global event is organized by DESA’s Division of Public Administration and Development Management, in partnership with UN Women and the UN Office on Drugs and Crime.
While contenders cannot nominate themselves, interested institutions deemed to have very good performance in any one of the prize categories can have their name put forward by Governments or civil society organizations.
In addition to the Public Service Awards, United Nations e-Government Special Awards will be issued at the United Nations Public Service Day. The e-Government Special Awards will recognize the success of each world region by distinguishing the top-ranked countries from Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe, and Oceania.
The Sixth Annual Meeting of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF), hosted by the Government of Kenya, was held in Nairobi on 27-30 SeptemberThe overall theme was “Internet as a Catalyst for Change: Access, Development, Freedoms and Innovation”. This broad theme reflects the outcome of a broad and inclusive multi-stakeholder consultation process. It also reflects the mandate of the IGF to develop a common understanding of the best way for all stakeholders to realize the boundless opportunities offered by the Internet.
The meeting was open to all entities accredited by the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), as well as other institutions and persons with proven expertise and experience in matters related to Internet governance.
Sixth Annual Internet Governance Forum (IGF) will be held on 27- 30 September in Nairobi, Kenya
Over 1,500 people – representing governments, civil society, intergovernmental organizations, academic and technical communities and the private sector – are expected to participate in the forum to be held at the UN Office in Nairobi (UNON) under the main theme: “Internet as a catalyst for change: access, development, freedoms and innovation”.
Over 500 people have already registered to participate, including representatives from 59 developing and 22 developed countries in different world regions. The event will include over 100 workshops organized by partner organizations. The Assistant-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, Mr. Thomas Steltzer, will represent UN DESA at this event.
A seminar on International Trade Statistics: Implementation of IMTS 2010 and follow-up to the Global Forum will take place in Vilnius, Lithuania, on 26-30 September
The Global Forum on Trade Statistics in February 2011, jointly organized by the UN DESA’s Statistics Division (UNSD) and the Statistical Office of the European Communities (Eurostat) in Geneva, made explicit demands to improve the relevance of international trade statistics by connecting and integrating it with other economic statistics.
As a follow-up to the Global Forum on Trade Statistics, UNSD in cooperation with Eurostat and Statistics Lithuania, is organizing a seminar for countries of Eastern Europe and Central Asia, focusing on the implementation of the new recommendations on merchandise trade statistics (IMTS 2010), which were adopted by the United Nations Statistical Commission in 2010, with emphasis on linking trade and other economic statistics.
UN creates expert group to consult on managing geospatial information
The UN Programme on Global Geospatial Information Management (GGIM) aims at playing a leading role in setting the agenda for the development of global geospatial information and to promote its use to address key global challenges. It provides a forum to liaise and coordinate among Member States, and between Member States and international organizations.
The ECOSOC made history recently in Geneva by establishing a new intergovernmental body to address an emerging global issue. The UN Committee on Global Geospatial Information Management will bring together, for the first time at the global level, government experts from all Member States to consult on the rapidly changing field of geospatial information.
The workshop, organized by DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM), took place in Vienna on 11-13 July
At the workshop, forty-four experts, including members of the Committee of Experts on Public Administration (CEPA), and practitioners concluded that innovative and more diversified understandings of civil society and grassroots formations must be compiled and examined towards defining the growing role of social accountability processes in the developmental sectors encompassed by the Millennium Development Goals. The workshop aimed to enhance knowledge and build a shared understanding of what participatory approaches and mechanisms work better than others and under what conditions.
Expert Group Meeting on “Citizens Engagement to Enhance Public Service Delivery” was arranged in Vienna on 7-8 July
Recommendations were made for the undertaking of a comprehensive analysis focusing on the newly emerging collaboration models among states, citizens, non-governmental organizations and the private sector during the meeting organized by DPADM.
These recommendations were reached as a result of the lack of empirically grounded comparative research and evaluations on the relationship between citizen engagement and service delivery, particularly on the tangible steps of transparency and accountability initiatives towards improving effective and citizen- centered public service delivery.
The objective of the meeting was to take stock of the diverse and innovative participatory approaches implemented across the world to strengthen public sector accountability and prevent corruption in public service delivery towards the achievement of the MDGs. It was attended by forty experts, including members of the Committee of Experts on Public Administration (CEPA), from twenty countries and eight international organizations.
UN/INTOSAI 21st Interregional Symposium on “Effective practices of cooperation between SAIs and citizens to enhance public accountability” was held on 13-15 July in Vienna
The event was organized by DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) and the International Organization of Supreme Audit Institutions (INTOSAI) and concluded with a reaffirmation of the importance of the independence of SAIs.
The symposium examined concrete criteria of audit processes and institutions such as the publication of audit reports in the media, participation of citizens in inter-institutional advisory bodies or councils, and procedural steps to citizen-initiated audits. Representatives of SAIs from eighteen countries in the developed and developing world as well as of INTOSAI and the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) participated.
DESA Briefing Seminar Series; Disability and Economics: The nexus between disability, education and employment will be held in New York on 1 July
It may seem obvious to say that education is an advantage in the labour market, and, in some cases, possessing it is what allows some individuals to enter the job market to begin with. However, in countries like Nepal, when considering the case of persons with disabilities, such common knowledge does not hold true in the minds of many. The prevailing belief is, still, that even if persons with disabilities are educated, they are less likely to make use of the education, or that they will not be useful in the workforce.
To empirically challenge this assumption, an evidence-based study was conducted in Nepal. The study found that the return on investment in education was very high among persons with disabilities, ranging from 19.4 to 32.2%. Despite this high return, one significant finding was that, across the board, persons with hearing impairments had fewer years of schooling than their counterparts with visual or physical impairments. This confirms the crisis of the lack of schools for students with hearing impairments.
Additionally, when analyzing the likelihood of employment of persons with disabilities, it was found that years-of-schooling, type of impairments and age are significant in predicting the likelihood of participants’ employment. Among these variables, years-of-schooling has a positive effect on the probability of employment. However, even aside from this finding, there are also several important nuances when the data is broken down by age and/or type of disability. The results suggest that unless affirmative action is taken on their behalf, it may be difficult for persons with physical impairments to enter directly into the competitive labour market.
A panel discussion will be held at UN Headquarters to discuss the relationships between disability, education and employment. Using the findings of the study conducted in Nepal, the panelists will highlight the moral, social imperatives of including persons with disabilities in the labour market, as well as show that it is good economics. They will also offer options for the further inclusion and participation of persons with disabilities in the labour market.
Expert Group Meeting on “Engaging Citizens to Enhance Public Sector Accountability and Prevent Corruption in the Delivery of Public Services” will take place in Vienna on 7-8 July
The goal of this meeting is to update global knowledge in the field of citizen engagement to enhance public service delivery, with particular attention to ways in which participatory approaches are being used in countries around the world to strengthen public sector accountability and prevent corruption. This objective is of particular importance at this time, as the UN Member States have identified participatory approaches to the provision of public services as a useful course of action for countries in achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
The meeting will bring together experts and practitioners in diverse aspects of citizen engagement, including public and social accountability, prevention of corruption and e-government, both from developed and developing countries, who work in national governments, international organizations, civil society organizations, and academic and research institutions. It will proceed as a series of dynamic round table discussions on specific aspects of citizen engagement and expected concrete outcomes include an analytical report to be published by the UN. In addition, the outcomes of the meeting will be used by DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) to develop the framework of two capacity building workshops to be held later this year and to produce a related publication, guidelines and online training courses.
It will be held back-to-back with the Workshop on Engaging Citizen to Enhance Public Service Delivery and Strengthen Accountability, also organized by DPADM in Vienna.
Improving efficiency and accountability in public service delivery
Workshop on Engaging Citizen to Enhance Public Service Delivery and Strengthen Accountability will be arranged on 11-13 July in Vienna
This Workshop will explore how the engagement of citizens — and their organizations in civil society and the private sector — can contribute to improve public accountability in public service delivery and spending. The workshop aims to promote a better understanding, and to develop concrete skills and abilities for the analysis, design, implementation and evaluation of citizen engagement processes aimed at improving efficiency and accountability in public service delivery, especially those services which are closely related to the MDGs.
The Workshop will provide ample time for discussion on regional trends and contexts, and on public services related to the achievement of the MDGs, such as healthcare, primary education, employment and entrepreneurship services. It will also allow for consideration of emerging accountability mechanisms involving citizen, parliaments and public enterprises. Key lessons learned will be reflected in a set of recommendations, presented in the concluding session, and incorporated in the report of the proceedings of the Workshop, to be published on-line.
The Workshop will be held back-to-back with the UN-INTOSAI 21st Interregional Symposium also to be held in Vienna.
The 21st Interregional Symposium will be organized by DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management and the International Organization of Supreme Audit Institutions in Vienna on 13-15 July
The Symposium will focus on the theme “Effective practices of cooperation between Supreme Audit Institutions (SAIs) and citizens to enhance public accountability”. It will provide the opportunity to identify, assess and exchange knowledge internationally about ways in which SAIs from countries around the world engage citizens, and innovations under analysis and consideration in this field as part of SAIs institutional development. For instance, publication of audit reports in the media, participation of citizens in inter-institutional advisory bodies or councils, and decision to start determined audits on requests formulated by certain number of citizens.
The theme of the Symposium reflects a growing recognition of the need to deepen the participatory processes in public administration matters. Given their responsibilities for independence, professionalism and reliability, SAIs are uniquely positioned to serve the public to promote effective public governance, increase the efficiency of public administration, improve development outcomes, fight corruption and promote trust in government. In terms of greater public scrutiny, SAIs have a very important and relevant role to play.
By making their reports public, they make government actions transparent for the citizens; and, by being responsive to the legitimate concerns of citizens, the civil society and the private sector, they help to build public confidence. The Under-Secretary-General of DESA, Mr. Sha Zukang, will participate in the opening and closing ceremonies of the Symposium and will chair one of its substantive sessions.
World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Geneva
In connection with the WSIS in Geneva on 16-20 May, DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management arranged a number of events
Ensuring implementation of WSIS action lines
On 18 May, DESA through DPADM, convened the Sixth Facilitation Meeting on implementing three of the 11 WSIS action lines, providing a platform for participants to: a) exchange information and experiences; b) identify the propriety areas for implementation within the Action Lines; and c) create synergies among different stakeholders for more effective knowledge sharing and collaboration to ensure the implementation of WSIS at the international, regional and national levels as well as enable further coordination of major stakeholders’ activities to support strategic planning and implementation of accessible, inclusive and participatory governments.
Exchanging experiences and practices on e/m-government
On 19 May, the workshop on “Greater Government Transparency and Citizen Engagement to Promote Effectiveness and Accountability in Public Service Delivery” was arranged. Organized by DPADM in cooperation with the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), it provided opportunities for participants to share experiences and exchange practices on e/m-government with speakers in order to develop new capacities for designing and implementing successful programs and policies for better government transparency and citizen engagement and create or strengthen international networks of stakeholders and practitioners based on proven viable experiences that have enabled lasting development results in different socio-economic and cultural contexts. A report on the workshop will be prepared.
IGF Open Consultations and MAG meeting
The Internet Governance Forum (IGF) held its Open Consultations and a meeting of the Multi-stakeholder Advisory Group (MAG) from 18 to 19 May at the ILO Headquarters in Geneva with approximately 100 people in attendance. The MAG deliberations, which mainly focused on the selection of workshops and the format of the main themes, including the selection of speakers, were considered positive and resolved to finalize the programme through online collaboration. They welcomed the note asking them to continue with their work until the conclusion of the 2011 IGF to be held in Nairobi and individual members volunteered as focal points for each theme shepherding it until then.
Fourteenth session of the Commission on Science and Technology for Development (CSTD)
While discussing agenda item 2 “Progress made in the implementation of and follow-up to the World Summit on the Information Society outcomes at the regional and international levels”, it was agreed by the Commission that the mandate of the “Working Group for the improvements to the IGF” should be extended for one more year to give it time to complete its work. The meeting also adopted a draft resolution which will be sent to ECOSOC for deliberation as part of the report.
Expert Group Meeting on family policies will be held in New York on 1-3 June
The UN Programme on the Family in DESA’s Division for Social Policy and Development is organizing this event under the theme “Assessing family policies: confronting family poverty and social exclusion & ensuring work-family balance.”
The meeting is convened as part of the preparations for the 20th anniversary of the International Year of the Family in 2014. The Expert Group Meeting will focus on the importance of designing, implementing and monitoring family-oriented policies especially in the areas of poverty eradication, full employment and decent work and work-family balance. The experts will offer recommendations on appropriate policies in these areas.
High Level Expert Group Meeting will be arranged on 20-22 June in Geneva
DESA’s Division for Social Policy and Development (DSPD), in close collaboration with the International Labour Organization (IL0), is organizing this event as part of the preparations for the 50th session of the Commission for Social Development, which is scheduled to take place in New York in February 2012.
The meeting is convened in the context of ECOSOC resolution 2010/L.5 in which the Economic and Social Council decided that the priority theme for the 2011-2012 review and policy cycle of the Commission should be “Poverty Eradication, taking into account its relationship to social integration and full employment and decent work for all.”
The outcomes of the meeting will provide important inputs to the work of the Commission, in particular contributing to formulation of policies that have been shown to have a major impact on efforts to reduce poverty.
Expert Group Meeting on “The Challenge of Building Employment for a Sustainable Recovery” will take place in Geneva on 23-24 June
The meeting aims at providing input to the work of the Commission and at informing ongoing national and international debates on the challenge of building productive employment. It also aims to send a strong message on the importance of promoting job-rich growth to reduce poverty and maintain social cohesion.
It is organized by DESA’s Division for Social Policy and Development (DSPD) in collaboration with the International Labour Organization (ILO) and will bring together specialists to undertake a review of responses to the global jobs crisis in different countries and regions of the world. It will also consider concrete policies and strategies to create productive, decent employment during the recovery.
The meeting has two main objectives:
To undertake a review of national and international responses to the global jobs crisis, identifying best practices in preserving existing jobs and in generating new, decent jobs, and discussing lessons learned;
To consider strategies, at the national and international levels, to create productive employment during the recovery as a central strategy for poverty eradication and social integration, so as to assist Member States to adopt policies consistent with the Global Jobs Pact.
Two new youth sessions will take place in New York in June highlighting information and communication technology and education
The International Year of Youth briefing events continue to bring attention to different youth issues in the lead up to the High Level Conference on Youth to be held on 25-26 July at UN Headquarters in New York.
DESA’s Programme on Youth has two new sessions in the pipeline for June, where one will highlight information and communication technology and the other education.
The Sessions are aimed at Member States, NGOs (with ECOSOC and/or DPI status), and staff members of the UN system. The Sessions will bring together panelists and audience to discuss the most important issues concerning youth in the context of the International Year.
The role of sports in development and its importance for people with disabilities will be highlighted at a panel discussion on “Sport as a tool for development: using sport to foster the inclusion and well-being of persons with disabilities” at UN Headquarters in New York on 27 June
The unique ability of sports to transcend linguistic, cultural and social barriers makes it an excellent platform for strategies of inclusion and adaptation. Furthermore, the universal popularity of sport and its physical, social and economic development benefits make it an ideal tool for fostering the inclusion and well-being of persons with disabilities.
Sport can help reduce the stigma and discrimination associated with disability because it can transform community attitudes about persons with disabilities by highlighting their skills and reducing the tendency to see the disability instead of the person. Through sport, persons without disabilities interact with persons with disabilities in a positive context forcing them to reshape assumptions about what persons with disabilities can and cannot do.
Sport changes the person with disability in an equally profound way by empowering persons with disabilities to realize their full potential and advocate for changes in society. Through sport, persons with disabilities acquire vital social skills, develop independence, and become empowered to act as agents of change. Sport teaches individuals how to communicate effectively as well as the significance of teamwork and cooperation and respect for others. Sport is also well-suited to reducing dependence and developing greater independence by helping persons with disabilities to become physically and mentally stronger.
Expert Group Meeting on International Standards for Civil Registration and Vital Statistics will take place on 27-30 June in New York
DESA’s Statistics Division is organizing an Expert Group Meeting on International Standards for Civil Registration and Vital Statistics, which will review the Principles and Recommendations for a Vital Statistics System, Rev. 2, published in 2001 by the UN (UN publication, Sales No. E.01.XVII.10).
The essential standard which the Principles and Recommendations promulgates – generating accurate, reliable and regular vital statistics from civil registration system – remains unchanged and valid. However, over the past 10 years several issues emerged that might require revisions and updates of the principles and recommendations, such as the increasing use of population registers as source of vital statistics, advances in modern technologies that have helped some countries in accelerating the improvement of their civil registration and vital statistics systems, and the development of statistical systems in countries.
The meeting will review the Principles and Recommendations for updates and elaborations and propose an outline for the next revision of the recommendations.
DESA’s Division for Sustainable Development and Development Policy and Analysis Division organized an Expert Group Meeting on 19-20 May
The meeting was arranged with the purpose to engage international and national experts in a substantive discussion on appropriate modeling techniques to implement a project titled “Supporting National Government in the Transition to Low-Carbon Development Pathway”.
The project aims to assist countries in accelerating the transition to a low-carbon economy through enhancing policymakers’ capacity to promote green technologies, including renewable energy development, affordable access to clean energy for the poor, and support to industries and other economic sectors in adopting low-carbon technologies. The project proposes to start with the following group of countries in Southeast Asia: Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, and Thailand.
Regional Ministerial Meeting was held in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on 12-13 May on the theme “Key Education Challenges in Latin America and the Carribean: Teachers, Quality, and Equity”
The meeting—hosted by the Government of Argentina, in cooperation with UNDESA, UNESCO, UNICEF, and ECLAC—was held in preparation for the 2011 Annual Ministerial Review of ECOSOC. It was attended by a number of education ministers and vice-ministers from Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as participants from Governments, regional organizations, the UN system, civil society and the private sector. ECOSOC was represented by Vice-President Ambassador Gonzalo Gutiérrez and Mr. Thomas Stelzer led DESA’s delegation.
Key messages emanating from the discussion include the following: LAC has made significant progress on the education agenda (primary education, gender equality in education, and adult literacy rates), but challenges remain. There is a need to develop strategies to address inequality in access to education and to improve education quality and to include civil society as a key partner in education policy. Bilateral donors and multilateral organization need to better harmonize their agendas and programmes and efforts are needed to promote the educational use of new technologies, as well mechanisms that facilitate the sharing of lessons learned on the use of ICTs in education.
A summary report containing a full list of policy recommendations from the meeting will be presented at the high-level segment of ECOSOC.
Two new youth sessions will take place in New York highlighting Girls and Young Women on 6 May and Indigenous Issues and Youth on 19 May.
The International Year of Youth briefing events continue to bring attention to different youth issues in the lead up to the High Level Conference on Youth to be held on 25-26 July at UN Headquarters in New York. The next session in line is on “Girls and Young Women” and will take place at the UN in New York on 6 May from 1:15 pm -2:45 pm. It will feature panelists from UN Women, United Nations Population Fund and young people from NGOs working on these issues.
On 19 May, the topic for discussion will be “Indigenous Iissues and Youth” focusing on the role indigenous youth play in issues of concern to them, highlighting initiatives and projects undertaken by young people. This session will be held in the UNICEF house from 1:15 pm – 2:45 pm and is co-organized by the UN Programme on Youth, UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, UNICEF and the Youth Caucus on Indigenous Issues.
The UN Programme on Youth has just finished its Facebook consultation with young people on the topic of “Girls and Young Women” and has now launched its new discussion on “Indigenous Issues and Youth”. Young people are encouraged to speak out and contribute to the consultations. Please circulate the link information below around your youth networks.
Symposium on “Migration and Youth: Harnessing Opportunities for Development” will be arranged in New York on 17-18 May
UNICEF, the current Chair of the Global Migration Group (GMG), of which DESA is also a member, is organizing this two-day Symposium immediately prior to the informal thematic debate on international migration and development, organized by the President of the General Assembly on 19 May.
The Symposium will consist of three plenary sessions and four parallel roundtables focusing on the role and participation of youth in international migration, the impact of international migration on youth, and the need to improve the protection and well-being of young migrants.
Each session is being organized by one or more members of the Global Migration Group. DESA and the World Bank are co-organizing the first panel on “Globalization, Cooperation and Youth: Newly Emerging Trends”. Under-Secretary-General of DESA, Mr. Sha Zukang has been invited to participate in a high-level panel together with Mr. Joseph Deiss, the President of the General Assembly, Mr. Peter Sutherland, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on International Migration and Development, and other senior officials.
The Symposium will bring together experts and practitioners who will present the latest evidence on the relationship between youth, migration and development and share good practices in leveraging the benefits of international migration for youth and young migrants and addressing its negative impacts. Participants will include representatives from the UN system and other intergovernmental organizations, Members States and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), including representatives of academic institutions, the private sector and youth organizations.
Mr. Anthony Lake, UNICEF’s Executive Director and current Chair of GMG, will present the main outcomes of the Symposium during the informal thematic debate on international migration and development on 19 May. GMG members will prepare background papers for the sessions and roundtables of the Symposium.
Platform to exchange knowledge and experience on ICTs
The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) Forum 2011: Open Consultations on Thematic Aspects and New Innovative Format will be held in Geneva on 18 May
The Sixth Facilitation Meeting of Action Lines C1 on the role of public governance in the promotion of ICTs for development, C7 on e-government and C11 on international and regional cooperation, will be held during the WSIS on 18 May. The meeting is open to all stakeholders from the public and private sectors, civil society and international organizations. The purpose is to provide a platform for exchange of information and experiences; to identify the propriety areas for implementation within the Action Lines; and to create synergies among different stakeholders for more effective knowledge sharing and collaboration in order to ensure the implementation of WSIS at the international, regional and national levels.
The meeting could also contribute to further coordination of major stakeholders’ activities to support strategic planning and the implementation of accessible, inclusive and participatory government. One of the current trends for e-government development is active and strong citizens’ and businesses’ involvement in public services delivery. This tendency is based on an unprecedented accessibility and openness of public administration data and possibilities for citizens and businesses to build value added public services on top of it. It is also one of the challenges for governments to have a reliable set of indicators and methodologies to measure new emerging effects of development.
WSIS is a unique two-phase UN summit that was initiated in order to create an evolving multi-stakeholder platform aimed at addressing the issues raised by information and communication technologies (ICTs) through a structured and inclusive approach at the national, regional and international levels. The goal is to achieve a common vision, desire and commitment to build a people-centric, inclusive and development-oriented Information Society where everyone can create, access, utilize and share information.
The Fourth Parliamentary Forum on Shaping the Information Society will take place in Geneva on 18-20 May
DESA, through The Global Centre for ICT in Parliament, together with the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), will be hosting this event entitled “The Triple Challenge of Cyber-Security: Information, Citizens and Infrastructure”.
The Forum will focus on the representative, law-making and oversight responsibilities of members of parliaments regarding the issues of cyber-security. It will address the particular challenges posed by the illicit use of information and communications technologies, such as the safeguarding of citizens in the connected environment; the protection of State information, data and infrastructures; and the transnational response to cyber crime.
The aim of the Forum is to further the dialogue among legislators on the different strategic and political priorities implemented at the national level and outline a broad perspective of different national engagements directed at responding to the challenge discussed. Its goal is also to delineate the role and responsibilities of parliaments in their legislative and oversight functions with respect to the topics addressed, identify good parliamentary practices and prepare recommendations for action by legislatures.
The Forum is expected to attract 150 members of parliament with responsibilities for Information Society issues from all over the world, as well as senior representatives and officials of international organizations, and experts from agencies, governments, the ICT industry and academia.
Informal Thematic Debate on International Migration and Development will take place at the UN in New York on 19 May
The President of the General Assembly is organizing this one-day informal thematic debate, providing an important opportunity for Member States to review their policies on international migration and development and to assess progress towards international cooperation on international migration ahead of the second High-level Dialogue on International Migration and Development, which will be held in 2013.
The debate will consist of two interactive panels with invited speakers. The morning panel will focus on the contribution of migrants to development and will be chaired by Mr. William Swing, Director General of the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
The afternoon panel will address the issue of improving international cooperation on migration and development and will be chaired by Dr. Khalid Koser, Geneva Centre for Security Policy. The President of the General Assembly will open and close the debate. The Secretary-General will also make opening remarks. Peter Sutherland, SRSG on International Migration and Development will make a substantive summary of the debate. Mr. Anthony Lake, UNICEF’s Executive Director and current Chair of GMG, will participate in the afternoon panel and deliver a statement on behalf of the Global Migration Group.
The first High-level Dialogue on International Migration and Development, held in 2006, established that international migration can contribute to development if supported by the right policies. Since 2006, Governments and the international community have been pursuing a variety of policies and programmes to maximize the development impacts of international migration, and to reduce its negative effects.
International migration is increasingly being mainstreamed in national development plans and poverty reduction strategy papers. To date, over $240 million has been allocated to multilateral activities on international migration and development.
The interactive debate provides a unique opportunity for Member States and other stakeholders to take stock of achievements to date, to identify the factors that reduce the benefits of migration, and to suggest ways to reduce or eliminate these factors ahead of the 2013 High-level Dialogue.
The international workshop “Greater Government Transparency and Citizen Engagement to Promote Effectiveness and Accountability in Public Service Delivery” will be held in Geneva on 19 May
DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM), in cooperation with the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), will organize this workshop during the 2011annual follow-up meetings of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS).
It will serve as an enabling platform of WSIS for an international and multidisciplinary group of experts and national practitioners to share their experiences and exchange practices on e/m-government, including strategies for designing, implementing, and evaluating government services, that have proven viable and have brought about lasting development results in different socio-economic and cultural contexts. The workshop sessions will provide opportunities for participants to interact with speakers, in order to develop new capacities for designing and implementing successful programmes and policies for better government transparency and citizen engagement, as well as to create or strengthen international networks of stakeholders and practitioners.
The one-day workshop will include one plenary and three thematic sessions on selected topics on citizen engagement and electronic government including the Government 2.0 platform. Each session will provide presentations followed by open discussions.
The sessions will include the following:
Plenary: Discussion on overall approaches, trends, best practices and key challenges in greater government transparency and citizen engagement to promote effectiveness and accountability in public service delivery.
Session I: m-Government: Benefits and outcomes for citizens, government and business
Session II: Open (Linked) data and social networks services for public services delivery
Session III: Strategies for ubiquitous, inclusive, equitable and efficient public service delivery.
The workshop is expected to be attended by 40 participants including government and public administration officials, key citizens’ e/m-government experts from academia and research institutions, civil society and private sector representatives and staff from the UN system.
The 10th Session of the Committee of Experts on Public Administration (CEPA) was held in New York on 4-8 April
The session focused around the theme “Public governance for results”, particularly in relation to improving the quality of life for all, in post-conflict and post-disaster countries, and in social protection policies for vulnerable populations. The Committee also considered performance management in governance in relation to internationally agreed development goals and commitments, in particular in regard to education of the 2011 annual ministerial review of the Economic and Social Council. In addition, the Committee made its annual review of the UN Programme on Public Administration and Finance.
The Committee, established by the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) in its resolution 2001/45, is comprised of 24 members who meet annually at UN Headquarters in New York. The Committee is responsible for supporting the work of ECOSOC concerning the promotion and development of public administration and governance among Member States, in connection with the UN Millennium Development Goals.
Evaluating ICT mechanisms for inter-parliamentary cooperation
Exchange Network of Parliaments of Latin America and the Caribbean (RIPALC) met in Panama City on 14-15 April
Secretaries General of 17 parliaments from across Latin America and the Caribbean gathered to exchange views and evaluate the establishment of a formal mechanism of inter-parliamentary cooperation for the region. The workshop entitled “Leveraging ICT to establish a collaborative network among Parliaments of Latin America and the Caribbean” was built upon the experience of parliaments in other regions, as well as on the outcomes of meetings held in recent months in Barbados and Chile. Issues such as the digital revolution in Latin America and the Caribbean and its impact on the legislative branches were also discussed.
During the event, a proposal was presented for the establishment of RIPALC (Red de Intercambio de Los Parlamentos de America Latina y El Caribe – Exchange Network of Parliaments of Latin America and the Caribbean). The Secretaries General discussed and deliberated on the establishment of bylaws for the operation of RIPALC, basing it on the model and good practices of the European Centre for Parliamentary Research and Documentation (ECPRD) and the African Parliamentary Network for Knowledge (APKN). With this new platform, resolutions and studies by Latin American and Caribbean Parliaments will be open to the general public, offering greater transparency about actions taken by Parliaments and ensuring a democratic space for discussion.
Delegates from seventeen countries signed the agreement to form RIPALC. The Network’s web page, which offers tools for sharing information, was developed by the Brazilian National Congress. Provisional governance has been established as Brazil’s Chamber of Deputies will act as the Executive Secretariat, with members of the Executive Committee including Barbados, Nicaragua, Panama, Brazil, and Uruguay.
The workshop was co-organized by the Global Centre for ICT in Parliament and the National Assembly of Panama.
The Committee of Experts on Public Administration (CEPA) will meet in New York for its 10th session on 4-8 April
The meeting will discuss public governance for results to improve the quality of human life for all, by supporting the implementation of the internationally agreed development goals, including the Millennium Development Goals. The complexities and dynamics of contemporary global economic, political and social environments present new challenges to government legitimacy and efficiency.
These are intensified by increasing occurrences of crises and disasters, producing growing demand for effective, prepared and responsive public institutions in UN Member States worldwide. Consequently, the need for results-based public governance abounds. To improve the quality of life for all, more successful processes to deliver public goods and services must be formulated, implemented and assessed.
CEPA is responsible for supporting the work of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), promoting public administration and services among member states. For this session, it brings together its twenty-four experts from government and academia from around the world. The Vice-President of ECOSOC, Gonzalo Gutierrez Reinel, will deliver an opening statement, followed by a welcome address by Sha Zukang, Under-Secretary-General for the Department of Economic and Social Affairs.
At the meeting, CEPA will review, contemplate and discuss existing frameworks and look into pragmatic implications of multi-stakeholder systems to achieve better governance. The Committee will also address the needs of populations in post-conflict and post-disaster countries and other vulnerable populations. Moreover, it will examine and discuss social protection policies and programmes designed to reduce the poverty and vulnerability of citizens, diminishing exposure to risks, enhancing the capacity of people to protect themselves against hazards and to counter the interruption or loss of income.
In addition, CEPA will examine the 2011 theme of the annual ministerial review of the high-level segment of ECOSOC, regarding the implementation of agreed goals and commitments for education. They will also debate best practices in educating and training public administrators in public performance management and review the work programme of the Division of Public Administration and Development Management.
The CEPA sub-committee for the UN Public Service Awards will also review and evaluate nominated initiatives and select the winners for 2011.
The third preparatory meeting regarding the proposed UN Committee of Experts on Global Geospatial Information Management will be held in New York on 4-6 April
The meeting is organized by DESA’s Statistics Division and the UN Cartographic Section/DFS to discuss and finalize the report on Global Geospatial Information Management (GGIM) to be submitted to the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and the inter-governmental process.
In addition, the meeting will consider the agenda and the modality of the forthcoming UN Forum on GGIM to be held in Seoul, the Republic of Korea on 25-28 October 2011. This is the last preparatory meeting and there are expectations of strong guidance from the member states on the progression of this GGIM initiative.
The Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) 2011 Africa Regional Meeting will be held on the theme “The right to Education for All in Africa: Reinforcing quality and equity” on 12 April in Lomé, Togo
The meeting is co-organized by DESA, in cooperation with the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), in collaboration with the Government of Togo.
The meeting will take place in conjunction with an African Union Teachers’ Conference and it is part of the preparatory process for the 2011 Annual Ministerial Review on “Implementing the internationally agreed goals and commitments in regard to education.”
Ministers of Education and a broad cross section of regional stakeholders will gather to discuss trends, challenges, and policies and programmes on education in Africa and their impact on the achievement of the Millennium development Goals. Panellists and experts will examine approaches to improve equity and inclusiveness in education and improve its quality.
They will also address ways to use universal primary education as a powerful driver to eradicate poverty, reduce child and maternal mortality, promote gender equality, and ensure sustainable development. A special session will showcase best practices and new initiatives from across the region.
Briefing sessions in celebration of the International Year of Youth
Next event in the series organized by the UN Programme on Youth of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs will take place in New York on 12 April on the topic of “Youth Participation”
The event is one of many arranged to celebrate the International Year of Youth, leading up to the UN Conference on Youth on 25-26 July. It will explore the issue of youth participation, taking examples from the work of the UN system, NGOs and young people themselves on youth participatory processes.
Featured participants will include Ravi Karkara, Child Participation Specialist with UNICEF; Pamela Wridt of CUNY Graduate Center; four youth speakers of a youth-friendly community in East Harlem; and Mahroo Moshari, Director of Manhattan Multicultural Counseling, and Representative of the International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences (IUAES) to the UN.
Participation is a fundamental right. It is one of the guiding principles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that has been reiterated in many other Conventions and Declarations. Through active participation, young people are empowered to play a vital role in their own development as well as in that of their communities, helping them to learn vital life-skills, develop knowledge on human rights and citizenship and to promote positive civic action.
The UN has long recognized that young people are a major human resource for development and key agents for social change, economic growth and technological innovation. Participation in decision-making is a key priority area of the UN agenda on youth.
To prepare for the events, the UN Programme on Youth is making use of the International Year of Youth Facebook page to ask young people about issues of most concern to them, using the responses to feed into the sessions.
Upcoming briefing sessions during the spring will highlight topics including: “Girls and Young Women”; “Indigenous Issues”; “Armed Conflict”; “Information and Communication Technology”; and “Education”.
Strengthening the protection of human rights of older persons
The first open-ended working group session will be convened on 18-21 April in New York
The working group was established by the General Assembly resolution 65/182 on 21 December 2010. This landmark decision to focus attention on the rights of older persons came nearly ten years after the adoption of the Madrid International Plan of Action on Ageing in 2002. It recognizes that national development strategies, policies and programmes still often fall short of addressing older persons’ right to participate in society and development, and to live safe and dignified lives.
The current situation of the human rights of older persons around the world will be considered. The group will also identify possible gaps and how best to address them, including by considering, as appropriate, the feasibility of further instruments and measures. It will draw on the experience and expertise of Member States, the UN system, NGOs, national human rights institutions, human rights mandate-holders and treaty bodies and a range of stakeholders.
The first session will focus on understanding the current situation of the human rights of older persons around the world. This includes two panel discussions on the existing international and regional human rights frameworks. At the end of the first session the working group is expected to start identifying possible gaps and measures to address them.
Stakeholder consultations took place in Geneva on 23-24 February in preparation for the IGF to be held on 27-30 September in Nairobi
Planning for the sixth meeting of the Internet Governance Forum continued with discussions on the agenda and detailed programme. The two-day session was followed by an informal meeting of the Secretary-General’s Multi-stakeholder Advisory Group (MAG), moderated by Alice Munyua, Head of Delegation of the Government of Kenya with the support of DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM), including the IGF Secretariat.
MAG is recommending that the format and agenda of the sixth IGF largely follow precedents set in previous meetings with an overall theme in 2011 of “Internet as a catalyst for change: access, development, freedoms and innovation.” The Group will reconvene in Geneva in May to continue conference preparation efforts.
The Commission on Science and Technology for Development (CSTD) Working Group on Improvements to the IGF also met in Switzerland last week to consider which issues should be the subject of the group’s deliberations and to begin reflecting on these topics.
Specific themes include: Review of the current situation and of IGF versus the Tunis Agenda; improving the IGF and linking it to the broader dialogue on global IT governance as directed by the UN General Assembly Resolution on “Information and communications technologies for development”; enhancing participation of developing countries; outreach to and cooperation with other organizations dealing with IG issues; and options for ensuring predictability, transparency and accountability in financing IGF.
All stakeholders were invited to submit thoughts, comments and points of view by 14 March to be made available as an input to the Working Group’s discussion. The second meeting of the Working Group was scheduled for 24-25 March in Geneva.
At its inter-sessional meeting on 17 December 2010, CSTD decided that the Working Group would be made up of 22 Member States. The Chair of CSTD also invited five representatives from each of the following groups: the business community, civil society, the technical and academic community; and from intergovernmental organizations, to participate and remain fully engaged throughout the process.
DESA was selected to be one of the five participating intergovernmental organizations along with International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and the UN Development Programme.
Getting ready for the 2011 UN Public Service Forum
A preparatory meeting was held in New York on 28 February and 1 March prior to the forum to be held in in Dar es Salaam on 20-23 June
A high-level delegation from Tanzania, headed by the Permanent Secretary of the Office of the President, George Yambesi, met with DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) to discuss and agree upon the structure, organization and logistics of the 2011 United Nations Public Service Forum.
Holding the UN Public Service Forum in Dar es Salaam is very significant as Tanzania will also be hosting Africa Public Service Day, which coincides with the UN Public Service Day, thereby bringing the whole region together. It is expected that over 400 participants will attend this event, including ministers from Africa and other regions of the world, government officials, representatives of international and regional organizations, civil society, and the private sector.
During the preparatory meeting, DPADM made presentations about the workshops to be held during the Forum. It was decided that the Forum will be composed of plenary sessions, capacity development workshops, a ministerial round-table and an inter-generation dialogue round-table. It will conclude with a final declaration with policy recommendations based on the findings of the workshops and the UN Public Service Awards Ceremony.
Workshop on Manufacturing Statistics will take place from 15-17 March in Santiago, Chile
This workshop, organized by DESA’s Statistics Division, in collaboration with Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) and the Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística (IBGE), continues the programme for the development of comprehensive and comparable manufacturing statistics in the Latin American region, initiated 2007.
The main purpose of this workshop is to discuss issues of data processing, including validation and imputation, as well as the compilation of production indices and related topics.
Expert Group Meeting to review the two draft reports of the Secretary-General for the 2011 high-level segment of ECOSOC on the theme of education is planned for 18 March in New York
The first Secretary-General’s report, for the Annual Ministerial Review, will examine progress made in the implementation of the education-related goals and put forward policy recommendations for their acceleration.
The second report of the Secretary-General, for the thematic discussion, will provide an in-depth analysis of the impact of current global and national trends on education.
The discussions will focus on the key findings and recommendations of the two draft reports. The expectation is that the diverse group of experts, including some members of the Committee on Development Policy (CDP), will highlight how policies in other sectors are impacting education outcomes.
The Expert Group Meeting will draw on the valuable recent work of the CDP on the impact of the multiple crises on development.
Nominations for the United Nations Public Service Awards (UNPSA) Programme grew by 44 per cent this year and were received from 58 UN Member States, with 7 participating for the first time
UNPSA is the most prestigious international recognition of excellence in public service. It rewards the creative achievements and contributions of public service institutions that lead to a more effective and responsive public administration in countries worldwide. Through an annual competition, the UNPSA promotes the role, professionalism and visibility of public service. It is held every year on 23 June, the United Nations Public Service Day. This year’s Awards Ceremony and Forum will be held in from 20-23 June in Tanzania.
For this year’s round, the region with the highest participation continues to be Asia and the Pacific. Latin America and the Caribbean doubled its share of the nominations submitted to 12 per cent from 2010.
With two new categories “Promoting gender responsive delivery of public services” and “Preventing and combating corruption in the public service” added in association with UN- Women and UNODC respectively, the UNPSA becomes even more relevant to addressing important public sector issues in its role of identifying and showcasing innovations and best practices. The Division is looking forward to growing levels of participation in these categories and will continue working together with the other UN organizations in outreach programmes to address this.
Early February, DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) completed the first two phases in the nomination evaluation process for identifying award winners. In the first phase 82 per cent of the cases were approved and 65 per cent in the second. The Division is preparing for the final evaluation by a Sub-group of the Committee of Experts in Public Administration in April and will continue to provide updates on this in the future.
Ninth coordination meeting on international migration was held in New York from 17-18 February
DESA’s Population Division convened the Ninth Coordination Meeting on International Migration in New York from 17 to 18 February 2011. The meeting had the following objectives: (a) to examine the development of indicators that measure the contribution of international migration to countries of origin and destination; (b) to exchange information on recent initiatives to build capacities on international migration and development, and (c) to discuss the contribution of United Nations agencies, funds and programmes and other relevant organizations to the Global Forum on Migration and Development as well as to the informal thematic debate on international migration and development which will be organized by the President of the General Assembly on 19 May 2011.
The meeting, which is the only system-wide event where intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations share information in a systematic way on their activities related to the various aspects of international migration, was attended by some 100 participants, including representatives of agencies, funds and programmes of the United Nations system, other intergovernmental organizations, as well as representatives of Member States, academia, civil society and the private sector.
The Global Forum on Migration and Development
The 2010 and 2011 chairs of the Global Forum on Migration and Development (GFMD), Mr. Julian Ventura Valero, Under-Secretary for North America of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Mexico and Mr. Eduard Gnesa, Special Ambassador for International Cooperation in Migration of the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs of Switzerland, gave presentations on the past and forthcoming Global Forum meetings.
The Global Forum is an informal, state-led, voluntary and non-binding process providing a platform for discussion among Governments and linked to the United Nations through the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on International Migration and Development. The theme of the 2010 Global Forum was “Partnership for Migration and Human Development-Shared Responsibility” and the 2011 Global Forum’s theme is “Taking action on Migration and Development”. For more information on the Global Forum, see http://gfmd.org/.
Report of the Secretary-General on international migration and development
Ms. Hania Zlotnik, Director of the Population Division/ DESA highlighted selected findings of the report of the Secretary-General, focusing on the impact of the recent financial and economic crisis on international migration. While countries of origin had been affected by the decline in remittances and in opportunities for labour migration, they had continued to pursue strategies to leverage the benefits of international migration for development. Another development had been the rise in activities on international migration and development undertaken by the United Nations system and other relevant international organizations. Crucially, the United Nations system had also increased its activities to ensure that the rights of all migrants were safeguarded.
The informal thematic debate on international migration and development, organized by the President of the General Assembly
The Head of Policy Issues in the Office of the President of the General Assembly, Ms. Heidi Schroderus-Fox, provided an overview of the preparatory activities for the Informal Thematic Debate on International Migration and Development, to be held in New York on 19 May 2011. The debate, convened at the request of the General Assembly (see A/RES/63/225), would advance States’ general understanding of the positive impact of migration on development for countries of origin, transit and destination. The discussion would also contribute to the wider, ongoing dialogue on international migration and development, including the General Assembly’s 2013 High-level Dialogue on International Migration and Development.
Coordination in the area of international migration and development: capacity-building and training
Ms. Michele Klein-Solomon, Permanent Observer for the International Organization for Migration (IOM) to the United Nations presented some of the main features of the Global Migration Group’s (GMG) handbook Mainstreaming Migration into Development Planning: A Handbook for Policy-makers and Practitioners.
Mr. Laurent de Boeck, Director of the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Observatory on Migration discussed the work-plan of the observatory for the following two years, which would centre on South-South migration and its impact on human development and on enhancing research capacities in the South.
Measuring the impact of international migration
Professor Delgado-Wise of the Autonomous University of Zacatecas and Laura Chappell of the Institute for Public Policy Research presented two different, but in many respects complementary, strategies for designing a system of indicators to examine migration and development. The discussion addressed the myths that often characterize the discourse on the linkages between migration and development and called for improved methods and theoretical models to bridge the gap between evidence and public opinions.
Mr. Patrick Simon, Director of Research at the Institut National d’Etudes Demographiques (INED) and Mr. David Khoudour-Castéras, Economist at the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), delivered presentations on the complexity of developing measures and benchmarks for monitoring the integration of migrants. Among the key challenges identified were the lack of a harmonized definition and time frame for monitoring and evaluating integration processes, and the need to take into account country-specificities in identifying the target groups for integration policies.
ECOSOC e-discussion on “Education: Closing the Gap” will be held from 1 February to 4 March
As part of the preparatory process for the ECOSOC 2011 Annual Ministerial Review, DESA will launch an e-discussion in collaboration with the United Nations Development Group (UNDG), United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and United Nation’s Children Fund (UNICEF).
The e-discussion is an open, multi-stakeholder forum for practitioners, academic experts and policy-makers to share new ideas and formulate critical policy messages to the UN intergovernmental decision-making process regarding the education related to MDGs and IADGs.
This year, expert moderators will facilitate a global discussion on quality, access quality in education, access to education and innovation in education. The outcome of the discussion will feed directly into the Global Preparatory Meeting (April 2011) and the Annual Ministerial Review of education being held in Geneva during the Substantive Session of ECOSOC (July 2011).
ECOSOC Facebook e-discussion on “Building a future for today’s youth: improving access to education” will be held from 16 February to 16 March
DESA and the Department of Public Information will organize another e-discussion to be hosted on the Facebook page of the United Nations Academic Impact. The purpose of the moderated online discussion is to provide a platform for people to express their hopes and dreams for education for all for themselves, their family and community.
The outcome of the Facebook e-discussion will be shared by the moderators of the e-discussion from each region (Japan for Asia; Ecuador for Latin America and the Caribbean; Lebanon for the Middle East and Western Asia and South Africa for Africa) with the Economic and Social Council on 5 April 2011 during a Global Preparatory Meeting in New York, for the 2011 Annual Ministerial Review on the theme of achieving education goals.
Activities on international migration and development
Ninth Coordination Meeting on International Migration will be held from 17-18 February in New York
The meeting, organized by DESA’s Population Division, is being held in response to General Assembly Resolution 58/208 of 13 February 2004, which requests the Secretary-General to continue convening meetings to coordinate international migration activities.
The meeting has the following three objectives: (a) to examine the development of indicators that measure the contribution of international migration to countries of origin and destination; (b) to exchange information on recent initiatives to build capacities on international migration and development, and (c) to discuss the contribution of United Nations agencies, funds and programmes and other relevant organizations to the Global Forum on Migration and Development as well as to the informal thematic debate on international migration and development which will be organized by the President of the General Assembly on 19 May 2011.
By providing participants with the opportunity to present their activities, the meeting will contribute to greater coherence of the United Nations and other international organizations in responding to the growing demand from Member States to support and develop activities on international migration and development.
The outcome of the meeting will contribute to the preparation of the report of the Secretary-General on international migration and development for the sixty-seventh session of the General Assembly.
Regional Workshop on Mutual Accountability for Eastern and Southern Africa was held on 24-25 January
DESA’s Office for ECOSOC Support and Coordination (OESC) helped to organize a regional workshop on mutual accountability in development cooperation, together with UNDP. Bringing together senior officials of government agencies responsible for aid management, parliamentarians and civil society organizations, the event aims at discussing how to develop national aid policies and ensure balanced and open mutual accountability fora where progress on aid effectiveness is being discussed. National stakeholders are invited to develop concrete recommendations based on their national experiences.
Key messages will feed into the preparations for the fourth High-level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in Busan and the 2012 Development Cooperation Forum (DCF). They will also contribute to the evaluation report the DCF will prepare on this occasion based on a comprehensive mutual accountability survey in up to 90 United Nations Member States.
This workshop is the first of a series of events aimed at deepening the understanding and improving mechanisms on mutual accountability, co-organized by UNDP and national governments, with analytical inputs from OESC. The mutual accountability survey is available on the DCF website in English, French and Spanish.
Expert Group meeting held in Geneva from 20-21 January had a particular focus on operational activities for development
A two-day expert group meeting was organized by DESA in cooperation with the Chief Executive Board for Coordination (CEB) Secretariat. The meeting, which brought together heads and other senior-level personnel of budget and finance offices from across the UN system as well as OECD, discussed how to further streamline and strengthen system-wide reporting on funding flows to the UN system. The participants examined the current strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and challenges of system-wide reporting on funding for the UN system and developed strategic priorities to enhance such reporting going forward.
The expert meeting reviewed how to foster effective synergy, complementarities and convergence between key system-wide reporting instruments, which include DESA’s annual report on funding for UN system-wide operational activities for development, the CEB’s report on the budgetary and financial situation of the organizations of the UN system and the UN system-wide comprehensive financial statistics database and reporting system which is in its early stages of development.
This task is made more complex as there are several new initiatives within the UN system aimed at increased harmonization of financial reporting across entities, such as the adoption of International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS), which will impact any coordination effort on system-wide reporting.
There has been increasing demand from donors and programme countries for enhanced system-wide reporting as it is expected that this would improve transparency, governance, coherence and coordination of the UN development system.
Significant increase in Public Service Awards nominations
United Nations Public Service Awards Call for Nominations closed on 15 January with a 44.4 per cent increase over 2010
Two new categories were created this year in partnership with UNODC and with UN Women. Eight new countries were nominated, including Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Dominica, Somalia, Tajikistan, Trinidad and Tobago, and Ukraine.
This year DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) held for the first time a series of informative sessions for representatives of Permanent Missions to the United Nations, to brief them on the programme and encourage them to notify their governments to increase nominations and participation.
The United Nations Public Service Awards is the most prestigious international recognition of excellence in public service. It rewards the creative achievements and contributions of public service institutions that lead to a more effective and responsive public administration in countries worldwide.
Through an annual competition, the UN Public Service Awards promotes the role, professionalism and visibility of public service. It is held every year on 23 June, United Nations Public Service Day. This year’s Awards Ceremony and Forum will be held in Tanzania.
The annual meeting was held in New York from 12-14 January to identify possible ways forward
The meeting was attended by 7 indigenous, 4 Members of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues as well as 20 Member States as observers, 30-40 representatives of indigenous peoples’ organizations and some 20 colleagues from the UN System, including the Secretariat of the Forum on Forests.
The meeting provided an opportunity to exchange information on issues regarding indigenous peoples and forests, including the impact of large-scale development, conservation projects and climate change mitigation measures in forests on indigenous peoples’ livelihoods. The meeting also analyzed cultural practices and resource management systems, highlighted good practices models of forest management and identified gaps and challenges as well as possible ways forward.
International Expert Group Meeting on Indigenous Peoples and Forests will be held in New York from 12-14 January
Forests account for 30 percent, or 3.2 billion hectares, of the earth’s land area and are the traditional territories for many indigenous peoples. Indigenous peoples living in forests possess clearly defined rights to land and natural resources, including communal ownership of their ancestral lands. They manage the natural resources on their territories, exercise their customary laws, and represent themselves through their own institutions.
However, these rights are often denied by development and conservation schemes. Indigenous peoples suffer disproportionately from large-scale development and conservation projects and are often forced to relocate, while their rights to compensation are often denied or overlooked. These actions very often result in serious consequences for indigenous peoples.
In 2006, the United Nations General Assembly declared 2011 the International Year of Forests and invited Governments, the United Nations system, relevant non-governmental organizations, the private sector and other actors to make concerted efforts to raise awareness at all levels to strengthen the sustainable management, conservation and sustainable development of all types of forests for the benefit of current and future generations.
Sustainable forest management is seen to contribute extensively to the achievement of the internationally agreed development goals, including the Millennium Development Goals with respect to poverty eradication and environmental sustainability. It is also seen to contribute towards the global effort to fight climate change and combat desertification and the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity, along with numerous other benefits for the betterment of the livelihoods of people.
For indigenous peoples, the International Year of Forests has the potential to have a central voice in the global debate on forests, as well as find a way forward to the often contentious interactions that occur between indigenous peoples, States, commercial and corporate forest interests.
At its ninth session, the Permanent Forum decided to hold an Expert Group Meeting, coinciding with the International Year of Forests. At its regular session on 22 July 2010, the Economic and Social Council approved the Permanent Forum’s recommendation in decision 2010/248.
The meeting will include indigenous experts from the seven Permanent Forum regions as well as Permanent Forum members, States, UN Agencies, Indigenous Peoples’ Organizations and academics. The findings of this Expert Group Meeting will be presented to the Tenth Session of the Permanent Forum in May 2011.
Workshop on MDG Monitoring for Countries in the Latin American and Caribbean region will be held in San Jose, Costa Rica from 31 January – 3 February
The workshop, which is organized by DESA’s Statistics Division in collaboration with ECLAC, will bring together representatives from national statistical offices, line ministries and international agencies, to review recommendations for reporting of MDG data and to establish strategies for dealing with data discrepancies and data gaps at the national and international level; particularly for poverty, labor and health related MDG indicators.
In addition, the workshop will provide participants with skills needed to improve the production and dissemination of MDG indicators, and aims at explaining data differences between national and international figures.
Open consultations on enhanced cooperation on international public policy issues pertaining to the Internet took place in New York on 14 December
On 14 December 2010, Mr. Sha Zukang, Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, convened a face-to-face consultation with Governments, international organizations, civil society and the private sector on the process towards enhanced cooperation on Internet-related public policy issues in response to ECOSOC resolution 2010/2. Participants were invited to reflect, above all, what international public policy issues are not being adequately addressed by current mechanisms and what specific processes should be pursued to enhanced cooperation in these areas.
While the range of issues continues to reflect the outcome of the World Summit on the Information Society in broad terms, opinions are divided on how to pursue cooperation in different areas. Suggestions range from discussion within existing institutional frameworks to the creation of a new international Internet organization. Speakers included representatives from 14 Governments, 3 international organizations, 8 civil society organizations, and 5 from the private sector. DESA Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) also received written contributions from 7 Governments, 7 international organizations, 28 civil society organizations, and 9 from the private sector.
DPADM will continue to collect written inputs from accredited entities through 31 December 2010. All inputs, both written and oral, will be synthesized by the Secretary-General and submitted as a report to the United Nations General Assembly through the Economic and Social Council next year, which will be prepared by DPADM.
Accountability, auditing and citizens’ engagement for development
International seminar on Strengthening External Public Auditing in the ASOSAI Region was held in Seoul, Republic of Korea, from 13-18 December
The Development Management Branch (DMB) of the Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) represented DESA in the international seminar on “Strengthening External Public Auditing” in the Asian Organization for Supreme Audit Institutions (ASOSAI) Region. The seminar was hosted by the Board of Auditing and Inspection (BAI) and was attended by the Asian members of the International Association of Supreme Auditing Institutions (INTOSAI). Mr. Roberto Villarreal, Chief of Branch (DMB), delivered a keynote presentation in the seminar on the topic of Accountability, Auditing and Citizens’ Engagement: Public Policy Issues to Enhance Development.
BAI has hosted seminars on various issues for the ASOSAI member Supreme Audit Institutions (SAIs) every three years since 1983 with a view to enhancing audit capacity of member SAIs. This year, the BAI seminar functioned as a regional follow-up to the INTOSAI Conference on Strengthening External Public Auditing in INTOSAI Regions held in Vienna, Austria from 26-27 May, 2010, in which Dr. Thomas Stelzer, Assistant-Secretary-General of DESA delivered a keynote presentation on “the Importance of Independent SAIs for the Implementation of the UN Millennium Development Goals.”
Attended by high-ranking officials of the ASOSAI member SAIs, the seminar involved a series of discussion sessions where participants delivered presentations on their respective countries’ level of independence. Several expert lectures were also delivered by eminent audit experts, such as current and/or former heads of SAIs, and the INTOSAI Secretariat officials.
Preventing and combating corruption in the public service
First Intersessional Meeting of the Open-ended Intergovernmental Working Group on the Prevention of Corruption was held in Vienna from 13 to 15 December
The Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) represented DESA in this high-level event, which was organized by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). The meeting was attended by over 100 national delegations for a total of approximately 500 delegates, including representatives from the World Bank, UNDP, OECD and others.
Following a new United Nations Public Service Awards category on “Preventing and Combating Corruption in the Public Service”, jointly established by DPADM and UNODC, the Division was invited to make a presentation about the Awards programme and innovative practices in governance. During the same session, UNODC presented a background paper entitled “Good practices in the prevention of corruption and regulation models in the public sector”, highlighting, among others, the work carried out by DPADM “on the nexus between corruption, poor administration and mismanagement”. Particular emphasis was given to the United Nations Public Service Awards, analytical studies, compilations of laws and practices, the Charter for the Public Service in Africa and the Ibero-American Charter for the Public Service. DPADM was also invited to make a presentation on the role of e-procurement and citizen engagement in the fight against corruption.
The Working Group is to adopt a report on its meeting, which is expected to contain recommendations for consideration and action by the Conference of the States Parties to the UN Convention against Corruption at its fourth session. The Working Group was established by the Conference of the States Parties to the UN Convention against Corruption to advise and assist the Conference in the implementation of its mandate on the prevention of corruption.
The Conference also decided that the working group will:(a) Assist the Conference in developing and accumulating knowledge in the area of prevention of corruption; (b) Facilitate the exchange of information and experience among States on preventive measures and practices; (c) Facilitate the collection, dissemination and promotion of best practices in corruption prevention; (d) Assist the Conference in encouraging cooperation among all stakeholders and sectors of society in order to prevent corruption.
Examining current trends in e-governance programmes
Expert Group Meeting on the United Nations e-Government Survey 2012: Towards a More Citizen-Centric Approach was held in New York from 6-7 December
A comprehensive revision of the United Nations e-Government Survey questionnaire was undertaken and new indicators were proposed at an EGM organized by DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) to review and examine the Survey’s methodology in response to current trends in e-government programmes. A group of e-government experts from academia and research institutes participated in the EGM. The discussions mainly focused on six proposed initiatives: i) user take-up and training of the public service delivery through ICT tools; ii) accessibility of Internet or mobile connectivity to all; iii) accessibility of e-services to vulnerable groups; iv) citizen engagement in e-service delivery; iv) Whole-of-Government and one-stop service provision; and vi) information services on environment related issues.
Mr. Nikhil Chandavarkar, Chief of the Communication and Outreach Branch, represented the Division of Sustainable Development at the EGM, particularly contributing to initiative vi mentioned above. This exercise also helped address the contribution DPADM will provide to the Rio+20 Conference. A set of suggestions for consideration on the upgrading of the United Nations e-Government Survey methodology and questionnaire has been developed as a result of the EGM, which will be used as a reference for the preparation for the forthcoming e-Government Survey.
2010 GAID Global Forum and Annual Meeting took place on 5-6 December in Abu Dhabi
The Global Alliance for ICT and Development (GAID) held its 5th annual Global Forum – “Information and Communication Technologies for achieving the Millennium Development Goals: Moving from Advocacy to Action” at the Yas Marina Circuit in Abu-Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
The Forum convened relevant stakeholders for an action-oriented dialogue on emerging issues and challenges in the field of ICT for Development. Throughout the two days, the participants performed a collective ‘reality check’ on the progress made thus far in using ICT to achieve the MDGs and what still needs to be done to ensure that ICT fulfills their vast potential for accelerating development.
During the Forum the Alliance also presented its major, recently launched initiative – the MDG eNabler, a free web-based set of ICT-based tools and resources designed to assist governments and all development practitioners in their work towards achieving the MDGs.
In the afternoon of the first day of the Forum, seven “solution salons” were held and allowed participants to break into thematic groups of their choice for intimate, focused sessions on issues related to the use of ICT for achieving the Millennium Development Goals.
Led by leading UN organizations, private sector companies and academic leaders, including WHO, UNESCO, Intel and Columbia University, among others, each session’s participants worked to identify the key issues and problems of their respective salon subjects, design and present solutions to these issues and problems and then report back to the larger Forum group the following day on their results and recommendations for GAID and the broader development community. These sessions were lauded by the event’s participants and the recommendations will be used to guide the work of the Alliance moving forward.
The Alliance also held Board and Strategy Council meetings in Abu Dhabi, where the future plan of action for the Alliance and the future development of the MDG eNabler initiative were discussed. There was wide recognition of the positive and forceful impact that the Alliance was making in the expanding field of ICT for Development, in particularly in its recently streamlined mandate to promote the use of ICT for achieving the Millennium Development Goals.
Briefing session to the Permanent Missions on the UN Public Service Awards 2011 was held on 23 November in New York
As a follow-up to a request by representatives of Permanent Missions to the United Nations who attended the briefing session on the UN Public Service Awards programme on 3 November 2010, DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) organized a special briefing session on 23 November 2010 for representatives from Latin American countries.
DPADM briefed the representatives about the UN Public Service Awards programme and the 2011 call for nominations. Mr. Limon Rodriguez of UNIFEM (part of UN-Women) made a presentation about the new UN Public Service Award category on gender-responsive delivery of public services. Representatives of Argentina, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Peru attended the briefing and expressed great appreciation for this initiative. The session was very well received by the representatives and many offered to disseminate information to their respective capitals and to local levels.
2010 GAID Global Forum and Annual Meeting will take place on 5-6 December in Abu Dhabi
The Annual Meeting and Global Forum are major annual events of the Global Alliance for ICT and Development (GAID) and bring together participants from the global ICT for Development community to engage in multi-stakeholder dialogues and debates around key and emerging issues in this field and foster partnerships and collaboration. This year’s event will be organized by GAID and hosted by the Abu-Dhabi Systems and Information Center.
The theme of this year’s Global Forum will be “Information and Communication Technologies for achieving the Millennium Development Goals – Moving from Advocacy to Action”. Participants will include ministers, senior policy makers, business leaders, representatives of international organizations, civil society and academia active in the field of ICT for Development.
The Forum will be an opportunity to perform a collective “reality check” on the progress made thus far in using ICT to achieve the MDGs and what still needs to be done to ensure that ICT fulfill their vast potential for accelerating achievement of the MDGs. The main goal of the Forum is to identify concerns and priorities to move decisively and productively from advocacy to action.
The Global Alliance will also present, for further discussion and feedback, its major initiative – the MDG eNabler, a free web-based set of ICT-based tools and resources designed to assist governments and all development practitioners in their work towards achieving the MDGs.
The Board of Directors and the Strategy Council of GAID will meet on 6 December, following the closing of the Global Forum. Among the principal items on the agenda for both meetings will be the discussion and adoption of the Plan of Action for 2011 and beyond.
18th Inter-agency and Expert Group Meeting on MDG indicators takes place in Geneva from 30 November-2 December
As part of the regular consultation with both national and international experts to review and discuss issues related to the MDG monitoring, the meeting will focus on localizing the MDG indicators, country capacity building and creation of appropriate frameworks for monitoring national development. It will also coordinate related technical cooperation activities in countries and plan the production of the global MDG monitoring outputs for 2011.
Expert Group Meeting on the United Nations e-Government Survey 2012: Towards a More Citizen-Centric Approach will be held in New York from 6-7 December
The meeting, organized by DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM), will provide a forum for discussion to allow the experts to review and methodically examine the Survey’s methodology. They will review the methodology in light of current trends in e-government programmes.
The experts will also discuss some challenges or emerging issues such as: user take-up and training; universal accessibility of Internet or mobile connectivity; accessibility of services by vulnerable groups; multi-channel service provision; whole of Government (WOG) and one-stop service provision; and, assessing the environment. The experts will provide advice and recommendations on how to integrate these issues into the next edition of UN e-Government Survey.
World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) follow up will take place in New York on 14 December
In its resolution 2010/2 of 19 July, the Economic and Social Council invited the Secretary-General “to convene open and inclusive consultations involving all Member States and all other stakeholders with a view to assisting the process towards enhanced cooperation in order to enable Governments on an equal footing to carry out their roles and responsibilities in respect of international public policy issues pertaining to the Internet but not of the day-to-day technical and operational matters that do not impact upon those issues.”
The consultations will focus on enhanced cooperation on international public policy issues pertaining to the Internet. The Council further requested that the consultations be undertaken “through a balanced participation of all stakeholders in their respective roles and responsibilities, as stated in paragraph 35 of the Tunis Agenda.” The consultations will consist of two parts: (1) submission of written comments, preferably; and, (2) a face-to-face meeting to be held in New York on 14 December 2010.
Enhancing cooperation in international tax matters
Sixth Session of the Committee of Experts on International Cooperation in Tax Matters took place in Geneva from 18-22 October
All participants agreed that the meeting fully succeeded in achieving the ambitious objectives of its busy agenda. The main areas of discussion included an update of the United Nations Model Tax Convention, a definition of “permanent establishment”, transfer pricing and an exchange of information on tax matters. Bilateral tax treaties between developed and developing countries, capacity building work in the tax area, tax treatment of services as well tax cooperation and climate change were also on the agenda.
Update of the United Nations Model Tax Convention
The Coordinator of the Subcommittee on the UN Model Tax Convention Update, Mr Robin Oliver (New Zealand), provided an overview of the amendments to both the text and the commentaries, as agreed by the Committee during the last few years (E/C.18/2010/CRP.1). The objective is to complete an update of the UN Model and related Commentaries in 2011. This Model is a centrepiece of the tax work undertaken by the Committee and its Secretariat at UN/DESA. As compared to the OECD Model, it favours capital importing countries, in majority of cases developing countries.
Dispute resolution
Following presentation by the Coordinator of the Subcommittee on Dispute Resolution, Ms. Claudine Devillet (Belgium), and ensuing discussion, it was agreed that two versions of Article 25 will be included in the text of the UN Model – one without binding arbitration and another one including such provision (E/C.18/2010/CRP.2 & Add.1). The arbitration is between countries and does not directly involve the taxpayer.
The Committee also agreed that a Commentary was needed to explain why arbitration clauses may or may not be considered suitable in a particular treaty. This reflects concerns that arbitration procedures might require developing countries to seek extra-budgetary resources in foreign currency to pay for relevant proceedings, as well as concerns that arbitration proceedings might inherently favour developed countries in disputes with developing countries.
Definition of “permanent establishment”
The result of a long-lasting work on a revised Commentary to Article 5 of the UN Model Tax Convention (E/C.18/2010/5 & 6) was introduced by Mr. Ronald van der Merwe (South Africa). The agreed text preserves a strong source country taxation element favoured by most developing countries. Article 5 is the centrepiece of the UN Model Tax Convention, as it indicates the threshold requirement for a State (that there be a “permanent establishment” in that State) before it can tax profits from the economic engagement of persons from its treaty partner. The OECD Model has a higher threshold than the UN Model in many respects, as favoured by capital exporting countries.
Transfer pricing: a practical manual for developing countries
Transfer prices are used by parts of multi-national corporations in their internal dealings. Abuse or mispricing can lead to large-scale tax evasion or avoidance, to which developing countries are especially vulnerable. Based on a draft outline of a manual to assist developing countries in this area, as agreed by the Committee last year, several working draft chapters (introduction, business framework, legal background, transfer pricing capability in tax administration and transfer pricing methods) were presented (E/C.18/2010/CRP.4) by the Coordinator of the Subcommittee on Transfer Pricing, Mr. Stig Sollund (Norway).
It was agreed that new draft chapters will be posted for comments on the Tax Committee website, with a view to completing the manual by 2012. This body of work was suggested to the Committee by the Secretariat last year and has drawn great interest from all sectors.
Exchange of information on tax matters
The Secretariat provided an oral update regarding the consideration by ECOSOC of the draft Code of Conduct on Cooperation in Combating International Tax Evasion, which had been recommended by the Committee at its 2009 session. The Committee again invited ECOSOC to take action, as a matter of priority, on the draft Code.
Revision of the Manual for the Negotiation of Bilateral Tax Treaties between Developed and Developing countries
Following a brief overview outlining the history of the Manual by the Coordinator of the relevant Subcommittee, Mr. Bernell Arrindell (Barbados), several Members of the Subcommittee introduced draft chapters of the Manual (E/C.18/2010/CRP.10 & Add.1). The Committee’s objective is to finalize the revision of the 2003 document by 2012. However, the work on this document has been moving quite slowly, due to its difficult history. Greater focus on a more practical approach to assist developing country treaty negotiators and administrators should lead to speedier progress over the next year.
Capacity building
The Coordinator of the Subcommittee on Capacity Building, Mrs. Ifueko Omoigui Okauru (Nigeria), provided an overview of the various focus areas and actors involved in capacity building work in the tax area (E/C.18/2010/CRP.11). The ensuing discussion focused on ways of improving cooperation between various actors. Several concrete activities were mentioned, including efforts to provide free access in targeted countries to some (online) training courses. A proposed website, developed in the context of a joint DESA/UNDP project on the South-South Sharing of Successful Tax Practices (“S4TP”) was demonstrated for approval of the Committee.
The tax treatment of services
Professor Brian Arnold (consultant) presented a paper (E/C.18/2010/CRP.7 & Add.1) focusing on the increasing importance of the topic, the lack of a clear definition of services and an analysis of the principles underlying the current approach of the UN Model to services. He suggested a comprehensive revision to achieve greater consistency and effectiveness. This area is likely to show intense differences over who should tax the provision of services – either the country of the provider or receiver. Developing countries generally prefer the former approach. This work will likely continue beyond 2011.
Tax competition in corporate tax: use of tax incentives in attracting foreign direct investment
The issue was introduced by Mr. Stefan van Parys, representing the World Bank Group, and comments were made by Ms. Maria Amparo Grau Ruiz, Completense University, Madrid, on the basis of a paper prepared by the Investment Climate Advisory Services of the World Bank Group (E/C.18/2010/CRP.13). The paper provided a framework for evaluation of the effectiveness of tax incentives in developing countries. This work completed the mandate given to the Secretariat and served to re-engage the World Bank in the UN Tax Committee activities.
Tax cooperation and climate change
The Secretariat presented a scoping paper (E/C.18/2010/CRP.12) focussing on areas where greater international tax cooperation might contribute to effective domestic responses to climate change, including issues arising under the UN Model, due to differing characterization and treatment of profits. OECD representative argued that such work in the UN forum was not likely to be productive, based on the OECD experience.
However, the members and observers of the Committee did not support the OECD position. It was agreed that the Secretariat, in cooperation with other interested institutions, will continue to explore this area. This work does not aim to advise on what tax regime a country should adopt, but rather seeks to examine where international tax cooperation can help make such a chosen regime as effective as possible by, for example, discouraging abuse and avoiding double taxation or unintended double non-taxation.
Next steps
As required, the Committee recommended to ECOSOC that its next, 7th annual session take place in Geneva from 24 to 28 October 2011. The proposed agenda will address the 2011 revision of the UN Model Tax Convention and its Commentaries, as well as the revision of the Manual for Tax Treaty Negotiations, the practical manual on transfer pricing, capacity building, taxation of services, cooperation in climate change, and a consideration of other items for future work.
ECOSOC will have before it a full report the Committee on its 6th session, which is due in January 2011. In the meantime, all background papers prepared for the session as well as presentations given at the session are made available on DESA’s Financing for Development website.
First International Conference on Open Government Data took place in Washington D.C. from 15-17 November
DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) delivered a key note plenary address and had several opportunities for collaboration and the development of initiatives in the area of e-government with key strategic partners in the context of the conference.
The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) invited DESA to partner in a project to assist Latin American countries to develop e-government strategies.
In addition, the General Services Administration, US Federal Government and the US CIO agreed to explore the possibility of co-sponsoring with DPADM the “Americas CIO Forum” in 2011, thus launching an operational regional virtual network. They also agreed to share with DPADM their experience of working with various CIOs.
Sir Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the www, in commenting on the UN e-Government Survey, noted that he would be keen to eventually see it follow an open data approach. He also expressed interest in having UN Member States join the W3C Consortium. (This would naturally depend on the key issue of national data sovereignty.)
The United Nations University (UNU) expressed interest in undertaking research with DPADM on the links between e-government and sustainable development.
The conference was organized by the US Government and was the first conference of this type. The audience included government officials (mostly from the US, but also from Australia, New Zealand and the UK). DPADM delivered the plenary keynote address on the featured theme “Open Government Data: Towards Adding Value and Measuring Success – Efficiency and Transparency X Privacy and Security”.
In continuing efforts to promote and support innovations in public service delivery worldwide, the United Nations is calling for nominations to its 2010 Public Service Awards
The 2011 United Nations Public Service Awards (UNPSA) is the most prestigious international recognition of excellence in public service and is open to local or national public organizations, and to public-private partnerships involved in essential service delivery to citizens. Contestant from public institutions cannot nominate themselves. Instead, interested institutions will have to be nominated by Governments and civil society organizations for their achievements and performance.
More specifically, the Awards aims to discover innovations in governance, rewards excellence in the public sector and motivates public servants to further promote innovation. In addition, the Awards also enhances professionalism in the public service, raises the image of public service, enhance trust in government, and collects and disseminate successful practices for possible replication.
Nominations can be made online until 31 December 2010. The 2011 Awards are given in 5 categories: Preventing and combating corruption in the public service; Improving the delivery of public services; Fostering participation in policy-making decisions through innovative mechanisms; Advancing knowledge management; and Promoting gender responsive delivery of public services.
New Awards category on Promoting gender responsive public service delivery
DESA’s Division for Public Administration & Development Management (DPADM) and the United Nations Development Fund for Women – UNIFEM (part of UN Women) have signed an agreement to collaborate and jointly manage a new UNPSA category on “Promoting gender responsive delivery of public services”.
An efficient public administration that delivers services for all citizens is central to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). It is equally apparent that the achievement of gender equality remains a great challenge in many parts of the world and negatively impacts progress towards all of the MDGs. Women’s enjoyment of rights, resources, and voice are shaped by governance systems.
While there has been notable progress in ratifying conventions and improving legislation, adequate design and delivery of gender-responsive services have lagged behind. For this reason, there is hope that this award will serve as a token of recognition for all those public servants who are working untiringly to improve the delivery of services to women and serve to spur others to learn and replicate from their good examples.
New Awards category on Preventing and combating corruption in the public service
DPADM and the United Nations Office on Drug and Crime (UNODC) have agreed to collaborate in the establishment and management of a new category on “Preventing and combating corruption in the public service”. This foresighted and important partnership, which aligns DPADM and UNODC’s missions in the area of integrity, accountability and transparency, will help to collect, document, share and possibly replicate good practices in the area of anti-corruption.
It will also encourage higher standards of public conduct and promote greater awareness of the importance to act against corruption in order to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. As it is well known, corruption hurts the poor disproportionately by diverting funds intended for development, undermining a Government’s ability to provide basic services, feeding inequality and injustice and discouraging foreign aid and investment. Corruption is a key element in economic underperformance and a major obstacle to poverty alleviation and development (United Nations Convention against Corruption).
Thus, promoting integrity and anti-corruption preventive practices is of the utmost importance to ensure that the State’s funds are used to improve people’s quality of life through the delivery of basic services and the establishment of a good business environment. Partnering with the above organizations will ensure that the project is carried out building upon and integrating in a coherent way the knowledge, expertise and experience of the various partners to the advantage of Member States.
Second Meeting of Expert Group on Energy Statistics will be held in New York from 2-5 November
DESA’s Statistics Division is organizing this Expert Group Meeting to review and endorse the provisional draft of the International Recommendations for Energy Statistics (IRES) prior to its submission to the United Nations Statistical Commission for adoption at its 42nd Session (22-25 February 2011).
The Expert Group will review the results of the worldwide consultation on the provisional draft of IRES that took place during the period from July to August 2010 and advise on their incorporation in the final draft. During this meeting a number of issues relevant to the preparation of the Energy Statistics Compilers Manual (ESCM) and to the development of the implementation programme of the revised recommendations will be discussed.
The meeting will gather experts from countries and international/regional organizations active in energy statistics.
Expert Group Meeting on the Revision of the Framework for the Development Environment Statistics will take place in New York from 8-10 November
DESA’s Statistics Division, in collaboration with Statistics Canada is organizing this meeting to revise the United Nations Framework for the Development of Environment Statistics, published in 1984, on the basis of improved scientific knowledge about the environment and new cross-disciplinary requirements created by emerging environmental concerns and their management.
The main objective of this EGM is to agree on the conceptual framework that best supports an integrative approach to environment statistics and helps countries to establish and improve their national environment statistics systems.
Workshop on MDG Monitoring will be held in Geneva from 8-11 November
The workshop, which is organized by STAT/DESA in collaboration with UNECE, will bring together national statistical offices and international agencies and provide an opportunity to explore ways to reconcile national and international data and review recommendations for the reporting of MDG data. The workshop will aim to establish strategies for dealing with data discrepancies and data gaps at the national and international level, particularly for health related MDG indicators.
This event will also provide national statistical offices with training in the production and efficient dissemination of data for MDGs monitoring (Maria Martinho, 3-4947).
The 18th Inter-agency and Expert Group Meeting on MDG indicators will be held from 30 November – 2 December in Geneva, Switzerland
The meeting is part of the regular consultation with both national and international experts to review and discuss issues related to the MDG monitoring. It will focus on localizing the MDG indicators, country capacity building and creation of appropriate frameworks for monitoring national development, as well as the coordination of related technical cooperation activities in countries. The meeting will also plan the production of the global MDG monitoring outputs for 2011 (Maria Martinho, 3-4947).
Responding to the statistical needs of the global economic and financial crisis
International Seminar on Early Warning and Business Cycle Indicators will take place in Moscow from 17-19 November
This is the final seminar organized by DESA’s Statistics Division and Eurostat in cooperation with the hosts of the three seminars, Statistics Canada (Ottawa, May 2009), Statistics Netherlands (Scheveningen, December 2009) and the Federal eState Statistics Service of the Russian Federation. These seminars are held in response to the call made in the fortieth Session of the United Nations Statistical Commission in 2009 for swift and coordinated statistical initiatives by countries and international organizations in response to the global economic and financial crisis.
The seminars will focus on the methodologies for compiling and releasing of high quality rapid (or ‘flash’) estimates, their international comparability, the communication strategy for such estimates and their analytical indicators on the performance of the real sector of the economy and the financial markets for effective macroeconomic monitoring.
The third international seminar is expected to formulate recommendations for the monitoring of business cycles and the early identification of turning points, as well as strategies for future work on improving statistical tools for this purpose. The outcome will be formulated as recommendations that will be presented to the United Nations Statistical Commission at its next session in March 2011.
The Summit Forum of the 2010 Shanghai World Expo will take place on 18 November
The Summit Forum is of the highest rank among three types of forums. It will be the climax of the Expo forums as it provides a stage for large-scale discussion of global urbanization issues. The “Shanghai Declaration,” which is to be announced at the Summit Forum, will be a significant document of the Expo based on participants’ understanding on global urban development. The “Shanghai Declaration” will be based on common willingness.
Linked to the core Expo theme of “Better City, Better Life,” the topic of the Summit Forum is recommended as “Urban Innovation and Sustainable Development,” which focuses on the key urban challenges confronting countries around the world. It is also based on the themes of past Expos and therefore enhances both the continuing value of the event and its long heritage.
The forum will take the form of conferences and sub-forums, accompanied by keynote speeches, round-table meetings, mini summits, group discussions, cocktail receptions, and visits in the Expo Site.
Up to 2,000 participants are estimated to attend the Summit Forum, including heads of state, ministers, mayors, Chinese government officials, the UN Secretary General, Commissioners General, and representatives of academic, business and media, as well as outstanding members of the younger generation.
Expert Group Meeting on the World Economy (Project LINK) was held from 20-22 October in New York
The LINK Global Economic Outlook indicates that the road towards recovery from the Great Recession is proving to be long, sinuous and bumpy. After a year of fragile and uneven recovery, growth of the world economy is now decelerating on a broad front, presaging an even weaker growth in the outlook for 2011.
The report points out the weakness of major developed economies that continues to drag on the global recovery. There seems to be no quick fix to many of the predicaments these economies are facing in the aftermath of the financial crisis. While credit shortage, financial fragility, persistently high unemployment and anaemic domestic demand are found in these economies, the contribution of government spending to GDP growth is expected to become negative in 2011 as a result of the announced fiscal consolidation.
In contrast, developing countries and economies in transition have shown a strong economic recovery. In the outlook, however, as the recovery in major developed economies falters, growth prospects in developing countries are expected to weaken in tandem.
The report identified a number of risks for the world economy. Risks for the world economy are mostly rooted in major developed economies, including those associated with persistently high unemployment, the continued fragility of the financial system and looming sovereign debt stress. For developing countries and economies in transition, major risks are associated with surges in capital inflows, which are causing upward pressures on their currencies. Mitigating these risks poses enormous policy challenges.
In major developed economies, macroeconomic policy options are limited by political factors restraining further fiscal stimulus and market responses to sovereign debt distress. This has led policymakers to rely increasingly on monetary policy, which may not suffice to boost aggregate demand and create new jobs. The surge in capital flows to emerging and other developing economies and the consequent pressures on currencies are complicating the international environment for developing countries.
During the High Level Meeting on MDGs, a Global Alliance for ICT and Development (GAID) Side Event was held on 21 September in New York
GAID held a high-level breakfast meeting to launch web-based knowledge tools and information resources, providing tangible and practical benefits to developing countries in their efforts to advance the MDGs.
The meeting was attended by government leaders and officials, CEOs and managers from ICT companies, and representatives of NGOs and international organizations from several countries. ASG Mr. Jomo Kwame Sundaram read a welcoming message on behalf of the Secretary-General.
Workshop on Harnessing Knowledge Management through Web 2.0 Tools took place in Shanghai, China, from 25 to 27 September
Knowledge Management has proven to be essential for government agencies at all levels to efficiently and effectively deliver public services and act as centers for the timely collection, organization and dissemination of information. However, due to the disparity between the haves and the have-nots, all countries are not at the same point in their development of efficient and effective Knowledge Management systems. Over the years, through Knowledge Management capacity building, many governments and institutions have moved toward electronic systems of data management.
Co-organized by DESA’s Division for Public Administration & Development Management (DPADM) in collaboration with the Regional Cooperation Office for City Informatization (RCOCI) of the Shanghai Municipal People’s Government, the meeting resulted in many actions to be undertaken by DPADM and UNPAN Partners, including updating the existing web user survey, starting an online discussion platform for continuous collaboration with workshop participants, updating the Discover UNPAN page and providing more detailed information for each partner organization and creating yearly progress reports in addition to regular monthly reports.
The meeting also decided to launch 6 more online courses in Spanish, discuss possible collaboration areas in knowledge management and consider translating some of the existing online courses into Arabic. As an outcome DPADM together with UNPAN partners will draft a set of standardized marketing tools on knowledge management products and produce a summary of UNPAN Partner fee based services to be displayed in UNPAN North America home page.
Fifth and last meeting of the Internet Governance Forum under its original mandate was held in Vilnius, Lithuania from 14-17 September
The meeting concluded with a number of calls by participants for continued dialogue and a renewed mandate. Jomo Kwame Sundaram, ASG for Economic Development, opened the conference on behalf of Sha Zukang, USG of DESA, together with President Dalia Grybauskaite of Lithuania. The theme of the meeting was “developing the future together”, a concept embodying what many participants perceive to be a fundamental achievement of the IGF – bridging cultural differences among stakeholders to discuss, in a flexible, open format, critical Internet resources, access, diversity, security, privacy and the many other important matters at hand.
DESA’s Statistics Division will host the Third Data Managers’ meeting in New York from 6-8 October
The Meeting will provide an opportunity for data managers from international agencies to update each other on recent developments in data dissemination and identify ways of expanding and improving the UNdata portal further (data.un.org). The meeting will cover several specific topics, including: data quality processes, SDMX, social networking for the statistical community, and the use of API.
Technology experts gather in e-Parliament Conference from 21-22 October in Midrand, South Africa
The 2010 World e-Parliament Conference, which is being organized by DESA, the Inter-Parliamentary Union, the Parliament of South Africa and the Pan-African Parliament and coordinated by DESA’s Global Centre for ICT in Parliament, will be held at the Pan-African Parliament in Midrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.
Apart from discussing the findings of the “World e-Parliament Report 2010”, the conference will focus on issues and challenges of “Governing at a time of technological changes” and emphasize the relationship between parliaments and media in light of the advent of new technologies.
At the Conference, leaders and members of parliaments, secretaries-general, parliamentary staff and officials, experts from international organizations and academics who work and deal with information and communication technologies in legislatures will have the opportunity to analyze good practices, exchange views on latest trends and institutional developments, learn from each other’s experiences, network with peers, and build partnerships in an international setting.
In accordance with ECOSOC decision E/2010/L.36 of 23 July 2010, the sixth session of the Committee of Experts on International Cooperation in Tax Matters will be held in Geneva from 18 to 22 October
The main objective of the session will be to complete the revision of the United Nations Model Double Taxation Convention between Developed and Developing Countries, in accordance with the Committee’s mandate. The session will also address important issues and proposals in other areas of the work of the Committee, such as for instance “transfer pricing” and capacity building in national tax systems.
Implementing the rights of persons with disabilities
Third Conference of States Parties to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities was held from 1-3 September at UN Headquarters in New York, under the theme: “Implementing the Convention through Advancing Inclusion of Persons with Disabilities”
The session began with elections for members of the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in accordance with article 34 of the Convention. As the total number of ratifications had passed 80, the membership of the Committee was increased by six to a total of 18 members. Additional elections were held for the six members of the Committee whose term expires in 2010.
Substantive roundtable discussions and an interactive informal session with civil society discussed the implementation of Articles 11, 19 and 24 of the Convention, on issues of inclusion and right to education, living in community and addressing the needs of persons with disabilities in situations of risk and humanitarian emergencies. A session was dedicated to an update on the implementation of the Convention within the UN System.
For the first time, a Civil Society Forum was held on the day prior to the opening of the Convention. The fourth Conference of States Parties to the Convention will be held on 7-9 September 2011.
Global Alliance for ICT and Development received support in Preparatory Meeting
On 1-2 September, the Global Alliance for ICT and Development (GAID) held a Preparatory meeting for the presentation of its ICT for MDGs Project in the context of the High-level Plenary Meeting of the General Assembly
The main purpose of the meeting was to refine and further develop, through an interactive discussion, the design and features of the project in preparation for a forthcoming presentation at the High-level Breakfast on 21 September. The event was attended by over 140 participants from 44 countries representing Governments, UN agencies and other international organizations, the private sector, civil society and academia.
There was overwhelming support for the Project on behalf of the participants. High-level representatives of developing country Governments, the African Union and the League of Arab States highlighted the urgency and practical relevance of this project. Important offers of support and participation were made by many participants, including the Governments of India, Italy and Germany, as well as by the private sector (Microsoft, Telefonica, Intel and others) and major civil society organizations.
Among other important decisions, the meeting agreed on a new name for the Project: ‘MDG eNabler’. It was also decided that an advisory committee will be established to help develop methodology and modalities for information processing and coordination of work.
16th Session of the Committee for the Coordination of Statistical Activities (CCSA) will be held in Vienna, Austria, from 1-3 September
The Committee for the Coordination of Statistical Activities (CCSA) is the main interagency mechanism in the professional field of official statistics, bringing together chief statistical managers from over 35 United Nations system and other international organizations, active in the collection and dissemination of official statistics. The Committee was established in 2002, taking over its key objectives from the former Administrative Committee on Coordination (ACC) Subcommittee on Statistical Activities, namely to promote coordination, integration and complementarity among the statistical programmes of the international organizations.
The Committee meets twice a year and the upcoming session will be jointly hosted by the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
The key topics on the agenda of the Sixteenth CCSA session include a special session on human capital and discussions on the Global Statistical System and the role of CCSA, development and maintenance of an Inventory on Global Statistical Standards, coordination of capacity building activities, use of non-official data in estimations made by the international organizations, establishment of a Network of statisticians working in international organizations, etc.
Information will also be provided about the outcomes from the recent Conference on Data Quality for International Organizations, status of the SDMX partnership and programme of work and celebration of the World Statistics Day. A report of the Committee’s ongoing activities will be presented to the forty-second session of the United Nations Statistical Commission.
PrepCom meeting for the presentation of the “MDG eMatrix” on 1-2 September and High-level Breakfast Presentation on 21 September
On 1-2 September 2010, the Global Alliance on ICT and Development (GAID) will convene a preparatory meeting for the presentation of the “MDG eMatrix (ICT for MDG Project)” at the margins of the High-level Plenary Meeting of the General Assembly on 21 September.
The principal objective of the PrepCom meeting is to finalize, through an interactive discussion and exchange of ideas and suggestions among high-level representatives of all relevant stakeholders, the design and features of the project.
On 21 September 2010, GAID will host a High-level Breakfast at which the “MDG eMatrix (ICT for MDG Project)”, the major new initiative of the Alliance, will be presented to high-level participants. Organized in the context of the High-level Plenary Meeting (HLPM) of the General Assembly, GAID will present the project to distinguished representatives of the Member States attending the HLPM of the General Assembly, Executive Heads of the entities of the UN system and other international organizations, top-level executives from the global private sector and other high-level stakeholders.
Implementing national action plans on violence against women
Expert Group Meeting will be held at the ECLAC/Subregional Headquarters for the Caribbean, Port-of-Spain, Trinidad and Tobago from 13-15 September, convened by DESA’s Division for the Advancement of Women in collaboration with ECLAC
Participants will review national action plans on violence against women and analyze different approaches and their effectiveness, as well as identify key elements and good practices for the development, content, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of national action plans on violence against women. A model framework for national action plans on violence against women to serve as a tool for Member States and other stakeholders in their efforts to adopt and implement such plans will be developed during this meeting.
The group of approximately eighteen (18) experts from all parts of the world includes government officials, lawyers, non-governmental organizations, academics and activists with in-depth knowledge and experience on national action plans addressing violence against women.
Workshop on forest governance and Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD+) in Latin America will be held from 31 August- 3 September in Oaxaca, Mexico
Organized by the Governments of Mexico and Switzerland and other partners with the support of the United Nations Forum on Forest, the workshop will discuss the relationships among sustainable forest management, forest governance, REDD+ and livelihoods, among other topics.
The Oaxaca workshop aims to better our understanding of the linkages and synergies between decentralisation and broader forest governance reforms, SFM, the improvement of living conditions for people who depend on forests and the increasing role of forests in climate change mitigation and adaptation.
The results are expected to directly feed into the 9th session of the UN Forum on Forests on the main theme “Forests for people, livelihoods and poverty eradication”, and will also contribute to the climate change process and inform UNFFCC COP 16, to be held in Mexico in November 2010.
The workshop will identify trends, facilitate the sharing of experience and distil lessons learnt on SFM, forest governance and decentralisation and REDD+ and identify opportunities and threats to livelihoods and poor people; contribute directly to the ninth session of UNFF; and inform discussions during COP16 in Mexico and contribute to REDD+ design.
Participants will include governments (both central and decentralised government units), development and environmental NGOs, local and indigenous peoples representatives, private sector representatives, regional organisations, and other relevant stakeholders from Latin America and other regions and global organisations such as UNFF, FAO, ITTO, UNFCCC.
First meeting of the Ad Hoc Expert Group (AHEG) on Forest Financing will be held from 13-17 September in Nairobi, Kenya
In 2009, a special session of the ninth session of the UN Forum on Forests decided to establish the Open-ended Intergovernmental AHEG Forest Financing to make proposals on strategies to mobilize resources from all sources to support the implementation of sustainable forest management, the achievement of the global objectives on forests and the implementation of the non‑legally binding instrument on all types of forests, including, inter alia, strengthening and improving access to funds and establishing a voluntary global forest fund.
The Expert Group in Nairobi will involve presentations by government-nominated experts, regional processes and development banks, forest related international organizations, major groups as well as prominent experts on forest financing. These discussions will inform participants of the main developments happening on forest financing in terms of actions, programmes and strategies, the remaining gaps, needs, obstacles, and required actions in this field, and features of feasible forest financing strategies. Experts will also discuss plans for intercessional activities on forest financing in the lead up to the tenth session of the Forum in 2013.
A preliminary report from the Expert Group will be submitted to the ninth session of the UN Forum on Forests (24 January – 4 February 2011) and final recommendations will be submitted for consideration and decision to the tenth session of the Forum in 2013.
Forest finance has been one of the most complex issues in the international forest policy debate over the last 17 years. Given the increased recognition of the role of forests in addressing major global challenges including climate change, forest finance issues are of high importance for the global community.
Internet Governance Forum (IGF) will be held from 14-17 September at the Lithuanian Exhibition and Convention Centre (LITEXPO) in Vilnius and will focus on the overall issue of IGF 2010 – developing the future together
International representatives of government, the private sector, civil society, the academic and technical communities, international organizations and the media will discuss the overall issue of “IGF 2010 – developing the future together”. This theme reflects the open and inclusive nature of the IGF with its multilateral, multistakeholder, democratic and transparent approach to discussions of Internet-related public policy issues.
The Vilnius meeting will help articulate a view of how we can use the Internet for the benefit of all humankind, and how we can further address the risks and challenges ahead. Internet governance should not be seen as an end in itself, but as a means of achieving development for all as expressed in internationally agreed development goals, including the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
In broad-based consultations the following programme for the meeting includes: Managing critical Internet resources; security, openness and privacy; access and diversity; Internet governance for development; taking stock of Internet governance and the way forward and emerging issues: cloud computing.
Some 1,500 participants from more than 100 countries are expected to attend. Assistant Secretary-General for Economic Development Jomo Kwame Sundaram will open the meeting.
The Internet Governance Forum is not a decision-making body, but a space for dialogue for all those involved to discuss Internet governance issues, where all participants engage as equals. There will be no negotiated outcome, but the meeting will seek to create an open and inclusive dialogue among all participants on public policy issues relating to the Internet and create new dynamics between participating institutions.
The Internet Governance Forum is an outcome of the Tunis phase of the World Summit on the Information Society, which took place in 2005. In the Tunis Agenda for the Information Society, Governments asked the Secretary-General to convene a new forum for policy dialogue to discuss issues related to key elements of Internet governance in order to foster the Internet’s sustainability, robustness, security, stability and development.
The initial four meetings of the IGF so far were held in Athens (2006), Rio de Janeiro (2007), Hyderabad (2008) and Sharm El Sheikh (2009). They illustrated the complexity and multifaceted nature of public policy issues related to Internet governance.
The General Assembly will decide later this year whether to follow the Secretary-General’s recommendation and extend the IGF mandate for another five years.
Reviewing the status of progress regarding poverty eradication
Expert Group Meeting on Poverty Eradication is part of the preparations for the 49th session of the Commission for Social Development (CSocD) and will be held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, from 15-17 September
Organized by DESA’s Division for Social Policy and Development (DSPD), in collaboration with the Economic Development and NEPAD Division of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, the meeting is convened in the context of ECOSOC resolution 2010/L.5 in which the Economic and Social Council decided that the priority theme for the 2011-2012 review and policy cycle of the Commission should be “Poverty Eradication”, taking into account its relationship to social integration and full employment and decent work for all.
The outcomes of the meeting will provide important inputs to the work of the Commission, in particular contributing to reviewing the status of progress regarding poverty eradication as well as examining continuing challenges and prospects for poverty eradication in developing countries.
The primary objectives of the expert group meeting are to undertake a comprehensive review of successes, best practices and lessons learned, obstacles and gaps, as well as key challenges and opportunities, leading to concrete national, regional and international strategies for action.
The recommendations that will come out of this meeting will assist the Commission for Social Development during its deliberations of the priority theme for the 2011-2012 review and policy cycle. The deliberations of the meeting will also contribute to the preparation of the Report of the Secretary-General to be submitted to the 49th session of the Commission for Social Development on the priority theme of “Poverty Eradication”.
The working language of the meeting will be English (UNECA will provide French translation). Documentation for the meeting will be provided in English.
Expert group meeting (EGM) on Gender, science and technology will take place from 28 September-1 October in Paris, France, in preparation of the fifty-fifth session of the Commission on the Status of Women
The EGM will be organized by DESA’s Division for the Advancement of Women (now part of UN Women) and in collaboration with UNESCO and explore the gender dimensions of science and technology, and identify policies and programmes that can accelerate progress towards the internationally agreed development goals, including the MDGs.
It will examine strategies for: Increasing women’s access to and use of technology, including more gender-responsive products, increasing women’s access to and participation in science and technology education and training, and eliminating barriers to women’s participation in science and technology employment.
Conference of African Ministers Responsible for Civil Registration will be held from 13-14 August in Addis Ababa
The Conference will be preceded by a preparatory meeting of experts from 9-11 August. The theme of the Conference is “Towards Improved Civil Status Information for Efficient Public Administration and Generation of Statistics for National Development and MDG Monitoring in Africa”.
The Conference is expected to achieve: the creation of a high-level regional platform for exchanging information on civil registration and vital statistics; enhanced awareness and commitment of African governments in the development of these systems; and endorsing resolutions and recommendations that would lead and govern African civil registration and vital statistics systems for the coming years.
DESA’s Statistics Division will participate on several levels; the Director will deliver a keynote address at the Conference and resource persons will support the ECA in substantive issues and by delivering key presentations on international standards for developing civil registration and vital statistics systems at both the preparatory meeting and the Conference.
Preparatory meeting for the presentation of the MDG Electronic Center in the context of the High-level Plenary Meeting of the General Assembly, will be held by GAID on 1-2 September
The principal objective of the preparatory meeting is to finalize, through an interactive discussion and exchange of ideas and suggestions among high-level representatives of all relevant stakeholders, the design and features of the eCenter in preparation for a presentation of a fully operational version to Member States in the context of the High-level Plenary Meeting of the General Assembly on 20-22 September this year.
Workshop on “Citizens’ Engagement in Development Management for Advancing towards the MDGs” took place in Barcelona, Spain from 21 and 22 June
As part of a number of activities co-organized by DPADM and the Government of Catalonia to celebrate this year’s Public Service Day the workshop developed the following concrete outputs: the publication of a report; a publication on guidelines for local and national governments to promote citizens engagement; an on-line training course on engagement of women in development matters; a global knowledge base on practices, legislation and institutions for citizens engagement and a battery of innovative tools based on ICT applications to facilitate the engagement of citizens. Finally, through conversations with participants from different countries, possibilities for future technical cooperation projects to be funded externally were explored.
The workshop gathered an average of 75 participants from 23 countries of Africa, Asia-Pacific, Europe and Latin America. Through presentations from experts and practitioners, and group discussions, participants discussed the potential of open government practices to include diverse modalities of participation of citizens in public policies and services for achieving the MDGs.
A large variety of national contexts were referred to, ranging from advanced countries in which the focus is on citizens engagement for its contribution to widening people’s rights and deepening democracy, to developing countries in which citizens engagement can help government design and implement policies and deliver services in ways that are more people-centered, responsive, inclusive, equitable, efficient and sustainable.
Country and sub-national experiences were revisited from Argentina, Catalonia, Jordan, Kenya and Russia. Winners of the 2010 UN Public Service Awards in the category of engaging citizens in public development affairs presented their respective innovations, from Brazil, Italy, Japan and Lebanon. In addition, a number of ICT-tools to facilitate citizens’ engagement were presented by participants from Australia, Brazil, Colombia and Venezuela.
International Conference on Good Governance for National Development was held in Seoul on 17-18 June 2010
The United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), UNPOG and UNDESA jointly sponsored this two-day workshop on good governance for national development. Mr. Aquaro presented UNDESA’s views on the key linkages between e-government and public governance. The results of the UN e-Government Survey 2010 and the UN Public Administration Knowledge Space were also presented.
In addition, there were several keynote addresses from the former Prime Minister of the Republic of Korea, the Secretary of the National Economic and Development Authority of the Philippines and various practitioners and specialist on the theme of the conference. All spoke on the importance of leadership and structure as a foundation of good governance for national development.
Two special workshops were part of this conference: (i) ICT Access and e-Government for Achieving the MDGs and (ii) the Development of the e-Cities Network in Asia and the Pacific.
The first workshop discussed the global and regional perspectives of e-government and the MDGs in Asia and the Pacific and identified the challenges that still exist as barriers for achieving the MDGs and how to develop a “Way Forward” for tackling these challenges.
The e-Cities Network workshop looked at ways cities could develop a substantive network that would showcase best practices and lessons learned at the local level and also looked at the possibility of expanding networks within Asia and the Pacific, counting on the support of associations of national cities from various countries.
After the e-Cities workshop, discussions were held to connect e-Cities Network to UN-PAKS. A course of action was agreed to concretely explore the development and utilization of e-cities as a strategic mechanism to disseminate UN-PAKS to citizens and vice-versa. It was agreed that more work needed to be done to materialize these promising possibilities.
The 7th Tyer Social and Economic Forum on Information Society will be held on 7-8 July
The Global Alliance on ICT and Development (GAID) has been invited to participate in the upcoming 7th Tver Social and Economic Forum which will focus this year on the development of Russia’s ‘Information Society’ strategies and plans. Organized by the Russian Managers Association and the Institute of Contemporary Development, the Forum is an all-Russian event and is arranged with the official support of the Presidential Executive Office and the Administration of the Tver Region.
Over 2,000 participants are expected to attend the Forum, including the President of the Russian Federation, Mr. Dmitry Medvedev. GAID Executive Coordinator, Mr. Sergei Kambalov, will be a keynote speaker in a parallel thematic session on the “International Experience in the Information Society Development” during the forum.
The Malawi National Seminar on Census Data Analysis is scheduled for 19-22 July
The main objective of the national seminar is to provide an opportunity for the staff member of the Malawi National Statistical Office in collaboration with the University of Malawi Population Studies Centre to further collaborate on the analysis of data from the 2008 census of Malawi on selected topics.
The national seminar will cover the following topics: (i) fertility and nuptiality from a gender perspective; (ii) fertility indices based on data from the 2008 census; (iii) measures of nuptiality based on data from the 2008 census: and (iv) use of the Census Info software for data presentation and dissemination.
After the seminar, participants are expected to produce thematic analytical reports, based on analysis generated during the seminar.
DESA’s Statistics Division sent an advisory mission to Bangladesh from 20-24 June to help assist with the preparation of the Bangladesh Housing Census scheduled in 2011
During the mission, the inter-regional advisor of the Statistics Division will work closely with the staff of the Bureau to review the census questionnaire of the 2011 Bangladesh Population and Housing Census, review the training materials and manuals, assess the data processing plans in details by stages, evaluate objectives and procedures of post enumerations survey, and discuss future plans for technical assistance.
International Seminar on Information and Communication Technology Statistics will be held in Seoul, Republic of Korea from 19-21 July
Statistics on information and communication technologies (ICTs) have received increasing attention in recent years, highlighting the need for reliable data on new technologies that have impacted all aspects of economic and social life. Especially since the Tunis phase of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), there has been much progress on the production of ICT statistics.
At the same time, the ICT area continues to evolve rapidly and statistical standards and definitions need to be revised and adapted continuously. As the main data collectors, national statistical agencies are crucial players in ensuring sustainable and internationally comparable ICT statistics.
The Seminar takes place at the half-way point between the Tunis phase of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) and 2015, when the United Nations General Assembly will review progress towards achieving the WSIS targets, in line with the MDGs. As such, this Seminar presents a timely opportunity for statistical agencies and other relevant stakeholders to discuss new developments, trends and challenges related to ICT statistics.
The Seminar will in particular facilitate the exchange of experiences, discuss progress on ICT statistics and policy making, measuring the information society and information economy as well as measurement issues related to households ICT surveys.
DESA’s Statistics Division, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) and the Statistical Office of the Republic of Korea (Statistics Korea) in cooperation with the Partnership on Measuring ICT for Development, are organizing this seminar.
GAID Preparatory Meeting on the Millennium Development Goals Electronic Center (MDG eCenter) will be held from 26-27 July in New York
Members of the Global Alliance for ICT and Development (GAID) together with representatives from member states, the private sector, key civil society actors and other leading development organizations including major UN agencies will convene an action-oriented forum focused on the development of the GAID Millennium Development Goal Electronic Center.
The main purpose of the meeting is to present the concept of the MDGs eCenter, including environment, mission, objectives, status of development, timetable for finalization of the two core components (Matrix of ICT Solutions for MDGs Advancement and Computer-Aided Strategic Planner) and to report on the results of on-line and physical consultations on the structure and functionalities of the Portal.
The forum’s discussion will focus on actions needed to organize the development and population of the Matrix and the finalization of the Strategic Planner. Furthermore, interest and commitment to participate and contribute content and/or resources will be discussed.
The establishment of the Broadband Commission for Digital Development in 2010 comes five years after the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), and ten years after the launch of the MDGs
The key aim of the commission is to accelerate attainment of those goals by the target date of 2015, through the introduction of ubiquitous access to broadband. Global leaders in government, business, civil society and international organizations have been invited to serve on the Broadband Commission as commissioners by the Secretary-General of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the Director-General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), with the strong support of the United Nations Secretary-General.
Given the Under-Secretary-General’s role as a commissioner of the Broadband Commission, DESA will provide input to both the Report to the UN Secretary-General and the Background Report to the Broadband Commission. The focus of DESA’s inputs will be on e-government, including ICT and promoting broadband for public service and government operations to be more efficient, effective, transparent and accountable.
The draft Report to the UN Secretary-General will be debated and finalized at a meeting of the Commissioners of the Broadband Commission to be held in Geneva, Switzerland, 11 July 2010. The Broadband Commission will report its findings to the Secretary-General in September 2010, immediately before the MDG high-level event to review work on achieving the Millennium Development Goals by the target date of 2015.
Workshop on Engaging Citizens in Development Management and Public Governance for the Achievement of the Millennium Development Goals will be held in Barcelona from 21-23 June
The workshop will explore policies, strategies, best practices and tools to promote the engagement of citizens in development management and public governance for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The goal of the workshop is to enhance the knowledge and build shared understanding among participants on how citizens can be engaged in different stages of strategy and policy making, and in public service delivery, with a view of promoting efficient and transparent public management and inclusive social and economic development.
The workshop will provide presentations by key experts from different regions of the world followed by open discussions with all participants, as well as group discussions on innovative approaches, methodologies and tools, including the use of ICT-tools, in citizens’ engagement. Key findings of the workshop deliberations will be reflected in a set of recommendations.
The workshop will also lead to innovative networking among participants and the participants will contribute to the online knowledge base on public administration and citizens’ engagement developed by the DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM). The workshop is held in connection with the comprehensive three-day United Nations Public Service Day Awards Ceremony and Forum 2010 and co-organized with the host of the event, Government of Catalonia, Spain.
Expert Group Meeting on Accessibility will be held at World Bank Headquarters, Washington, DC, from 28-30 June
The meeting, co-organized by DESA and the World Bank, will bring together experts with experience in various areas of accessibility as related to persons with disabilities, including the built-environment, transportation, facilities and services and information and communications technology. The expert group will have for its review a technical monograph on accessibility and other relevant documents as background documents.
The meeting is expected to review current policies and good practices, as well as existing national and international standards and practices on accessibility. The experts will make a set of recommendations for policies to advance and support the efforts of countries to implement internationally agreed development goals, such as MDGs.
The findings and recommendations of the meeting will provide a basis for the on-going discussion for Governments, development organizations, agencies and all other relevant stakeholders.
9th Session of the Committee of Experts on Public Administration (CEPA) was held from 19-23 April
The Committee agreed to adopt a multi-year programme, 2011-2013, on the main theme, “Public governance for results to improve the quality of human life” and that each of the three years will have different sub-themes. The sub-themes for CEPA in 2011 will be on: a conceptual framework, public governance for results in post-conflict and post-crisis countries, social protection for vulnerable populations, and performance management in governance.
The report of the Committee included recommendations to the Member States, the Economic and Social Council and the UN Secretariat on key challenges and opportunities for public administration in the context of the financial and economic crisis with particular reference to leadership, transparency, accountability, and social protection for vulnerable groups and people-centred policies.
The report also included recommendations on the 2010 theme of the Annual Ministerial Review of the high-level segment of the Economic and Social Council: implementing agreed goals and commitments in regard to gender equality and the empowerment of women. These recommendations focused, among others, on the continued high relevance of gender equality, the under-representation of women in public administration and the importance of ICT as tool to advance the empowerment of women.
In reviewing the United Nations Programme on Public Administration and Finance, the Committee welcomed the restructuring of DPADM, including the creation of the Public Administration Knowledge Space (PAKS). The report also acknowledged the positive achievements of UNPAN in terms of collaboration and connectivity with different stakeholders.
Consultations on DESA’s Global Alliance for ICT and Development (GAID) eMDG Portal at WSIS Forum was held on 12-13 May in Geneva
The concept and prototypes of the Matrix of ICT Solutions for Advancing the MDGs and of the Computer-aided Strategic Planner were presented to the participants of the WSIS Forum, which is the principal annual gathering of key stakeholders involved in the follow-up to the World Summit on Information Society.
Both sessions were well attended by representatives of governments, United Nations agencies, private sector and civil society and the outcome was both positive and constructive. The overall reaction of the attendees was unequivocally positive. No one questioned the utility and value of the proposed set of ICT4MDGs tools.
Representatives of several developing country governments were very encouraged by a presentation and endorsement from the Minister of ICT of Macedonia who shared his positive experience with the current prototype of the Strategic Planner. Government representatives expressed their urgent interest in testing the Planner and contributing to its further development.
Joint Task Force on Environmental Indicators will be held in Geneva from 3-4 May, jointly organized by the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) and DESA’s Statistics Division
The Joint Task Force on Environmental Indicators has been established to foster collaboration of national statistical offices and environmental ministries and agencies in the improvement of environment statistics. The meeting will review the Guidelines on the Application of Environmental Indicators in Eastern Europe, Caucasus and Central Asia.
The meeting will discuss the indicators revised on the basis of the conclusions of the first meeting and will consider further indicators for revision based on countries’ experience with their application. It will also look into the possibility to include new indicators to fill in gaps in the coverage of some of the priority subject areas.
Third Parliamentary Forum on Shaping the Information Society
The forum will discuss ICT and the Global Economic Crisis: Current Situation and Future Perspectives in Geneva from 3-5 May
The event, co-organized by DESA, IPU and ITU through the Global Centre for ICT in Parliament will focus on key issues relevant to the crisis recovery such as the investments in high-speed Internet networks, e-government and competitiveness and social and economic costs of cybercrime. It will also discuss liberalization of telecommunication and ICT markets and promoting competition and national responses to regulation challenges.
The outcome is expected to support the Parliamentary Forum to better delineate the political role and responsibilities of parliaments in their legislative and oversight functions on the above issues, to identify good parliamentary practices and to draw recommendations for action by legislatures.
Improving collection and dissemination of statistical data
Conference on Data Quality for International Organizations will be held in Helsinki from 6-7 May
The Conference will be held immediately after the Q2010 European Conference on Quality in Official Statistics (Helsinki, 4-6 May 2010) under the auspices of the Committee for the Coordination of Statistical Activities (CCSA). Eurostat and DESA’s Statistics Division are organizing this fourth CCSA conference dedicated entirely to quality issues, which will be hosted by Statistics Finland.
The purpose of the conference is to provide statistical experts from international or supra-national organizations with a forum to discuss specific data quality issues related to their work and exchange experiences regarding the various quality mechanisms developed for improving the collection and dissemination of data.
The main focus of this year’s conference will be on how international support for the development of national quality assurance frameworks can be provided, therefore, the discussions will also reflect upon the programme review on National Quality Assurance Frameworks carried out by Statistics Canada for the forty-first session of the Statistical Commission (see document E/CN.3/2010/2).
Inter-regional Meeting on the Mauritius Strategy +5 Review will be held in New York on 8 May
The purpose of the meeting is to provide a forum for the Small Island Developing States (SIDS) to evaluate in the Pacific, AIMS and Caribbean regions national and regional challenges in implementing the Mauritius Strategy.
The meeting will also discuss common priorities for action and finalize a global synthesis report for consideration by CSD-18, acting as the preparatory committee for the high-level review of the Mauritius Strategy in September 2010. Major groups are invited to nominate representatives to the Inter-regional Meeting.
The review meetings held in the Pacific, AIMS and Caribbean regions produced three regional synthesis reports. These regional reports are based on National Assessment Reports by SIDS, as well as inputs from UN Agencies, intergovernmental organizations, non-SIDS countries and major groups.
Second Preparatory Meeting of the Proposed United Nations Committee on Global Geographic Information Management will be organized by DESA’s Statistics Division in collaboration with the UN Cartographic Section in New York on 10-11 May
The purpose of the meeting is to discuss and initiate the preparation of a report, for the approval of ECOSOC, on global coordination of geographic information management, including the consideration of a possible creation of a United Nations global forum for the exchange of information among countries and other interested parties.
The meeting will also focus on sharing best practices in legal and policy instruments, institutional management models, technical solutions and standards, interoperability of systems and data, and sharing mechanisms that guarantee that geographic information and services are easily and timely accessible.
Bringing together official representatives from member countries as well as representatives from relevant professional organizations, the meeting will also offer the possibility to the participants to discuss the terms of reference and the modalities of work for the global forum and the Committee of Experts.
Workshop on the 2010 World Programme on Population and Housing Censuses: Census Evaluation and post Enumeration Surveys, for Countries in the ESCAP Regions will be held in Bangkok from 10-14 May
DESA’s Statistics Division, in collaboration with UNESCAP, is organizing a Regional Workshop for countries in the region on census evaluation in the context of the 2010 World Programme for Population and Housing Censuses.
The purpose of the workshop is to present an overview of the various methods of evaluating censuses with a focus on the post enumeration survey (PES) methodology. More specifically, the workshop will cover elements of the PES with regard to planning and implementation, frames and sample design as well as methodologies for evaluating content and coverage errors. It will also cover matching procedures, imputation of missing values and tabulation and dual system of estimation.
The workshop will also offer the possibility to the participants to present and discuss the experience of their countries on different aspects of census evaluation and the post enumeration survey.
Internet Governance Forum, Multistakeholder Advisory Group and WSIS meetings will be held in Geneva from 10-14 May
IGF Planning Meeting
A planning meeting of the Internet Governance Forum will take place from 10-11 May, preparing the programme of the fifth annual IGF Meeting to be held in Vilnius Lithuania on 14-17 September 2010.
Open to all interested stakeholders, the meeting will focus on the selection of workshops and their relationship with the main sessions. More than 80 workshop proposals have been submitted to the IGF Secretariat.
Meeting of the Multistakeholder Advisory Group (MAG)
The main task of this meeting on 12 May is to review the MAG’s functioning and to make proposals for improvements in view of a possible renewal of its mandate.
WSIS Forum 2010
On 12 May, DESA will convene the Fifth Facilitation Meeting on Implementing the Outcomes of the World Summit on the Information Society. Participants will exchange information and discuss progress in implementing 3 of the 11 WSIS Action Lines:
Action Line C1. The role of public governance authorities and all stakeholders in the promotion of ICT for development;
Action Line C7. ICT Applications – eGovernment; and,
Action Line C11. International and regional cooperation
The purpose of the Fifth Facilitation Meeting, which is open to all stakeholders from the public and private sectors, civil society, and international organizations, is to inform participants of the meetings on the respective sub group’s activities and to provide a platform to exchange information and experiences.
The meeting will also identify the proprietary areas for implementation within the Action Lines and create synergies among different stakeholders for more effective knowledge sharing and collaboration in order to ensure the implementation of WSIS at the international, regional and national levels.
Furthering the partnership between DESA and OECD in e-Government
In recognition of the United Nations E-government Survey, DPADM/DESA was invited by OECD to participate in the OECD Workshop on E-Government Indicators that took place on 29-30 March at the OECD Headquarters in Paris
The United Nations E-Government Index is the official OECD indicator for global e-government readiness in the OECD publication Government at a Glance 2009. The workshop deliberations resulted in support for the development of a framework for the second stage e-government indicators that support policy-making, especially back-office indicators, performance (outcomes and outputs) indicators, and economically-oriented indicators.
The participants highlighted the need to fine-tune the framework and the methodology, and to adopt a commonly agreed upon terminology. Subsequent to the meeting, DESA through DPADM accepted an invitation by OECD to become a Member of the newly established virtual taskforce of e-government indicators specialists.
The 9th session of the UN Committee of Experts on Public Administration will be held at the United Nations Headquarters in New York from 19 April to 23 April
Since late 2007, the global financial and economic crisis has had a significant negative impact on the income, wealth and living conditions of both developed and developing countries. It has also had a major impact on public administration, especially on the implementation of social and economic policies and, more generally, on its economic functions.
Arguably, public administration is in need of reform. Transformation and the adoption of measures that will not only contribute to a recovery from the crisis in the short and medium term but will also help achieve better sustainable, inclusive and equitable development in the long term are necessary. The ninth session of the Committee of Experts on Public Administration, to be held from 19 to 23 April, will focus on how public administration can cope with the current challenges and regard them as opportunities for structural overhaul and reform.
The Committee is responsible for supporting the work of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) concerning the promotion and betterment of public administration and services among Member States in connection with the internationally agreed development goals, including the Millennium Development Goals.
The President of ECOSOC, the Honourable Hamidon Ali, will be delivering an opening statement on 19 April, which will be followed by a welcome address by Mr. Sha Zukang, the Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs.
Some of the sub-themes to be covered during this session are: enhanced public governance for fast and coordinated policy response, citizen-centred public service delivery, leadership for effective decision-making in the public sector, transparency and responsive accountability, as well as social and financial protection for priority vulnerable groups.
A special case study will be presented on public administration reform in Singapore by Mr. Philip Yeo, Special Advisor for Economic Development, Office of the Prime Minister, Singapore. The Committee will also review the United Nations Programme on Public Administration and Finance to take stock of past achievements and provide advice on its future activities.
In addition to the main theme, the Committee will also examine the 2010 theme of the annual ministerial review of the high-level segment ofECOSOC: implementing agreed goals and commitments in regard to gender equality and empowerment of women. This session will be opened by Ms. Rachel Mayanja, Assistant Secretary-General, and Special Adviser to the United Nations Secretary-General on Gender Issues and Advancement of Women. It will also include a discussion on information and communications technology and gender equality and a presentation of a case study on the empowerment of women in local government in Lesotho, by Her Excellency Pontso Suzan Matumelo Sekatle, Minister of Local Government and Chieftainship in Lesotho.
The Secretariat of the Commission on Sustainable Development is holding its 4th innovative Thematic Seminar Series on 9th April that will present scientific and technical information on issues under review by CSD 18 and 19
While mining provides a livelihood for millions of people in developing countries, its activities have been associated with serious environmental and social impacts on communities living near extraction sites, while generating few or limited benefits to producing countries in terms of economic growth and poverty reduction.
Since 2002, major international multi-stakeholder initiatives have been launched, targeting more transparency over the revenues generated by mining activities by both companies and governments. The mining industry has also stepped up their engagement in social issues arising in mining or neighbouring communities and in corporate social and environmental responsibility (CSER) activities.
However, absence of Prior and Informed Consent (PIC) with indigenous communities, resettlements and conflicts between the mining communities and other actors are still an issue in many countries. Adequate capacities at the national and sub-national government levels for planning, dealing with companies, enforcing regulations relating to health and working safety and the environment are often lacking.
All interested representatives from Governments, UN entities, IGOs, NGOs and other Major Groups holding a valid UN grounds pass or representing an accredited organization are welcome to participate.
Multi-stakeholder meeting of the Partnership on Measuring ICT for Development was hosted by DESA’s Division for Public Administration and Development Management on 22 February
The meeting was attended by representatives of the World Bank, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the Economic Commission for Latin America & the Caribbean (ECLAC). The meeting reported on and reviewed the progress made by the various Task Groups working under the aegis of the Partnership and discussed the planned activities for 2010-2011.
The Partnership’s report to the United Nations Statistical Commission (UNSC) was made available as an information item for the 41st session of the UNSC. It was considered important for the Partnership to continue to include ICT statistics on the UNSC agenda as a means to encourage the adoption of ICT statistics by Member States.
ITU informed the Partnership that they are working on a quantitative review of the ICT indicators, in collaboration with the UNESCO Institute of Statistics (UIS), DESA and the World Health Organization (WHO) with the objective to identify a set of measurable indicators that could be applied by national and international stakeholders to monitor progress in achieving the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) targets, and to take stock of what has been achieved to date in terms of reaching the targets.
The Partnership is an international, multi-stakeholder initiative to improve the availability and quality of ICT data and indicators, particularly in developing countries.
Preparing for the Committee of Experts on Public Administration
The Committee will meet on the theme “Challenges to and Opportunities for Public Administration in the Context of Financial and Economic Crisis” in the following month
The preparations for the 2010 CEPA meeting (19-23 April in New York) are well underway. In consultation with CEPA members, since the last CEPA session in 2009, DESA’s Division for Public Administration & Development Management (DPADM) has now identified key topics for discussion during the upcoming session.
The topics will include enhanced public governance for fast and coordinated policy response, citizen-centered public service delivery, transparency and responsive accountability as well as social and financial protection for priority vulnerable groups.
DPADM is also undertaking preparatory work for the establishment of the new bureau of the Committee, as well as working on the statement for the Under-Secretary-General, the President of ECOSOC and the Chair of CEPA.
On 8 February, Mr. Sha Zukang, USG of DESA and Mr. Talal Abu-Ghazaleh, Chairman of the Global Alliance for ICT and Development (GAID) met with the Secretary-General, Mr. Ban Ki-Moon, to discuss GAID’s progress and the path ahead.
The Secretary-General thanked Mr. Sha Zukang for his continued support as well as the current and former leadership of GAID for their tireless commitment. The agenda included the development of a Matrix of ICT Solutions for MDGs Advancement that GAID committed to present next September in the context of the United Nations Summit on MDGs, and initial ideas of the Chairman and Co-Chairs on normative matters on rights in Information Societies and uses of ICT for the protection of life and property. The Secretary-General gave his full support to the continuing efforts of GAID, in particular to the Matrix project. The Secretary-General accepted the role of a “Honorary Chair” of GAID.
On the same day, DESA hosted the 7th meeting of the Steering Committee of GAID at the United Nations Headquarters in New York. Participants included the Minister for the Information Society of Macedonia, Mr. Ivo Ivanovski, members from the private sector and civil society, and United Nations staff.
Mr. Sha Zukang acknowledged the success of the Alliance in advocacy for ICT for development and reiterated the need to be more results-oriented. The Committee welcomed the appointment by DESA of the new Executive Coordinator of the Secretariat of GAID, Mr. Sergei Kambalov, as well as the designation by the Chairman of Mr. Sarbuland Khan as his Honorary Advisor.
The Committee determined that the main output of GAID in 2010 will be the Matrix of ICT Solutions for MDGs Advancement to be delivered next September in the context of the United Nations Summit on MDGs. The Committee discussed ways to secure the successful implementation of the 2010 Action Plan. Attention was given to the need of effective fund raising to support the GAID budget for 2010.
Enhancing cooperation in Internet Governance
Multi-stakeholder Advisory Group (MAG) of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) met in Geneva, 10 – 11 February, to prepare for the Forum’s 5th session, to be held in Vilnius, Lithuania in September 2010
In a dialogue with stakeholders, the Group settled on the theme of “Developing the future together” with a six-point agenda as follows: Security, openness and privacy, Access and diversity, Internet governance for development, Taking stock of Internet governance and the way forward, Emerging issues: cloud computing.
This agenda built on the work of previous sessions while setting the stage for future discussions on public policy issues related to the Internet, should the mandate of the IGF be extended. Specifically, the item on “taking stock of Internet governance” is intended as an assessment of progress in governance-related matters over the last 5 years.
The item on “Internet governance for development” is a reflection of stakeholder interest in the relationship between Internet governance and economic and social development, in particular Internet governance for the achievement of MDGs.
The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) has advised the Director of the Division for Public Administration and Development Management (DPADM) that the Secretary-General’s report on action taken to enhance cooperation in Internet governance, which was prepared by DPADM for the 2009 session of ECOSOC but deferred to the 13th session of Commission on Science and Technology for Development (CSTD), may be considered on 18 May. UNCTAD has proposed that DESA send a representative to introduce the report. At the same session, CSTD will consider a report on WSIS implementation and follow-up, including an update on the activities of the Internet Governance Forum.
AIMS and Caribbean Regional Meeting on Mauritius Strategy of Implementation +5 will be held on 9-10 March in Male, Maldives and on 16-17 March in St. George, Grenada respectively
After the first regional meeting, held in Vanuatu on 8-9 February, two more meetings will be held in preparation for the two-day high-level review of the Mauritius Strategy for the Further Implementation of the Barbados Programme of Action for the Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing States (SIDS), to be conducted at the sixty-fifth session of the General Assembly.
The purpose of these meetings will be to provide a forum for SIDS in the Caribbean and AIMS (African, Indian Ocean, Mediterranean and South China Seas) regions to evaluate continuing national and regional challenges in implementing the Mauritius Strategy as outlined in the respective national assessment reports. The meetings will also assess recent trends and discuss common priorities for action and prepare a regional synthesis report. This report will outline priorities, emerging issues and future areas for further addressing the vulnerabilities of SIDS.
The AIMS and Caribbean regional review meetings will be attended by representatives of SIDS governments in the respective regions, UN agencies active in the regions, representatives of relevant non-UN regional and international organizations, and representatives of relevant Major Groups.
The Caribbean review meeting will be characterized by a one-day technical meeting followed by a ministerial segment on the second day. Following the completion of the Mauritius +5 meeting, ECLAC will host the Twenty-Third Session of the Caribbean Development and Cooperation Committee (CDCC). The CDCC will undertake an assessment of current development trends for the Caribbean and define ECLAC’s strategic role in support of regional integration and national development aspirations.
The regional synthesis reports of these two meetings, as well as the report from the Pacific review meeting that was held in Vanuatu in February, will serve as inputs to the SIDS interregional meeting that will take place on 8 May 2010.
The purpose of the interregional meeting will be to review the outcomes of the three MSI regional meetings, prior to these being presented during ‘SIDS Day’ at the 18th Session of the Commission on Sustainable Development. SIDS Day will act as the preparatory committee for the high-level review of the Mauritius Strategy in September 2010.
12th session of the Committee for Development Policy will be held in New York from 22-26 March to discuss the 2010 Annual Ministerial Review and review the status of LDCs
The Committee for Development Policy (CDP) is a subsidiary body of the United Nations Economic and Social Council. CDP provides inputs and independent advice to the Council on emerging cross-sectoral development issues and on international cooperation for development, focusing on medium- and long-term aspects. The Committee is also responsible for reviewing the status of Least Developed Countries (LDCs) and for monitoring their progress after graduation from the category.
The 24 members of the Committee are nominated by the United Nations Secretary-General in their personal capacity, and are appointed by the Council for a period of three years. Membership is geared to reflect a wide range of development experience as well as geographical and gender balance.
The twelfth session this year will discuss the 2010 Annual Ministerial Review on implementing the internationally agreed goals and commitments in regard to gender equality and the empowerment of women. The Committee will also focus on LDC-specific support measures, which will be used as an input to the ongoing preparations for the Fourth United Nations Conference on Least Developed Countries.
The Committee will address the Council’s request to consider the findings of the Secretary General’s report (A/64/278) on the implementation of the Mauritius Strategy and submit its independent views and perspectives on the United Nations’ support for Small Island Developing States (SIDS).
In addition, the Committee will monitor the recent socio-economic development progress of those countries earmarked for graduation from the list of LDCs (Maldives and Samoa).
The CDP will also examine the financial aspects of addressing climate change, focusing on the coherence and consistency of the financing architecture for adaptation to climate change as an input to the 2010 Development Cooperation Forum on Policy coherence and financial architecture for climate change.
Thematic Seminar Series from January to April will help to prepare for the upcoming Commission on Sustainable Development in May 2010
The CSD Secretariat has launched a new and innovative Thematic Seminar Series to present scientific and technical information on the current issues under consideration this year at the CSD – transport, chemicals, waste management, mining, and the 10-Year Framework of Programmes on Sustainable Consumption and Production.
The CSD Thematic Seminar Series features presentations by technical experts, video documentaries highlighting challenges and successes, and interactive discussions. It is designed to inform all CSD participants on the latest research, data, and case studies that will underpin the discussions during the upcoming Review Session this spring.
The briefings are taking place from January through April, from 10 am until 1 pm. The remaining themes, dates and locations are about Sustainable Consumption and Production on 23 March, Transportation on 13 April and Mining later in April.
The Committee will meet on the theme “Challenges to and Opportunities for Public Administration in the Context of Financial and Economic Crisis” in the following month
The preparations for the 2010 CEPA meeting (19-23 April in New York) are well underway. In consultation with CEPA members, since the last CEPA session in 2009, DESA’s Division for Public Administration & Development Management (DPADM) has now identified key topics for discussion during the upcoming session.
The topics will include enhanced public governance for fast and coordinated policy response, citizen-centered public service delivery, transparency and responsive accountability as well as social and financial protection for priority vulnerable groups.
DPADM is also undertaking preparatory work for the establishment of the new bureau of the Committee, as well as working on the statement for the Under-Secretary-General, the President of ECOSOC and the Chair of CEPA.
On 8 February, Mr. Sha Zukang, USG of DESA and Mr. Talal Abu-Ghazaleh, Chairman of the Global Alliance for ICT and Development (GAID) met with the Secretary-General, Mr. Ban Ki-Moon, to discuss GAID’s progress and the path ahead.
The Secretary-General thanked Mr. Sha Zukang for his continued support as well as the current and former leadership of GAID for their tireless commitment. The agenda included the development of a Matrix of ICT Solutions for MDGs Advancement that GAID committed to present next September in the context of the United Nations Summit on MDGs, and initial ideas of the Chairman and Co-Chairs on normative matters on rights in Information Societies and uses of ICT for the protection of life and property. The Secretary-General gave his full support to the continuing efforts of GAID, in particular to the Matrix project. The Secretary-General accepted the role of a “Honorary Chair” of GAID.
On the same day, DESA hosted the 7th meeting of the Steering Committee of GAID at the United Nations Headquarters in New York. Participants included the Minister for the Information Society of Macedonia, Mr. Ivo Ivanovski, members from the private sector and civil society, and United Nations staff.
Mr. Sha Zukang acknowledged the success of the Alliance in advocacy for ICT for development and reiterated the need to be more results-oriented. The Committee welcomed the appointment by DESA of the new Executive Coordinator of the Secretariat of GAID, Mr. Sergei Kambalov, as well as the designation by the Chairman of Mr. Sarbuland Khan as his Honorary Advisor.
The Committee determined that the main output of GAID in 2010 will be the Matrix of ICT Solutions for MDGs Advancement to be delivered next September in the context of the United Nations Summit on MDGs. The Committee discussed ways to secure the successful implementation of the 2010 Action Plan. Attention was given to the need of effective fund raising to support the GAID budget for 2010.
Multistakeholder Dialogue will be held on 1 February in New York to ensure a more effective and coordinated implementation of global policy on sustainable development
The slow rate of implementation of the sustainable development agenda, including the Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) decisions, remains a source of concern. This concern has been expressed by many stakeholders at different international meetings including in sessions of the Commission itself.
Although CSD continues to remain the leading mechanism within the United Nations system to follow up the implementation of Agenda 21 and the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation, many stakeholders hold the view that CSD needs to become more forward-looking and action oriented.
This is possible, but requires that decisions taken by the Commission are implemented in their true spirit by all stakeholders. Governments of developing countries continue to struggle with accessing enough resources, and acquiring capacities and technologies to implement the decisions leading to slow progress in meeting internationally agreed goals.
The dialogue is an innovation established by DESA and will bring together former and current leadership of CSD along with major implementing partners.
The meeting will discuss how the Commission can become more forward-looking and action oriented. It will focus primarily on CSD-17 decisions pertaining to agriculture, rural development, land, drought, desertification and Africa, however its outcomes are also meant to hasten implementation of the broad development agenda as detailed in Agenda 21 and the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation.
Meeting objectives include reviewing partner engagement, raising awareness, exploring new implementation modalities, building partnership and fast tracking successful practices.
Drafting International Recommendations for Energy Statistics
Oslo Group on Energy Statistics will meet in Cork, Ireland from 1-4 February
The International Recommendations for Energy Statistics (IRES) are being developed in accordance with the decisions of the United Nations Statistical Commission at its 36th and 37th sessions which, inter alia, recognized the significance of energy statistics, recommended their development as part of official statistics and called for the revision and further development of the relevant international standards (see the Reports on the thirty-sixth session and on the thirty-seventh session of the Commission). These decisions followed a programme review of energy statistics conducted by Statistics Norway and the recommendations of Ad-Hoc Expert Group on Energy Statistics ( New York, 23-25 May 2005).
The Statistical Commission approved the establishment of two complimentary working groups to carry out the work: (a) the Oslo Group on Energy Statistics to contribute to the development of improved methods and international standards for national official energy statistics, and, in particular, to review and contribute to the updating of the United Nations handbooks and manuals on energy statistics; and (b) the Intersecretariat Working Group on Energy Statistics to enhance international collaboration and coordination.
IRES is intended to cover a broad range of issues from basic concepts, definitions and classifications to data sources, data compilation strategies, energy balances and dissemination. Once approved by the Commission, IRES will provide a firm foundation for a long-term development of energy statistics based on Fundamental Principles of Official Statistics. Additional guidance to assist countries in the implementation of IRES will be provided in the Energy Statistics Compilers Manual (ESCM) which will be prepared by UNSD as a part of IRES implementation programme.
This meeting will discuss the provisional text of the International Recommendations for Energy Statistics and will share national practices in energy statistics.
Setting priorities to implement the Mauritius Strategy
DESA and the ESCAP Pacific Operations Centre (EPOC) will co-host the Pacific Regional Meeting on Mauritius Strategy of Implementation +5 on 8-9 February in Port Vila, Vanuatu.
The purpose of the meeting will be to provide a forum for Small Island Developing States (SIDS) in the Pacific to evaluate continuing national and regional challenges in implementing the Mauritius Strategy as outlined in the respective national assessment reports, to assess ongoing monitoring and evaluation activities, to discuss common priorities for action, and to prepare a regional synthesis report for consideration by CSD-18 acting as the preparatory committee for the high-level review of the Mauritius Strategy in September 2010.
The regional synthesis report will outline priorities, emerging issues and future areas for further addressing the vulnerabilities of SIDS.
It is expected that the meeting will be attended by: representatives of SIDS governments in the region; UN agencies active in the region; representatives of relevant non-UN regional and international organizations; and representatives of relevant Major Groups.
ICT to help achieve the Millennium Development Goals
Steering Committee Meeting of DESA’s GAID will discuss the Plan of Action of the Global Alliance for the coming year on 8 February in New York
The Steering Committee, that is headed by Mr. Talal Abu Ghazaleh, Chairman of Talal Abu Ghazaleh Organization, consists of members from both the public and private sectors, and civil society, and provides strategic guidance to the work of the Global Alliance for ICT and Development (GAID) regarding the Alliance’s mission to best harness the vast potential of Information and Communication Technologies to further development efforts around the world.
The agenda for this important meeting will include discussions about a Matrix on the uses of ICT for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals, a proposed joint product of DESA’s GAID and the Division for Public Administration & Development Management.
The Steering Committee will also discuss the Global Alliance’s participation in and organization of important meetings for 2010, including World Summit on the Information Society Week and Commission on Science and Technology for Development meetings in May, and the High Level event during the General Assembly summit on the MDGs in September in the context of which GAID will present the ICT for MDG Matrix, and the Annual Meetings and Global Forum of GAID which are scheduled to take place in Shanghai in October, in conjunction with the World Expo.
In preparation for the upcoming Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD), the CSD Secretariat is hosting briefings from January through April
The CSD Secretariat is launching new and innovative Thematic Seminar Series that will present scientific and technical information on the current issues under consideration – transport, chemicals, waste management, mining, and the 10-Year Framework of Programmes on Sustainable Consumption and Production.
The CSD Thematic Seminar Series will feature presentations by technical experts, video documentaries highlighting challenges and successes, and interactive discussions. It is designed to inform all CSD participants on the latest research, data, and case studies that will underpin the discussions during the upcoming Review Session this spring.
The series started off last month on the topic of Waste Management and will continue on 11 February with Mining, followed by Chemicals on 23 February and Sustainable Consumption and Production on 23 March. The last session will be on Transportation on 13 April. All briefing will be held at the United Nations Headquarters from 10:00 am to 1:00 pm.
Expert Group Meeting from 12-14 January focused on articles 3 and 32 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and was followed by the first meeting of UNPFII the next day
The meeting organized by the Secretariat of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (SPFII) was attended by 60 people including four Permanent Forum Members, six indigenous experts, representatives from States, UN Agencies, indigenous peoples’ organizations, NGOs and academia. Discussions were held around the various concepts of development, with participants stating that such concepts must consider the reality and struggle that indigenous peoples experience in order to live in a society that is market-driven.
Development policies, institutions and systems established by States must allow for the co-existence of indigenous governance, economic, social, cultural, spiritual knowledge and natural resource management systems.
On 15 January, SPFII hosted the first meeting of the UNPFII, the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and their Secretariats. The meeting was chaired by the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous people.
Participants discussed cooperation and coordination in relation to their work to promote the UN Declaration the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the sessions of the UNPFII and the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (EMRIP) and in addressing allegations of human rights violations. It was agreed that the three mandates and their secretariats would hold a similar meeting next January, to be organized by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
International meeting on National Development Strategies, Economic and Social Councils, Citizens’ Engagement and Participatory Democracy, and Uses of ICT for Development was held on 17-18 December in Paris
Collaboration to build a knowledge base on good practices observed in diverse countries was initiated at this workshop, organized by DESA’s Division for Public Administration & Development Management (DPADM), with the participation of the International Association of Economic and Social Councils and Similar Institutions (AICESIS) and the Information and Communication Sector of UNESCO. The meeting was also held in the context of collaboration agreed last July between DESA and AICESIS.
The workshop was attended by 50 people, mostly Presidents and close collaborators from Economic and Social Councils (ESC) from 29 countries in Africa, Asia and Europe. Speakers included high level officials from UNESCO, AICEISIS, GAID and staff from DPADM.
In addition, international dialogue on how National Development Strategies (NDS) can be enhanced through the participation of organized civil society (through Economic and Social Councils and similar institutions) and by the use of Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) for development, particularly to advance towards the MDGs, was initiated.
Participants welcomed the opportunity to openly discuss challenges about reaching the MDGs and opportunities provided by participatory processes to define and carry out NDS to this aim, as well as opportunities presented by ICT to enhance public governance, accountability, transparency and efficiency about public service delivery, as well as social networking and private sector participation to facilitate conditions for the achievement of the MDGs.
In particular, the proposal to contribute to a global knowledge base on Public Governance, Citizens’ Engagement and Uses of ICT for Development was considered useful by all participants, and some like ESC of Hungary, Luxemburg and Senegal, as well as the Secretariat of AICESIS, offered their support to collaborate and play leading roles in this regard.
The meeting also resulted in strong support from ESC for the Development Account project which was started by DPADM in 2009 to build capacities in ESC of 16 African countries. A coming workshop in the context of this project will be held at Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, in 2010, in which ESC from other regions will attend to share their experiences with African.
European Union’s 5th Ministerial Meeting on e-Government was held in Malmo, Sweden from 19-20 November
The Director of DESA’s Division for Public Administration & Development Management participated in a panel on global teamwork in e-government as part of the Ministerial Meeting. Ms. Qian was joined on the panel by representatives from the European Commission, OECD, the World Bank, and IBM.
DESA’s message to participants, which was conveyed in a prepared statement, was that European interests do not stop at the EU border and collaboration should not stop there either. The Information Society is the future society and global e-government collaboration presents a tremendous opportunity for visionary leaders.
Global cooperation in e-government, as in other areas of public interest, is both possible and desirable in all areas covered by the UN development agenda – indeed in all areas where international cooperation is already taking place. The simplest way to organize global teamwork would be through existing institutions such as the United Nations.
The world is not lacking for cooperation mechanisms. It is only lacking resolve. In the global arena, that resolve usually begins with a UN General Assembly resolution, and EU Member States should begin by sponsoring one.
Experts will meet from 12-14 January in New York to understand indigenous peoples’ development and to identify the means to realize such development under multiple cooperation
Recommended by the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII) at its eighth session in May 2009 and authorized by the Economic and Social Council at its regular session on 30 July 2009, the International Expert Group Meeting on Indigenous Peoples – Development with Culture and Identity – will bear multiple goals and also be the special theme of the ninth session of the UNPFII.
Permanent Forum members, indigenous experts, states and representatives from United Nations agencies and funds will have the opportunities to exchange information and analysis on the various concepts of development and practices and their impact on indigenous peoples’ livelihoods, communities, cultural practices and lands and natural resources. Positive and negative practices will be highlighted to give references to further measures.
The meeting will analyze enshrined human rights within international standards and policies and how they contribute to indigenous peoples’ concept of development with culture and identity. Options and further plans to build the necessary conditions for development such as empowering and strengthening indigenous peoples’ organizations and governance systems will be identified. They will also analyze opportunities for partnerships with indigenous peoples on development issues and how such arrangements might be informed by good practices and corporate responsibility models.
The final report and recommendations of the Expert Group Meeting will be to be submitted to the ninth session of the UNPFII.
e-Discussion on Women and Poverty will be held from 11 January to 12 February, organized by the United Nations Development Programme and DESA
In March, the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) will undertake a 15 year review of the implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action. In late June, the ECOSOC Annual Ministerial Review will examine the implementation of the internationally agreed development goals on gender equality and women’s empowerment. In September, the UN General Assembly will undertake the 2010 review of implementation of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), and propose policy measures to accelerate implementation over the period to 2015. 2010 will also be a watershed year for the promotion of gender equality and women’s empowerment.
This e-discussion presents a unique opportunity to make voices heard, and to influence the deliberations of the above events by formulating critical policy messages and action agenda to the United Nations intergovernmental processes. Participants can bring new thoughts and ideas to the policy debate, drawing on their experiences, and help make a difference in the fight against poverty.
The e-discussion will address the following topics:
What are the new understandings of poverty and its gender dimensions that have evolved since the adoption of the Beijing Platform for Action? What are good practices in gender-responsive poverty analysis and poverty reduction activities?
How can the institutional and policy environment for addressing the gender dimensions of poverty be strengthened, building on the Beijing Platform for Action and the Millennium Declaration?
How can national poverty reduction strategies and programmes as well as international support more effectively address the gender dimensions of poverty in the build-up to 2015?
What are the core policy messages for leaders participating in the 2010 CSW, ECOSOC, and the High-level Plenary Meeting on MDGs? What are the most critical actions required to tackle “gender and poverty”, in light of new obstacles and challenges, such as climate change and the impact of the global economic and financial crisis?
How could financing for gender equality be strengthened in order to alleviate the gender dimensions of poverty?
The e-discussion is open to all stakeholders. Practitioners, experts and policy-makers, from within and outside of the UN system, and especially those working at the country level, can make use of this opportunity to contribute to the United Nations intergovernmental processes, and more broadly, help create a more equal world.
The United Nations Committee of Experts on Environmental-Economic Accounting (UNCEEA) is composed of representatives from national statistical offices and international agencies, and provides strategic vision and direction to environmental-economic accounting and related statistics.
At UN Headquarters recently, DESA’s Under-Secretary-General Wu Hongbo highlighted the crucial role of public administration in reaching the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and the post 2015 development agenda. “We want to acknowledge the significant task of public administration, which is vital for sustainable development”, Mr. Wu said.
The Advisory Expert Group on National Accounts (AEG) has been established to assist the Inter-secretariat Working Group on National Accounts (ISWGNA) in resolving issues on the research agenda of the System of National Accounts (SNA), identifying emerging research issues, and assisting the ISWGNA in the review of the SNA implementation programme.
Following its first report ‘Realizing the future we want for all’, which provided initial thinking on potential dimensions and contours of a renewed global development agenda, the UN System Task Team on the Post-2015 UN Development Agenda just published its second report. 
In collaboration with UNDP, the OECD Global Network of Foundations Working for Development (netFWD) and the Worldwide Initiative for Grantmaker Support (WINGS), DESA is organizing this special ECOSOC event on the role of philanthropy in development cooperation. 
The theme of the Expert Group Meeting (EGM) was “Audit and Advisory Activities by Supreme Audit Institutions (SAIs): Risks and Opportunities, as well as Possibilities for Engaging Citizens”. 
The Summit included a Ministerial Roundtable on “Innovation in Public Governance, a Ministerial Perspective” and three parallel workshops focusing on “Innovation in Public Governance: Perspectives from United Nations Public Service Awards (UNPSA) Winners” and on the sub themes of; (i) innovation in regulatory reform and administrative simplification for effective service delivery; (ii) innovation in public governance through networks and partnerships; and (iii) innovation in e-services. Each workshop featured a speaker from DPADM and a past UNPSA winner. 
Arranged in partnership with UNDP and UNESCO, the e-discussion serves as an open, multi-stakeholder forum for practitioners, experts and researchers to share new ideas and formulate critical policy messages to the UN intergovernmental negotiations on the potential of STI and culture for sustainable development solutions.
This event, focusing on reconfirming rights, recognizing limits and redefining goals, will bring together about 250 civil society activists and stakeholder representatives to gather inputs into the sustainable development and post-2015 discussions. 
The world has never faced such a large youth population as the one inhabiting the globe today, with about 40 per cent of the world population under the age of 25. With the recent economic crisis and high unemployment rates, there are many challenges facing today’s young generation. The world’s 67 million indigenous youth face even greater challenges, but have big hopes.
The arrival of the Internet, mobile devices and other technologies has caused a fundamental change to the nature of data. Big Data has important, distinct qualities that differentiate it from “traditional” institutional data, in particular its timeliness. If governments wanted to, they could already let Big Data play a role in providing information on topics that are currently under the purview of national statistical offices (NSOs).
More than 150 experts from 75 countries and 23 regional and international organizations and processes, as well as major groups and independent experts attended the event.
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