U.N. group launches pilot programs to trim country-specific operations - Print Version - International Herald Tribune
U.N. group launches pilot programs to trim country-specific operations
The Associated Press
Thursday, February 1, 2007
NEW YORK
The United Nations launched a pilot reform program pooling the resources and money for
a number of U.N. agencies in specific countries as a way to trim costs and raise
efficiency, officials said.
The "One U.N." effort, initiated Thursday by the U.N. Development Group, targets more
than two dozen agencies in eight countries.
The program addresses "a real problem with coordination, of duplication and of
efficiency," said Kemal Dervis, chair of the UNDG, set up by former Secretary-General
Kofi Annan in 1997 to improve U.N. development work at the country level.
The UNDG was part of an expansive reform program introduced when the world body
was being criticized for waste, corruption and mismanagement. The new pilot programs
also have the goal of realizing the Millennium Development Goals, including cutting
extreme poverty by half and achieving universal primary education by 2015.
Annan's successor, Ban Ki-moon, has pledged to make accountability and transparency
cornerstones of his tenure as secretary-general.
The pilot program targets programs in Albania, Cape Verde, Mozambique, Pakistan,
Rwanda, Tanzania, Uruguay and Vietnam, whose governments volunteered last year to
take part. At least four other nations have expressed interest, said Dervis, who also
serves as administrator of the U.N. Development Program.
The initiative has already been launched in Vietnam, where money for six of 12 U.N.
agencies there will be pooled within the next two months, said John Hendra, U.N. resident
coordinator for the country.
Combining money makes them more attractive to donors through increased transparency
of operations, officials said.
"In the business of public policy and foreign aid, excessive competition is actually very
inefficient by encouraging the proliferation of small projects ... and actually hurts the
effectiveness of these resources," Dervis said, citing a recent analysis by the Center for
Global Development, an independent think tank.
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U.N. group launches pilot programs to trim country-specific operations - Print Version - International Herald Tribune
In some countries, expansion of U.N. activities has led to governments asking to deal with
just one U.N. representative instead of several.
A status report on the pilot program is expected in June, with discussions to follow at the
next U.N. General Assembly, Dervis said.
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