Meeting Minutes
UNDG Working Group on Communications and Advocacy Meeting
27 February 2015; 09:30 a.m.; UNICEF, 3 UN Plaza, New York
Summary of action points
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Working Group (WG) members, who volunteered to lead work plan activities, will
meet to elaborate how the specific activities will be implemented;
A task team will be set up to take forward activities under result area 3;
The Chair and the Secretariat will revert with options for field-testing WG activities;
The Chair and the Secretariat will follow up with agencies to secure their firm
commitments to lead activities where needed;
The next meeting of the WG will be held by mid-April. At the meeting, WG members
will report on progress on key activities.
Attendance
Organization
Participants
Chair
Yoka Brandt
DPI
Janos Tisovszky
UN Women
Nanette Braun
UNCTAD
Chantal Line Carpentier
UNCTAD
Ahmad Mukhtar
UNDP
Mila Rosenthal
UNDP
Caroline Hooper-Box
OHCHR
Victor Fernandez
UN Habitat
Rosa Surinach
UNICEF
Paloma Escudero
UNICEF
Madeline Eisner
UNIDO
Ralf Bredel
UN Millennium Campaign
Mitchell Toomey
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UNESCO
Neil Ford
WFP
Domenica Sabella
WHO
Olivia Lawe-Davies
Secretariat
DOCO
Gina Lucarelli
DOCO
Peter Serenyi
I) Background:
On 27 February, the second meeting of the newly-established UNDG Communications
and Advocacy Working Group was convened. During the first meeting on 27 January
2015, four key results were identified by the WG. These key results were then further
elaborated by the DOCO Secretariat, and activities were developed to support the
achievement of the envisaged results.
II) Purpose of the meeting:
The purpose of the second meeting was to drill down to activity level, and to seek
volunteers to lead on the implementation of various activities. The Chair, Yoka Brandt,
explained that the general direction of the work plan had been approved during the
recent meeting of the UNDG.
The Chair highlighted that there are points of synergy with other working groups Sustainable Development and Human Right working groups, in particular. The Chair
also noted that, on 25 February, she had presented the objectives and results of the
UNDG WG on Communications and Advocacy to the global level UN Communications
Group, convened by DPI. At that meeting, participants agreed that it is important to
maximize the synergies and minimize the overlaps between the two groups. It was also
noted that many of the members sit on both groups, so in principle strong coordination
should be feasible.
III) Work Plan presentation and discussion highlights:
The Secretariat (Gina Lucarelli) presented the rationale for the four results and the
activities that fall under them, in order to provide colleagues with the broader picture.
The results are as follows:
1. Rollout of the Guidance on Communicating As One;
2. Collecting and connecting knowledge;
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3. Pilot themes for advocacy around the SDGs in select countries;
4. Recommendations for co-design of country programming.
Result area #1, the Communicating as One guidance is fairly new. There is a need to
determine which UN Country Teams are rolling out the guidance. Therefore, the
immediate step is to collect data on the extent to which the guidance is being applied,
which can then inform our next steps as a working group.
Result area #2, recognizing that the best learning process is country-to-country, peer-topeer, developing and maintaining a substantive knowledge repository is essential. It can
provide useful information that is accessible on demand to country offices and identify
what has already been done in the area of joint communications and advocacy.
Result area #3, the new development agenda will require concerted advocacy as part of
its implementation strategy. Topics such as equity, social accountability and climate
change require an integrated approach. This will help us learn how best to support
countries in these areas. The WG will specifically collaborate with the Sustainable
Development WG to pilot select advocacy themes in a couple of countries.
Result area #4, the UNDG is revising the existing country programming (UNDAF)
guidance to make it SDG based and results oriented. There is a need to reflect the joint
communications component as part n parcel of the UNDAF guidance. There is also a
need to have a supporting communications plan that can make the UNDAF accessible
to the general public and open up post-2015 public engagement channels, drawing on
past experiences of “A Million Voices”.
Conclusions from the work plan discussion:
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For result area 1, UNICEF, DPI and UNDP volunteered to co-lead. They will
initiate the collection of baseline data for determining the support needed by UN
Country Teams applying the CaO guidance and identifying lessons learned. DPI
noted that some of the processes in the SG’s strategy on “Time for global action
2015” may be also relevant here.
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For activities under other result areas, various WG members volunteered. This is
accordingly reflected in the work plan. For result area 3, a Task Team will be
constituted.
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Drawing on interventions and suggestions of WG members, the Chair stressed (i)
the importance of collecting baseline data to inform on-going rollout and pilots of
advocacy approaches; (ii) the importance of working together with the Human
Rights and Sustainable Development Goals’ working groups, and find practical
ways to gather input from UNCTs; (iii) the need to involve country teams in a way
that does not overburden them and that yields maximum impact. The Chair and
the Secretariat will provide options on what is the feasible approach to follow.
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IV) Next Steps
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WG members who have volunteered to lead specific activities should work
together to further elaborate the activities, based on the work plan.
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Task team/s will report on progress in the coming weeks and at the next WG
meeting. DOCO, as Secretariat, to coordinate with relevant members as needed.
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The next WG meeting to be held in late March – mid April, date tbd.
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