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UNDP - Origins and Background

Background

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) was established in November 1965 as a result of the merger of two other programmes, the United Nations Special Funds and the Expanded Programme for Technical Assistance. The respective expertise of the two predecessors were combined granting UNDP close to 50 years of experience in the field of cooperation.

UNDP is referred to as the UN Flagship organization that focuses on global development. Its mission is “to provide its clients -- the developing countries -- with knowledge-based policy advice on the entire range of issues that pertain to reducing poverty, building institutional capacity, and managing the challenges of globalization.” This mission statement was defined in 2000 and reflects the new priorities of the organization.

UNDP`s overriding priority is the eradication of poverty. More recently, the organization has taken the lead in working towards meeting the target of halving world poverty by 2015. According to UNDP, the means to achieving poverty eradication is through sustainable human development (SHD). Within this SHD approach, poverty is not only defined as the lack of access to such resources as food, shelter and income, but as a denial of basic human rights. This includes a right to good health, adequate nutrition and basic education. Poverty therefore is defined as the denial of the opportunities and choices that allow for human development.

Working towards the eradication of poverty is a complex task that requires supporting developing countries in a variety of ways. To best meet the needs of individual developing countries and communities, UNDP has chosen to work closely with the countries they serve. Hence, unique to the organization is their extensive presence “in the field” in developing countries. There are over 131 UNDP offices worldwide with thousands of projects undertaken in more than 160 countries.

UNDP activities and programmes in the field are very diversified and fall under any one or several of these four areas: social development, gender, environment and governance. The key Divisions and Units within UNDP providing programmes in these areas include:

Reform is presently a popular word within the United Nations system. After over 50 years in existence, the UN has had to seriously reassess its role in world governance. Since the adoption of the United Nations Charter in 1945, staggering changes have characterized the last half a century.

Although society has undergone an historical rate of change, we find ourselves today with a deepened awareness of the double edge sword of this evolution. At the same time that we have raised the overall welfare and health in many societies, more people, particularly in developing countries find themselves living in outmost poverty. While we have improved our food and electricity production capacity, we have at the same time seriously damaged our water system, our soils and ecosystem functions putting into question our continued capacity to perpetuate our own existence, or the existence of a significant portion of the world’s human population, beyond the next century.

These rapid changes have caused some to question the role of the UN and others to pronounce the existence of such a global body as the UN more critical now than ever before.

The reform process has affected most key UN programmes and agencies, including the United Nations Development Programme and the United Nations Environmental Programme. Certainly the fields of Environment and Development have undergone an extensive transformation in the last 30 years and have demanded a review of their respective mandate and focus of work.

Some of the criticism directed towards the UN System, and the UNDP, includes the heaviness of its bureaucracy and its resulting ineffectiveness. Also, while UNDP has continued to be present in the field through the numerous country offices, the significant reduction in the capacity of these offices to carry out the breath of work undertaken by the organization contributed to weaken UNDP. The growth of headquarters and associated costs also contributed to the disenchantment of member countries with the organization. Hence, many countries have not been inclined to be as generous in their voluntary contributions to UNDP in the last decade. Acknowledging the need for increased effectiveness, UNDP’s present reform sets out to streamline and focus its programme of action as well as strengthen the country offices.

Moving upstream is the new direction chosen by the Administrator. This means that UNDP will increasingly support poverty alleviation in developing countries by addressing the problems at the governance level – policy advice, institution and capacity building, etc. Support at this level has been increasingly in demand and requires an expertise that is country sensitive. With its presence in the field, UNDP has both acquired the trust and the local and national expertise to provide such services. It is believed that solidifying the foundation of developing countries’ governance system - through strategic development of policy and institution - will allow UNDP to be more effective to combat poverty and provide for sustainable human development.

Motivation for such a direction is driven by the new development challenges facing developing countries. One of these key challenges is the quasi-exclusion of developing countries, particularly the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) from global trade. In UNDP’s 1999 Human Development Report on globalization, the economic integration of developing countries in the world economy is considered key to sustainable human development and poverty eradication. Economic integration of developing countries requires that they develop appropriate policies and institutional capacity. The intervention of UNDP at such a level, as opposed to facilitating and coordinating field projects in small communities, is an upstream undertaking.

The reform of UNDP towards an upstream focus requires some significant changes within the organization. The Administrator’s plan is to engage in this shift by providing a new leadership style and organizational culture, new measures of accountability and performance, and by engaging in innovative partnerships. Priority will be given to building the country-offices and ensuring their capacity to provide country specific policy advice and expertise. The organizational model envisioned by the Administrator in the Business Plan of 2000-2003 is one based on dispersed capabilities and decentralized networks.

The Administrator has chosen to address the reform of the organization by initiating change in four areas: policy, partnerships, leadership, and people. Within each of the areas the expected outcomes, as outlined in UNDP’s Business Plan 2000-2003, are:

Among the decisions to be implemented between 2000-2003 include the reduction of staff at headquarters by 25%, increased investment in training to realign staff capacity with the new focus, administrative cost reduction by 10%, results-based planning, and streamlined, simplified and decentralized procedures.

Additional details about UNDP’s reform and the focus for the 2000-2003 period can be found in The Way Forward – The Administrator’s Business Plan 2000-2003.

On April 4 2000, the Administrator Mark Malloch Brown presented to the Executive Board the disappointing results of the voluntary contribution by member countries for the year 2000. Contribution to core funding amounts to $682m for 2000, a figure similar to the disappointing 1999 contributions. The target that had been set for this first year of the new business plan was $800m with an objective of raising these funds to 1.1 billion by 2003.

The impacts of limited core funding affects most directly the work in the field since the bulk of core funding goes to programmes. The continued decrease in core funding since 1992 has resulted in a direct and significant impact in much needed assistance in Sub-Sahara Africa – a 48% drop in funding.

UNDP, as the overall coordinator of development programmes within the United Nations, and in light of the urgent need for continued support to developing countries, must meet the funding targets to be effective.