The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) is the world's largest multilateral source of grant funding for development cooperation. It was created in 1965 through a merger of two predecessor programs for United Nations technical cooperation. Funds come from the voluntary contributions of Member States of the United Nations and its affiliated agencies, which provide approximately US $1 billion yearly to UNDP's central resources. A 36-member Executive Board composed of both developed and developing countries approves major programs and policy decisions.
UNDP has three overriding goals:
To help the United Nations become a powerful and cohesive force for sustainable human development;
To focus its own resources on a series of objectives central to sustainable human development: poverty elimination, environmental regeneration, job creation, and advancement of women;
To strengthen international cooperation for sustainable human development and serve as a major substantive resource on how to achieve it.
Through a network of 132 offices worldwide, UNDP works with 174 governments to build developing countries' capacities for sustainable human development. To execute the projects and programs it supports, it draws upon developing countries' national technical capacities, as well as the expertise of over 30 international and regional agencies and nongovernmental organizations.
People are at the center of all UNDP activities, which focus on six priority themes: poverty elimination and grassroots development; environment and natural resources; management development; technical cooperation among developing countries; transfer and adaptation of technology; and women in development. Entrepreneurship is promoted as a means of creating jobs and reducing poverty. Requests for assistance in areas of good governance and human rights are increasing. Global and interregional programs address worldwide problems, including food security and HIV/AIDS.
A UNDP Human Development Report, published yearly since 1990, assists the international community in developing new, practical and pragmatic concepts, measures and policy instruments for promoting more people-oriented development.
UNDP normally also plays the chief coordinating role for operational development activities undertaken by the whole United Nations system. This includes administering special-purpose funds such as the UN Sudano-Sahelian Office (UNSO); the UN Capital Development Fund (UNCDF); the United Nations Volunteers (UNV); and the UN Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM).
UNDP assisted developing country governments and local NGOs and grassroots organizations in preparing for the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED). It is now assisting these countries in integrating environmental concerns into development plans and strengthening their capacities for the management of environment and sustainable development programs as called for in Agenda 21, UNCED's blueprint for action. With the World Bank and UNEP, UNDP is one of the managing partners of the Global Environment Facility (GEF), through which it is helping countries translate global concerns about ozone layer depletion, biodiversity loss, international water pollution and global warming into local action plans.
In emergency situations, UNDP works closely with other UN agencies to ensure a relief-to-development continuum.
From Basic Facts About the United Nations. Published by United Nations Department of Public Information. Copyright 1995 United Nations.
