some changes in UN DESA and more to come

There have been some changes in New York which might interest you.
After a LONG time UNDESA have at last appointed their Chief Economist and Assistant Secretary General (ASG) for Economic Development Elliott Harris. Elliott was ASG for UNEP and  Director of the New York Office and of the Secretariat of the UN Environment Management Group (EMG) in September 2013.
Prior to joining UN Environment, he worked as an Economist in the IMF from 1988 to 2013, gaining extensive policy and programmatic experience in African and Central Asian countries, as well as in the Fiscal Affairs Department on public expenditure policy issues.the ASG for UNEP in New York and formally with the IMF.

The new Director for the Finance for Development Office  (FfDO) is Navid Hanif who was the Director of the ECOSOC Support Office and Coordination (OESC) and prior to that in the Division for Sustainable Development. Navid was also when he was in the Pakistan Mission one of the three authors of the GA resolution that set up the World Summit on Sustainable Development. The distinctive function of the FfDO is to provide effective substantive secretariat support for sustained follow-up within the United Nations to the agreements and commitments reached at the International Conferences on Financing for Development, as contained in the 2002 Monterrey Consensus and the 2008 Doha Declaration on Financing for Development, and financing for development-related aspects of the outcomes of major United Nations conferences and summits in the economic and social fields, including the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, as well as the United Nations development agenda beyond 2015.
The principal mission of the Office is to promote and support an integrated, cross-cutting and holistic nature of the FfD follow-up process. To this end, FfDO serves as a focal point in the United Nations Secretariat for overall follow-up to the implementation of the outcomes of  the above-mentioned conferences and summits, provides secretariat support to the intergovernmental process entrusted with the follow-up to the Conferences, supports and facilitates the participation of all stakeholders, follows closely the issues and policies related to international economic, financial and development cooperation, and keeps under review actions taken at all levels in the FfD follow-up process, as well as within the framework of international economic, financial and development cooperation, in general.

The new Director for ECOSOC Support and Coordination is Marion Barthelemy. Prior to that she was Director of the Division For Public Administration And Development Management coming from the Division on Sustainable Development where she was the Chief, Intergovernmental Support and Interagency Branch. United Nations Division for Sustainable Development. The Office for ECOSOC Support and Coordination (OESC) in the Department of Economic and Social Affairs provides substantive support to the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and the General Assembly.
The Office assists ECOSOC in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development by fostering debate and innovative thinking, promoting consensus on ways forward, and coordinating efforts to achieve internationally agreed goals. It also helps in the follow-up to major UN conferences and summits.It is also going to support the HLPF  There will be more the interface with other divisions, and Division for Sustainable Development will still bring most of the substance.
The Office also helps to coordinate ECOSOC's work to ensure coherence in the implementation, follow-up and review of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.  In this respect, it oversees coordination of the Council's annual session and related analytical work, which culminates in the ECOSOC High-level Segment each July, including the ministerial component of the High-level Political Forum.  The Office also supports ECOSOC by convening multi-stakeholder responses to emerging issues of relevance to the new development Agenda. To foster integrated approaches to the pursuit of sustainable development, the Office is responsible for coordinating the ECOSOC Integration Segment, which brings together the work of the ECOSOC and UN system to support Member States.  In fulfilment of its mandates and roles in coordination and integration, the Office also promotes coherence between ECOSOC and the General Assembly, providing support to the Economic and Financial (Second) Committee of the General Assembly.
There is more changes to come. As they do ill update this blog.