Felix Dodds comments on sustainable development, coffee & life

Guest blog: Lenni Montiel: Senior UN Development Leader (Ret.) | Former UN Assistant Secretary-General |UNDP Resident Representative | Governance, Public Policy & Multilateral Diplomacy | Leadership Advisor & Trainer | Chevening Scholar. Lenni writes on LinkedIn about the UN and international development. Originally published here. T he next major UN election has begun, and you've probably never heard about it. The International Labour Organization is selecting its next Director-General. Unlike most organizations in the UN system, the ILO has a unique governance model. It is not governed solely by Member States. Its Governing Body consists of 56 members: 🔹 28 government representatives 🔹 14 employers' representatives 🔹 14 workers' representatives This tripartite structure, established in 1919, means that candidates must build confidence not only among governments but also among employers and trade unions. The current timetable is: 📅 31 August 2026 – Deadline for...

Applications for who should replace Achim Steiner as the Administrator of UNDP closed on the 9th of June. So far, no white smoke from the UN Secretary General's office. Before looking at the potential candidates, let's look at some of what Achim achieved. Some of his key achievements and initiatives during his tenure: Championed South-South Cooperation: Steiner actively promoted the role of the  Global South  in driving development solutions and advocated for stronger partnerships between countries of the Global South, notably through the  BAPA+40 Conference  in 2019. Modernized UNDP's Approach: His first Medium Term Strategy showed that Steiner wanted to reinvent UNDP, shifting its focus from traditional development coordination to a more mission-driven, service-oriented approach, emphasizing its role in helping countries chart their development paths. This was a more networked approach to development bringing together teams from across the UN system ...

Guest blog by Michael Stanley-Jones (2023). Sustainable Development in Practice: A Handbook for Integrating Environment, Climate and Poverty Reduction . United Nations Development Programme–United Nations Environment Programme Poverty-Environment Action: Nairobi Poverty-Environment Action for Sustainable Development Goals, a joint project of the United Nations Development Programme and the United Nations Environment Programme, has since 2018 brought poverty, environment and climate objectives into the heart of government and private sector decision-making in eight least developed countries: Bangladesh, Lao Peoples‘ Democratic Republic, Malawi, Mauritania, Mozambique, Myanmar, Nepal, and Rwanda. It has contributed to further integrating poverty-environment, climate and gender objectives in three additional countries: Indonesia, South Africa and Tanzania—so as to strengthen the sustainable management of natural resources and to alleviate poverty. There are three stories from the ...

By Felix Dodds and Chantal Line Carpentier who   is Chief, UNCTAD New York office of the Secretary-General, former UN DESA Major Groups Coordinator where she facilitated non-state actors’ contributions to the SDGs negotiations. She’s an Agricultural and Environmental Economist with PhD. from Virginia Tech and MSc. and BSc. from McGill University The financing for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Paris Climate Agreement will need a refocusing of private sector finance. In that context, it might be useful to just look at the UN ecosystem of initiatives on   private sector finance to address these issues. There are several entry points in the UN system which can have an impact on the private sector. These include: UN General Assembly The annual UN General Assembly resolution on “Promoting investments for sustainable development. [A/C.2/L.40]” (UN, 2020) (see UNCTAD section below) UN ECOSOC forum on Financing for Development “About the Forum The ECOSOC...