details of mentor The presentations were made at the latest General Assembly briefing on UN80 resolutions held at UN Headquarters – the fourth such meeting so far this year. UN policy chief Guy Ryder said the new document serves as a navigational tool that clarifies when and through which organs of the organization decisions are expected to be made for each work package of the initiative.
The guide outlines the objectives and the actions being taken to achieve them, the progress made so far on those actions and the actions planned for the coming months (as well as whether an intergovernmental process is envisaged).
“We are working on some of the most complex issues facing the UN system and I believe we are making real progress in how we understand these challenges and how we create solutions together,” Mr Ryder said.
‘Go ahead and step up’
Mr Ryder’s presentation was followed by updates from senior UN officials on the three action packages in the UN80 Action Plan (Shared Platform Initiative, Regional Reset and Joint Knowledge Centre).
Amina MohammedThe Deputy Secretary-General explained that the Common Platform initiative – which aims to improve collaboration between humanitarian and development operations and simplify the work of Resident Coordinators and Humanitarian Coordinators – is about “reducing complexity and building collaboration between humanitarian and development operations”.
The internationally coordinated humanitarian response is translating into national coordination, Ms Mohammed said. He called for the development response to “move forward and move forward.”
UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher spoke via video link from Baidoa, Somalia, which, he said, reflected the importance of ensuring that the UN’s humanitarian and development pillars work more closely and effectively together. He said, “People I meet today are concerned about the combination of flash floods and droughts. We can meet those human needs as much as we can, but without development investment in water storage, water tracking, dams, water infrastructure, we will not be able to properly turn that situation around.”
Better results at the grassroots level
Ms. Mohammed also reported on progress on the Regional Reset, an effort to reform the United Nations’ current, fragmented regional architecture, with more than 240 regional offices and multiple entities working in parallel, sometimes not in line with country needs.
This increases costs, weakens coordination with governments, partners and country teams, and limits the system’s ability to respond to regional and national challenges.
The reform process is not about creating new structures, he said, but about making existing systems “work as one and better.” The success of the regional reset, he added, will depend on “whether we can translate these proposals into more timely support to countries, a more coherent response to regional challenges, and ultimately more concrete results on the ground.”
pooling UN knowledge and expertise
The third area under discussion at the briefing was the Joint Knowledge Centre, which was a response to a core challenge: the fact that knowledge in the UN development system is dispersed across entities with overlapping mandates, fragmented products and inadequate integrated policy support.
The purpose of the Hub is to aggregate knowledge on priority issues, reduce duplication, strengthen coherence and make knowledge more accessible to Member States. Currently in the pilot phase, it is expected that by September 2026, they will be fully operational and providing coherent and effective UN-wide support by integrating data, knowledge and expertise.
Li Junhua, head of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA), told delegates, “By drawing together existing knowledge across institutions around shared priority issues, these centers reduce duplication, strengthen system-wide coherence and ensure that the wealth of UN knowledge is more readily available to support the needs and priorities of Member States.”
Pedro Manuel Moreno, Acting Head of the United Nations Agency for Trade and Development (UNTRA)UNCTAD) reported that the centers under development will focus on three main areas: trade and regional integration, productive transformation and strategic foresight.
The hub, Mr. Moreno said, would mean “more cohesive data, statistics and analysis” for UN member states, and “more coherent policy support, using the strengths of each entity rather than duplicating it.”
Progress can be tracked under the UN80 initiative a public dashboardWhich provides an overview of actions, timelines and implementation across the system.
