AFD and the United Nations

The United Nations is a major platform for debates on certain development topics, such as the MDGs or Global Public Goods. It gives AFD the opportunity to provide input to discussions and thus help it evolve in its environment, namely international aid. Its different institutions commit considerable volumes of official development assistance every year via a multitude of organizations, funds and programs, the diversity of which can sometimes have an impact on the effectiveness of resource allocations.

In 2008, AFD defined a strategy vis-à-vis the United Nations, which identifies the benefits our agency can gain from a targeted partnership with UN agencies. In addition to the interest of being associated with the universal image of the United Nations, working more closely with the UN can help promote AFD’s expertise and ideas during international debates on development. 

► United Nations Industrial Development Organization [+]

Partnership with AFD

UNIDO is AFD’s main partner in the United Nations system in the field of support for private sector development. Both institutions enjoy good cooperation relations, which have given rise to a few joint projects in terms of intellectual collaboration. This trend has been confirmed with the creation of a training component for decision-makers in developing countries (in the form of clusters) and a project to upgrade businesses.

 

Presentation of the institution

UNIDO was founded in 1966 and since 1985 has been a specialized institution in charge of promoting and accelerating industrial development in developing countries. It has set a certain number of priorities in its Strategic Plan for 2005-2015. The first is to reduce poverty, in particular through productive activities, and consequently to promote industrial growth in the least developed regions. Moreover, UNIDO is in charge of trade capacity building, as well as raising awareness of and access to energy efficiency, particularly via the use of renewable energies.

Go to the UNIDO website

► United Nations Development Programme [+]

Partnership with AFD

By institutionalizing their partnership, AFD and UNDP have identified four priority areas for collaboration: poverty reduction, democratic governance, post-crisis recovery and research on the topic of development. Cooperation between the two institutions is mainly based on knowledge production, which specifically focuses on human development and the private sector’s contribution to it.

For example, AFD participated in the “Growing inclusive Markets” initiative and in the report “Creating Value for All: Strategies for Doing Business with the Poor”. Finally, AFD regularly provides support for reports on human development that focus on various topics such as migration and climate change.

 

Presentation of the institution

UNDP was founded in 1965 and has an extremely broad-based vocation: to help countries build their national capacities in order to achieve sustainable human development. Its first activity is of an operational nature, as it assists development policies by building capacities, supporting democratic governance, reducing poverty and preventing risks and conflicts. It must, moreover, ensure that the policies and programs of United Nations agencies working in the field of development are coherent and effective. Finally, UNDP, via its knowledge production activities, provides input to debates on human development by proposing an alternative measurement to GDP alone, i.e. the HDI (Human Development Index). In order to follow up this initiative, this UN agency has created a Human Development Report which addresses a different topic every year.

Go to the UNPD website

► United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization [+]

Partnership with AFD

The main cooperation methods with UNESCO are dialogue and consultation in the framework of projects in the sectors of education, culture or heritage protection and development. AFD’s operations at UNESCO World Heritage sites give it greater visibility. Current activities include certain projects for tourism development at heritage sites in the Saint-Louis region in Senegal, an urban development program in Lao PDR and programs to develop widespread access to education for populations.

 

Presentation of the institution

UNESCO was founded by an international Convention in 1945 and is today one of the main specialized institutions in the UN system. It is active in the sectors of education, natural sciences, social and human sciences, culture, communication and information.
UNESCO has been the reference organization in the heritage sector since its General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage in 1972. In this capacity, it manages the listing of world heritage sites.

Go to the UNESCO website

► United Nations Global Compact [+]

Partnership with AFD

The fact that AFD and the Global Compact share the same convictions and values proved to be a major asset for the establishment of the partnership. Moreover, this organization offers AFD a relatively extensive and non-restrictive series of actions to implement. Finally, thanks to its network, the Global Compact makes it possible to establish contacts with new actors during international summits.

The partnership between AFD and the Global Compact comprises two components, since AFD is one of the signatory institutions and has contributed €100,000 to the Global Compact Foundation.

 

Presentation of the institution

The Global Compact is an initiative launched by the former UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan, following on from the Davos Forum (1999). The concept was launched during the World Economic Forum in 2000. One of its missions is to give businesses incentives, by advocacy actions and awarding a label, to respect the ten universal principles it has defined for the implementation of their strategic orientations and the development of their activities. The values recognized by this institution above all concern the respect for human rights, access to decent work and taking the environment into account.

Go to the Global Compact website

► United Nations Children's Fund [+]

Partnership with AFD

AFD has contacts with UNICEF, particularly with its French Committee. It is a two-tier partnership, since AFD works in a general manner with the UN agency and implements certain specific projects alongside the French Committee. The dynamics of the partnership are consequently mainly based on projects for basic education and water and sanitation. The French Committee handles the training and communication aspect between the two institutions. This mainly concerns helping health professionals acquire skills in managing children affected by HIV/AIDS.

 

Presentation of the institution

UNICEF is a United Nations agency founded in 1946 to provide support to children and teenagers in developing countries and war-torn or disaster-struck countries, particularly in the field of health. The five priority areas defined by UNICEF are as follows: young child survival and development, basic education and gender equality, child protection from violence and exploitation and advocacy for children’s rights.

Go to the UNICEF website

► United Nations Environment Programme [+]

Partnership with AFD

UNEP is AFD’s main partner for the topics of climate change and energy efficiency. Their partnership is primarily based on knowledge production focusing on bilateral donors’ climate change financing. Indeed, this type of actor finances 66% of this sector. Their dominant position in the fight against climate change must be taken into consideration by environmental experts, whose objective is to disseminate sound policy practices and identify the challenges of tomorrow. UNEP consequently sees the need to have exchanges with an actor like AFD, which plays a key role by providing 10% of the financing donors earmark for this topic.

 

Presentation of the institution

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) was founded following the United Nations Environment Conference of 1972. Its mission is to work for environmental protection in order to foster sustainable development for all countries. It has defined priority principles which include monitoring the state of the environment, integrating activities to protect the environment within the UN, awareness raising actions on environmental problems, exchanging information on ecological technologies and disseminating technical, legal and institutional opinions to governments.

Go to the UNEP website

► International Fund for Agricultural Development [+]

Partnership with AFD

Relations between AFD and IFAD are relatively recent. Some cooperation themes have, however, been identified by the two institutions with a view to possible cofinancing operations. Indeed, the two partners wish to work more closely together in certain areas, for example, on the rise in food prices and the consequences for Sub-Saharan Africa, payment for environmental services and managing agricultural risks.

The second component of the partnership is mainly based on the creation of the African Agriculture Fund (AAF), which aims to support agro-industrial businesses and African agricultural cooperatives via private equity investments. Due to the ethical concerns that are specific to this partnership, this Fund will give priority to businesses and agricultural organizations that respect the environment and to smallholdings.

The partnership has been considerably scaled up since 2010, particularly thanks to new common projects is Syria and Cameroon.

 

Presentation of the institution

IFAD was founded following a United Nations conference in Rome in 1976 in order to mobilize additional resources to increase agricultural production in developing countries. IFAD’s strategic objectives defined in its strategic framework for 2007-2010 are to provide the rural poor with access to natural resources (land and water), improved agricultural techniques, a wide range of financial services, markets, employment and business creation and to local and national processes for the definition of policies and programs. One of the particularities of IFAD lies in the way it operates, which is different from other international finance institutions: it works first and foremost with communities and helps them to organize themselves into village cooperatives or producers’ organizations.

Go to the IFAD website

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Last update in April 2012