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Speeches

To the Executive Board

January 21st 2002

Let me begin by congratulating the other members of the Board after being elected today, and also to welcome the new members of the Executive Board and to acknowledge the work made in the last years by the outgoing members. I would like to remind them that this is an open-ended body in which any member of the United Nations can participate on equal terms.

As it was already mentioned, Executive Director Carol Bellamy is now in Tokyo attending a meeting related with Afghanistan. We will have the opportunity to hear her report when she comes back.

This week we will examine an important substantive agenda. I am sure we will proceed as speedily as possible to complete our work and at the same time have the opportunity to discus all the items of the agenda. I would like to draw to your attention the joint meeting of UNICEF, UNDP/FNUAP and WFP, and let you know that, as President of the Board, I intend to inform ECOSOC about that meeting.

In my opening statement, I want to describe mainly three areas related with some issues that are relevant to the work of the Executive Board in 2002.

The first issue is related to the country notes. We will try to introduce a few changes in the framework of the debate, in order to promote an interactive discussion among the members of the Board. I will ask the Secretariat to explain the methodological decisions that were taken by the Board about this issue.

But regardless of the procedure that we finally use at this opportunity, there is a substantive issue that the members of the Board may want to refer to in their interventions. We should critically evaluate the contents and structure of the country notes in order to unify their quality and their relevance. Many of the country notes sent to the Board for their approval are of high quality. Nevertheless, we have to build a mechanism that allows the members of the Board to receive clear and dynamic information about the cooperation programmes that are going to be implemented. The Board has to take some guidelines into account:

Clarity in the objectives.

Clarity in the outcomes.

Relevance of the information reported to the Board in order to make decisions.

Consistency with the Mid-Term Strategic Plan.
Perhaps some of you want to make a preliminary reference to this issue in your interventions.

The second issue I would like to mention is the importance of the discussion of a mechanism for cooperation between the Security Council and the Board, thus following the proposal presented by the President of the Council on December 2001 related with issues under consideration on the agenda of these intergovernmental agencies. For instance, in this session UNICEF we will discuss the programme of cooperation with Guinea Bissau, an issue that is being discussed currently at the Council. I wonder if we can find a mechanism to inform the members of the Council about its contents in such a way that they can take into account the programme when they make decisions about peace building in that country.

The third issue relates to the field visits for 2002. Even though the Board will evaluate the issue in due time, including its possible destinations, I would like to report to you that I will make all the necessary efforts to rise their profile and the level of participation. To make these visits more interesting, I will also try to take into account the international situation in the selection of the places. I wanted to emphasize this because I am convinced of their enormous usefulness not only to the Board, but also to UNICEF offices in the field that take an effective advantage of this visits.

Thank you.