"Towards Global Partnerships": Development of the Secretary-General’s Report

Project context

The UN/business partnership agenda is rapidly evolving. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has taken up where Kofi Annan left off in emphasizing the importance of UN collaboration with the private sector. In his first public speech outside the UN, the Secretary-General stressed that the Organization must engage more fully with non-state actors in order to bring about a prosperous, more secure and peaceful world. He also noted that business and the UN share common goals. In preparation for last year’s General Assembly and as follow-up to Resolution 60/215 adopted by the General Assembly in December 2005, GPPi assisted the UN Global Compact Office in developing the Secretary-General’s Report "Towards Global Partnerships," which was presented at the 62^nd session of the General Assembly.

Project objectives

The report aimed to take stock of recent partnership developments and trends as well as tracked the implementation of previous proposals for enhanced cooperation between the UN and business. Furthermore, the report offered new recommendations to advance business collaboration and in doing so contributed to building a more robust institutional framework that enhanced the UN’s capacity for partnership. In particular, the report highlighted progress in the following areas:

• Building institutional capacity at country offices
• Monitoring and impact assessment
• Sharing of lessons learned
• Training for UN staff at all levels
• Streamlining of guidelines
• Improvement of partner selection process

The report included illustrative case studies and was based on the results of a survey and a scoping exercise that GPPi has conducted.