22 July 1986

38th plenary meeting

Report of the Committee for Programme and Co-ordination on the work of its twenty-sixth session

The Economic and Social Council,

Having considered the report of the Committee for Programme and Co-ordination on the work of its twenty-sixth session,

I 1. Takes note with appreciation of the report of the Committee for Programme and Co-ordination on the work of its twenty-sixth session and endorses the conclusions and recommendations contained therein;

2. Re-emphasizes once again the importance of the programming and co-ordinating functions carried out by the Committee for Programme and Co-ordination as the main subsidiary organ of the Economic and Social Council and the General Assembly for planning, programming and co-ordination;

II Improvement of the work of the Committee for Programme and Co-ordination under its mandate

1. Endorses the conclusions and recommendations of the Committee for Programme and Co-ordination on the improvement of its work under its mandate;

2. Welcomes, in particular, the recommendations relating to the review of the medium-term plan and the programme budget, convinced that their implementation will contribute to the effectiveness and efficiency of the United Nations;

3. Reiterates the importance of setting priorities in the plans and programmes of the United Nations in accordance with the Regulations Governing Programme Planning, the Programme Aspects of the Budget, the Monitoring of Implementation and the Methods of Evaluation, endorses the recommendations of the Committee on priority setting, and urges the Committee to continue to improve priority setting in the United Nations in accordance with its role, as set out in its mandate;

4. Endorses, in particular, the recommendations of the Committee on general and specific measures to improve the relevance and effectiveness of co-ordination within the United Nations system, on the implementation of the conclusions reached by the Committee upon consideration of analyses of the state of co-ordination in given areas, and on better integration of planning, programming and co-ordination;

5. Stresses the importance of an adequate mechanism to ensure that the conclusions and recommendations of the Committee are systematically followed up by the appropriate sectoral, functional and regional intergovernmental bodies and, in that context, requests the Secretary-General to implement fully the measures referred to in paragraph 48 of the report of the Committee;

III Proposed revisions and addendum to the medium-term plan for the period 1984-1989

1. Endorses the conclusions and recommendations of the Committee for Programme and Co-ordination on the proposed revisions to the medium-term plan for the period 1984-1989;

2. Notes with satisfaction the addition to the medium-term plan of chapter 31, containing a new major programme on programme planning and co-ordination, as revised by the Committee;

3. Reiterates that the medium-term plan should continue to serve as the framework for the formulation of biennial programme budgets;

IV Statements of programme budget implications

1. Notes that rule 31 of the rules of procedure of the Economic and Social Council provides that the Secretary-General shall prepare and provide to the Council an estimate of the programme budget implications of implementing any proposal involving the expenditure of United Nations funds;

2. Welcomes the recommendation of the Committee for Programme and Co-ordination that the Economic and Social Council, starting with its first regular session of 1987, should, for a trial period of two years, be provided with statements of programme budget implications of the draft resolutions before the Council in the format established for such statements submitted to the General Assembly;

V Programme performance and evaluation

1. Notes with satisfaction the changes in the methodology introduced in the report on programme performance of the United Nations for the biennium 1984-1985 and requests the Secretary-General to continue his efforts towards further improvement;

2. Stresses the importance of programme performance reports, evaluations and cross-organizational programme analyses, as endorsed by the competent intergovernmental bodies, as instruments for promoting efficiency and for integrating the programme and co-ordination processes;

3. Endorses the recommendation of the Committee that, in programme areas where a major conference is to be held, the programme should be evaluated sufficiently in advance of the conference for the findings and recommendations to be taken into account in the preparatory work for the conference; if a programme is evaluated after a conference has taken place, such an evaluation should be made only after the programme has been revised in the light of the results of the conference and enough time has elapsed for its impact to be assessed;

VI Cross-organizational reviews of the medium-term plans of the organizations of the United Nations system and cross-organizational programme analyses

1. Endorses the conclusions and recommendations of the Committee on the cross-organizational programme analysis on economic and social research and policy analysis in the United Nations system;

2. Stresses, in particular, the need for research on current and emerging issues of international co-operation in the economic and social fields and the need to improve further the quality of research activities and products;

3. Stresses also the need for a closer relationship and better complementarity between the studies undertaken within the regular programmes of the organizations and the research activities of the United Nations University and of the autonomous research institutes of the United Nations system;

4. Invites its subsidiary bodies to examine ongoing and planned research activities within their areas of competence and to formulate their requests for studies in the light of such information and of emerging issues of international concern, and further invites them to consider, where appropriate and feasible, explicitly relating their draft resolutions to the medium-term plan;

5. Requests the Secretary-General:

(a) To enhance the quality and relevance of research activities in the United Nations by, inter alia, implementing the measures recommended in paragraphs 186 and 187 of the report of the Committee;

(b) To increase, through the Administrative Committee on Co-ordination, the flow of information on the research activities and research findings of the organizations of the United Nations system;

(c) To submit to the Council, on a biennial basis, a summary of the main research findings of the system on major global economic and social trends, policies and emerging issues;

6. Requests the Administrative Committee on Co-ordination to follow up the system-wide recommendations made by the Committee for Programme and Co-ordination on economic and social research and policy analysis;

7. Decides to review the implementation of its recommendations on this subject at its second regular session of 1988 on the basis of a report of the Secretary-General to be submitted through the Committee for Programme and Co-ordination;

8. Endorses the recommendation of the Committee that the cross-organizational review of the medium-term plans of the organizations of the United Nations system and the cross-organizational programme analysis in the area of science and technology for development be merged into a single report of the Secretary-General to be submitted to the Council at its second regular session of 1987, through the Committee for Programme and Co-ordination;

9. Decides to consider at its second regular session of 1987 the methodology, format and role of the existing analytical instruments for co-ordination, including cross-organizational programme analyses, cross-organizational reviews of the medium-term plans of the organizations of the United Nations system and system-wide medium-term plans, on the basis of the recommendations of the Committee for Programme and Co-ordination, in the context of its consideration of the report of the Secretary-General on all aspects of co-ordination requested by the General Assembly in its resolution 40/177 of 17 December 1985;

10. Reaffirms that the Committee for Programme and Co-ordination has the responsibility for making recommendations to the Council on the subjects and timing of analytical studies pertaining to issues of co-ordination.