Norway, 2006

The United Nations

is now more at the centre of international affairs than it

has been for many years. We see the Secretary-General

and his staff driving diplomacy. They are on the

ground, moving forward peace efforts in the Middle

East and coordinating and sustaining peace operations

in Lebanon. The United Nations is drawing up

mandates and getting ready for new and urgent

assignments, such as the one in Darfur.

The United Nations is assisting countries coming

out of conflict, such as Burundi and Sierra Leone. It is

giving protection under international law to soldiers

and civilians in Afghanistan. It is also launching a

Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy.

It is to the United Nations that we all turn when

other processes fail, and Norway is working hard to

support its leading role, be it by sending naval units to

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Lebanese waters, by having soldiers in Afghanistan, or

by training future peacekeepers for Darfur.

The policy platform of the Norwegian

Government states that:

“It is in Norway’s best interest that we have a

United Nations-led world order. The Government

will therefore work to strengthen the United

Nations and international law.”

The United Nations can count on Norway. We

believe that our combined efforts in the areas of peace,

the environment and development will pass the tests of

foresight as well as hindsight.

Those of us who are staunch supporters of a

strong and effective United Nations must also be key

players in driving the process of change and renewal. I

have the honour to serve with colleagues on a panel for

United Nations reform appointed by the Secretary-

General. The Panel is drawing up proposals on how the

United Nations can deliver more and do so better and

faster in the areas of development, humanitarian

assistance and the environment.

It was the 2005 Summit that called for greater

coherence in and better governance of the United

Nations. Over time the United Nations has added new

bodies, new organs and new activities to its portfolio.

Few people comprehend the overall picture; few can

tell what the United Nations is doing in a particular

country for development; and few can definitively

answer how much money the United Nations is

spending in a specific country.

In several countries the United Nations system is

represented by more than 20 different organizations. A

country such as Ghana is reported to be host to 14

different United Nations agencies. Many United

Nations organizations deal with many of the same

issues. This is simply overlapping. More than 20

different United Nations organizations deal with water

and more than 10 United Nations organizations deal

with the promotion of education for young girls. This

leads to a fragmented, loosely governed system; it

leads to duplication and reduces possibilities for

monitoring results. This is not the way we would

govern our own affairs — nationally or locally. It is

we, the Member States, who are to blame.

We must put an end to duplication, fragmentation

and rivalry between different parts of the system.

Instead, we must focus on results. We must be willing

to change, adapt to new situations and relinquish tasks

that are no longer needed. We need to ensure that less

is spent on bureaucracy, and more is spent in the field.

Let us take, for example, the coordination of

humanitarian relief after the establishment of the

Central Emergency Response Fund headed by Jan

Egeland. With these resources, he is able to coordinate

more effectively through the direction of the financial

flows. In the absence of a crisis governance and

financing cannot be separated.

All matters of reform seem extremely

controversial here in the United Nations, but they must

be carried out. The most irresponsible thing we could

do now would be to do nothing, i.e. to allow bodies,

governing boards and their representatives to duplicate

work and squander scarce resources.

The report of the High-level Panel on System-

wide Coherence will be presented to the Secretary-

General later this year. We have had an open,

transparent process. We have held meetings in all parts

of the world and listened to a great many stakeholders,

practitioners and country representatives. My plea to

you all — to all the Member States — is to meet that

report with an open mind.

Let me be clear about this: any efficiency gain

must be channelled back to the developing world.

Every single cent gained in improved performance or

reduced overhead must go to aid that reaches the

needy. Recipients and donors alike would find that

attractive.

We are in the fortunate position of having set

clear goals for the Organization. Six years ago we

adopted the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)

here in New York. We pledged to do our utmost to

achieve these goals — Norway is working on all eight.

This year we give 0.96 per cent of our gross national

product in development assistance and we will reach

the 1 per cent mark in a few years.

Now we have vigorously set out to take a lead in

realizing Millennium Development Goal 4, which

compels us to reduce child mortality by two thirds by

2015. Every year, children, in numbers equal to one

and a half times the population of New York City, die

before their fifth birthday — most of them from

preventable diseases. A number of children, equal to

the death toll in the recent tsunami, die every month

from pneumonia alone. Vaccines, costing just $20 for

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each child, could have prevented most of those

common diseases.

Allowing such child mortality puts shackles on

the growth potential of States, prolonging the long

night of underdevelopment. This can and must be

changed. Yesterday I announced that the Norwegian

Government has decided to increase its annual

contribution to child mortality and vaccines from

$75 million per year to $125 million next year. In total,

Norway will contribute $1.3 billion through 2015 for

vaccine-related activities to reduce child mortality.

The next step will be to develop a global strategy

for reaching Millennium Development Goal 4,

specifically a plan for financing and execution.

Meeting that Goal, and other Millennium Development

Goals, really depends on United Nations reform. An

organization that sets goals and carves them in stone —

as we did when we adopted the Millennium

Development Goals — such an organization must adapt

its structure and methods of work to these goals.

We also have to reform the United Nations to

reduce child mortality, i.e. in order to save lives as we

said we should. We have done great things in the past

and have greater means than any other generation and

any other organization. I invite you all to join this

global campaign for child survival.