XII Joint Country Steering Committee Meeting

On behalf of the UN Family in Montenegro, let me first of all welcome you to the UN Eco House at the 12th Joint Country Steering Committee. As each year, we use this meeting to look back at the results achieved during the last year, but also to discuss plans for the future, in order to achieve promise given by the Government of Montenegro and the System of United Nations through the Integrated UN Programme for Montenegro or shorter UNDAF.

2018 was a successful year for Montenegro. The country opened two EU negotiation chapters – the one on economic and monetary policies, and the other one on environment. The later one being of particular importance for the first eco-state in the world with an estimated heavy bill of 1.5 billion associated with it.

Economic growth in Montenegro remained stable with positive outlooks for the future and the major development project being uninterruptedly implemented.

Globally, Montenegro continued to contribute to UN peacekeeping missions and, as the UN Secretary General pointed, remained a “pillar of stability” in the Western Balkans.

Still, challenges do remain. The UN still stands ready to support the Government to work together for achievement of requirements for full membership to the EU. Significant additional efforts are needed to boost implementation of the National Strategy for Sustainable Development and thus address the requirements of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. To do so, it is necessary to introduce better environmental management, as well as to pay close attention to the national sustainable development governance structure, enhance the rule of law, boost economic development while taking care of the most vulnerable. We need to invest more effort in respecting human rights of the children, women, elderly persons, migrants and asylum seekers, the Roma community, LGBTQI people and people who live in underdeveloped rural areas. We need to invest more in youth and the dignity of people with disabilities. We must leave no one behind.

16 resident and non-resident Organisations of the UN Development System support the Government and other partners in addressing these challenges. From this year, as you know, we have a new setup of the UN Family aimed at further improvement of our support to Montenegro. It is part of the global UN Reform at the national level, initiated and driven by the UN Secretary General. The aim is to enhance the support of UN country teams to the host countries in achieving Sustainable Development Goals. More on this issue will come later during the meeting.

We are here to work with you on issues of migration and refugees, child protection, health and preservation of culture and cultural heritage, to safeguard the environment and democratic governance, but also to support the economic prospects of the country.

All these efforts are pursued jointly with the national partners through work of four Results Groups for Social Inclusion, Economic Governance, Environmental Sustainability and Democratic Governance.

Dear Co-conveners of Results Group,

I sincerely thank you for your hard work in all the reporting and planning processes, but also in the process of implementation. UN Organisations and the Government of Montenegro have a very productive and results oriented cooperation thanks to your hard work.

In the year when the Reform of the UN System has been launched, with pressure on UN agencies to become more effective in their support of Members States, we in Montenegro, as a small administration and country and associated small UN office, have to work harder to deliver on our commitments. The UN System will continue to provide impartial advice and technical expertise and bring access to the latest knowledge, innovations and practices to meet Montenegro's development and human rights challenges.

In line with the outlined challenges, Our priorities remain the same – to support human rights and sustainable development of the society.

UN Montenegro will keep investing in the education system and application of twenty first century skills and empowering youth through the Innovation Lab. Gathering socio-economic data through the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey will support informed and evidence-based policy making. We will further improve e-Governance through the continuation of Social Card, introduction of e-Government Service Bus, introduction of new online services. UN will work with clusters and improve competitiveness of the economy, while delivering support to the asylum protection system and enhancing the migration response.

As you can see, many things are still to be done jointly. We have achieved a lot together, and I hope the path of excellent cooperation will continue in the future through many ongoing and forthcoming initiatives that sustainably and irreversibly transform Montenegro.