The reinvigorated Resident Coordinator system, four years on

19 May 2022

Four years ago, UN Member States agreed to boost development coordination to make the most of the UN’s offer to support countries and enable them to tap into the full UN expertise – at the country, regional and global levels – to secure hard won development gains and advance the SDGs.

The reinvigorated Resident Coordinator (RC) system, fully staffed, operational and powered by a new generation of Resident Coordinators, has proven its worth, ensuring timely, coherent and effective UN support to countries during another year of extraordinary challenges, as developing countries continue responding to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, amidst increased global volatility.

2022 Report of the UNSDG Chair shows that, despite a complex global context, the returns on investments in coordination are tangible.

Enhanced coordination was pivotal to:

• Serve as first line of defense against the pandemic, guiding the UN development system’s collective efforts that protected, supported and serviced populations, partners, and clients
• Strengthen joint planning and programming through a new generation of Common Country Analyses and Cooperation Frameworks, going beyond sectoral approaches
• Harness the full expertise of the UN development system and other partners for sustainable development, including International Financial Institutions 
• Scale up commitment to full transparency and accountability, including through a first-ever multi-annual results framework for the RC system
• Boost commitments to 2021 global summits and support national convenors of dialogues on critical SDG priorities
• Continue to advance UN development system reform implementation, including support for a renewed regional architecture and advancing the efficiency agenda.

Four years into the reform we clearly see increased integrated policy response, a more strategic needs-based approach to tackle countries’ development needs, better linkage of UN expertise at all levels to serve country needs, increased accountability and transparency for sustainable development results, improved ability to speak with one UN voice and increased overall efficiencies.

Evidence shows that coordination matters to speed up the SDGs

Host governments' and donor governments’ feedback on the Resident Coordinator system continued to improve.

• 81% of host Governments report that, since the UN development system repositioning in 2018, the UN development system currently works together better, a 4% increase compared to 2020
• 87% of donor governments indicate that the Resident Coordinator system has improved coherence in UN activities, reducing duplication of efforts
• 75% of donor governments consider that the Resident Coordinator system has leveraged the comparative advantage of individual UN entities
• 89% of host Governments believe Resident Coordinators effectively lead UN teams to support countries' priorities, up from 88% in 2020 and 79% in 2019
• 87% of donor governments state that the Resident Coordinator system has scaled up collective action that supports the SDGs
• 86% of donor governments state that, since the repositioning of the UN development system, UN entities work more collaboratively together

To view the interactive version of the report, visit the 2022 UNSDG Chair Report on DCO online report, report's resource page and glossary.