EU Presidency Statement - 'Reform of the UN Economic and Social Council'

Madame President,

I have the honour to speak on behalf of the European Union. The Candidate Countries Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey, the Countries of the Stabilisation and Association Process and potential candidates Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Serbia and Montenegro, and the EFTA country Iceland, a member of the European Economic Area, align themselves with this statement.

I would like to thank you, Madame President for convening this informal panel discussion, to thank Under Secretary Ocampo for his work as moderator, and most importantly to thank the panellists for their stimulating contributions. This debate on making ECOSOC more effective will, no doubt, continue and the EU stands ready to engage in that debate.

Effective Multilateralism

EU is committed to effective multilateralism as a central element of its external action. We strongly support the UN and its objectives. We share with other member States the wish to strengthen the UN so that it can pursue those objectives as effectively as possible. The onus is on us all, member states, Secretariat, agencies to work to ensure that the UN fulfils its objectives. UN reform is therefore a matter of continuous evolution, rather than revolution.

Our goal is the effective implementation of the outcomes of the major UN conferences and summits, in particular the Millennium Declaration, which for the EU constitutes the overarching policy framework for the UN. The MDGs and the other internationally agreed goals provide us with clear objectives on which the international community needs to focus its attention and, above all, its action. ECOSOC provides us with a mechanism to that end: a central role in the oversight and coordination of UN work in the economic, social and environmental fields including operational activities for development. We stress the important role of ECOSOC in relation to the promotion and protection of human rights and the promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of women.

I would recall the EU Africa Joint Declaration on Effective Multilateralism, dated 1 April 2004, where both sides agreed that an effective multilateral system, including a rule based order and strong international institutions, is essential to addressing the interlaced problems of conflict, poverty, underdevelopment and the absence of human security.

The President of the General Assembly will shortly commence open ended consultations in preparation for the 2005 Major Event. The EU considers that the ECOSOC could and should play a key role in the preparations for that meeting of HOSG, in particular at the High Level and Coordination segments of the 2005 Substantive Session.

General Principles

There is always scope for improvement and it may be useful to set out some guiding principles, building on lessons learnt, which govern our approach to further improving ECOSOC's effectiveness.

How can we build on more interactive, less formalised debate? How can we strengthen system wide coordination? How can we ensure adequate attention to the coordinating and management function of ECOSOC? Where can ECOSOC most effectively add value to the work of the wider system? How can we reduce the burden on Missions and the Secretariat?

I propose to make some observations on the Spring Dialogue, follow up to major UN conferences, post conflict situations (including the ad hoc advisory groups on African countries emerging from conflict), the High Level Segment and ECOSOC's role on the oversight system-wide coordination of economic, social and environmental work, including operational activities for development.

Spring Dialogue

The EU places considerable importance on the Spring Dialogue as a key component in the follow up to the Monterrey Consensus. In that context, ECOSOC plays an important role in the outreach by the United Nations system through its engagement with the BWIs and WTO and civil society. This year's event was, in our view, a success, with substantive contributions by inter governmental representatives, Executive Directors, staff members of the BWIs and WTO, civil society representatives, and with the active participation of the President of the Trade and Development Board and the Secretary General of UNCTAD. As always, lessons can be learnt and improvements made in the future; in particular, we might avoid over preparation in terms of its format. The discussions at the dialogue could be more interactive and dynamic. The lessons learnt can also help efforts to improve more generally the working of ECOSOC and the organisation of ECOSOC events.

Integrated and coordinated implementation of and follow up to UN conferences

We should continue in our approach to improving the working of ECOSOC. General Assembly Resolution 57/270B on the integrated and coordinated implementation of and follow up to major UN conferences and summits brought progress in a number of areas. Action is needed in relation to two issues, in particular, which could have positive impact on the role of ECOSOC. These are firstly, the decision to establish by the Substantive Session this year a multi-year work programme for the Coordination Segment which would allow a more coherent and integrated consideration of follow up to conferences and secondly, the request to the functional Commissions to examine their methods of work which would be reflected in ECOSOC's ability to carry out its co-ordinating and oversight role.

We welcome that the review of methods of work has commenced within the functional commissions and we encourage them to devote due attention to that work so as to being results in 2005.

However, I would recall the EU statement of 27 February which regretted the failure to take action concerning op 45 of 270B which invited the functional commissions to contribute from their respective standpoints to the assessment by ECOSOC of the cross sectoral thematic issues selected for the coordination segment; and op 49 which urged ECOSOC to make better use of the report of the Secretary General on the work of the functional commissions and to dedicate more time to its review. By following these recommendations, ECOSOC has the potential to better coordinate the work of the functional Commissions.

Post-Conflict Situations

There is a clear need for a coordinated approach in which the UN institutions, the General Assembly, Security Council, ECOSOC as well as the Funds and programmes, UN agencies, BWIs and member States would work together across the whole cycle of conflict to ensure a smooth transition from conflict management and peacekeeping to long term reconstruction until the danger of instability or a return to conflict has passed. The UN is in a unique position to deliver an integrated approach, bringing together political, peacekeeping, and humanitarian, human rights, judicial and development actors.

This is a complex issue but one where we believe ECOSOC may be well-placed to add value, by bringing together so many key actors from across the UN system.

We look forward to the ECOSOC event which will take place on 12 July during the substantive session to consider the issue of transition from relief to development. That occasion will allow us to reflect on how the international community should address transition from relief to development, drawing on a wealth of experience and work in this area. In this context we welcome the work of the ad hoc advisory groups on African countries emerging from conflict and recall that we had a useful exercise on Monday as part of the assessment of the work of those groups.

High Level Segment

The EU attaches considerable importance to the High Level Segment as a forum for Ministers exchange of views on matters falling within the mandate of ECOSOC. Last year's HLS on rural development helped restore that issue to its rightful place on the development agenda. At the same time, while the need for proper preparation for the Ministerial high level segment is appreciated, we consider that holding preparatory meetings at Ministerial level runs the risk of taking away from the impact of the High Level Segment itself and, at the same time, over burdening Missions and the Secretariat. .


Operational Activities and Humanitarian Segments

The Operational Activities and Humanitarian Segments are vital elements of the Substantive Session. ECOSOC can play a positive role in its oversight and coordination of operational activities, in particular through the Triennial Comprehensive Policy Review. We support a vigorous role for the UN development funds and programmes and agencies and their increased effectiveness at country level.

The Humanitarian Segment provides an important interface for policy dialogue and operational guidance between Member States and the humanitarian agencies of the UN, which undertake an enormous amount of work in difficult and sometimes dangerous circumstances. The work of the segment has seen significant improvements and the EU welcomes the progress in achieving more focussed discussions and outcomes. The EU feels that there is scope for further improvements in order to enhance the effectiveness of ECOSOC in relation to humanitarian crises and to clarify the respective roles of ECOSOC and the General Assembly in this regard.

ECOSOC's management function

The ECOSOC's management function is central to the overall UN performance on integrated and coordinated implementation of and follow up to conferences and summit outcomes.

There are a number of relatively minor but positive steps which could help to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of ECOSOC and help ensure that proper attention is given to, in particular, the work of the General Segment of ECOSOC's substantive session.

In this sense, we would encourage the Secretariat to examine possible improvement top the preparations for the Substantive Session, particularly the General Segment, by the more timely provision of the annotated agenda and of relevant reports as well as streamlining the format of the reports to ensure a higher degree of user friendliness

We should also consider clustering of agenda items for coherence and overview and to facilitate the organisation of work for delegations. There could be a focus on select reports according to need within each cluster with oral presentation of reports in order to ensure a more concrete and transparent debate. We would welcome a better ordering of the formal debates and informal negotiations on draft Resolutions in order to allow delegations to be present at both.

Madame President,

The EU considers that further evolution of ECOSOC's working methods in these areas can benefit us all and help make the Council more effective in the execution of its mandate.

Thank you.

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