Description of Delegation's work in Paris

Head of Delegation: Ms Laurence Argimon-Pistre

General Context

The European Commission established institutional relations with UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation) as early as 1964, with the status of an observer. Modalities of cooperation between the two institutions were established by two exchanges of letters in 1964 and 1973 respectively.

In 1996, UNESCO and the European Commission concluded a framework agreement harmonising their administrative and financial procedures, enhancing the cooperation between the two institutions in UNESCO's fields of competence, which include Education, Culture, Human and Natural Sciences, Information Society and Communication. The volume of UNESCO activities carried out with financial assistance provided by this partnership has practically doubled each year since then.

During the past seven years, this collaboration has been developed "upstream", stimulating joint reflections on the policy strategy to be adopted in areas of cooperation and implementing joint programmes and projects in the field. The following are examples of these two different approaches.

1. Joint reflections

Since 1997, UNESCO has contributed to the process of reflection, coordinated by the European Commission, on the future relationship between the European Union and the ACP (Africa, Caribbean, Pacific) countries. UNESCO participates in the discussion of the EU/ACP Conference organised in Brussels, and was invited by the ACP Member States to take part in another ministerial conference held in Libreville (Gabon). It also contributed to the European Commission for the drafting of a "Green Paper" on the subject.

UNESCO also took part in a number of expert meetings organised by the European Commission to establish the interregional programme on cultural heritage in Mediterranean countries. The MEDA programme selected several projects for financing presented by countries; the process was co-ordinated by UNESCO. UNESCO's Director-General presented an integrated local development strategy based on promoting and enhancing the cultural heritage of the Mediterranean countries to the European Commission in 1997.

In the field of science and the information society, several meetings were organised in Brussels with the European Commission in order to discuss UNESCO's participation in EU science and technology programmes.

2. Devising partnership strategies

National projects:

Romania: " Support for the reform of higher education".
UNESCO has the status of a contractor in relation to the country commissioning it, following an invitation to tender to implement a project funded by the European Commission under its PHARE programme for Central and East European countries.

Mozambique: "The empresa Joven project"
UNESCO has been entrusted, at the government's request, with the responsibility for carrying out a craft centre building scheme. The funding agreement was concluded in the field between the UNESCO office and the Delegation of the European Commission.

Education in Somalia
Following contacts between the EC Delegation in Nairobi and the UNESCO office, two educational projects were identified and implemented by UNESCO.

Co-operation between the European Community and UNESCO at the national level: The restoration of the Lalibela site in Ethiopia.
The Ethiopian Ministry of Culture asked UNESCO to prepare a comprehensive project for the restoration of the Lalibela site. On UNESCO's advice and after having been informed of the project by the Ethiopian authorities, the Commission's Delegation in Addis Ababa asked UNESCO to implement it. The restoration project identification exercise lasted over eight months and was conducted by international experts proposed by UNESCO and accepted by the Ethiopian Government and the European Commission as well as national experts.

The UNESCO/EC partnership is also based on a regular exchange of information at headquarters and in the field, with a view to identifying areas of cooperation and potential complementary actions for implementation in partner countries.
Such partnerships may take a variety of forms: the national government may subcontract to UNESCO the execution of Community-funded projects; the Delegation of the European Commission may, subject to agreement with the national authorities, draw on UNESCO's expertise; the head of a national project appointed and funded by the Commission may request UNESCO to execute a component of the project; or, finally, a European city which has obtained European funding for the restoration of a city in the developing world may wish to associate UNESCO with the project; this was the case, for instance, with the French town of Chinon and the Laotian town of Luang Prabang.

In any case, EC/UNESCO co-operation corresponds to the priorities laid down by the beneficiary countries, and follows the three approaches defined under the European Commission's external policy for national, regional and interregional development.
At the national level, priorities are agreed bilaterally after consultation between the European Commission and the country concerned. UNESCO will only undertake a partnership activity if it comes within the scope of the priorities adopted, and if the request is made by the beneficiary country.

Asia: "Drug abuse prevention project designed for marginalized young peoples (DAPPA)

The European Commission entrusted UNESCO with the task of implementing the first stage of this programme, which is being carried out in India, Laos, Sri Lanka and Thailand and which aims to prevent drug abuse through non-formal education and acquisition of basic skills. The second stage of this programme will be launched early 2002 and will be extended to Caribbean countries.

At the regional level (sub regional level in UNESCO's terminology), the identification of possible partnerships has to take account of the priority areas defined by the countries concerned. The request for the activity to be executed by UNESCO again has to come from the countries concerned.

UNESCO projects financed by EC in "Telematics Applications" and Science:

Project on 'Support for Telematics Applications Co-operation with the Commonwealth of Independent States' (STACCIS)

"3D ultrasound Telemedical Workstation" (Teleinvivo)
"Development of new markets for telematics products in Central Asia" (Denema)
"Network of cultural institutions in Central Asia" (HeritageNet)
"Trans-European tele-education network" (Ten)

Arab World : "Project to improve science and engineering teaching in southern Mediterranean universities": launched under an inter-regional programme, this project, devised and implemented by UNESCO's Regional Office in Cairo, brings together seven universities in member countries of the European Union and the Arab World, under UNESCO's co-ordination.

Lastly, at the interregional level, UNESCO is participating regularly in the Commission's programmes, which are published in the form of calls for applications.

These programmes usually involve setting up regional or interregional networks providing co-operative links between educational and research institutions in the EU Member States and in the beneficiary countries.

This approach, which is designed to foster knowledge transfers between North and South and promote regional integration, is very similar to that of the networks, which UNESCO is already co-ordinating.

This complementarity increases the incentive to integrate UNESCO's networks into partnerships with the Commission. UNESCO's expertise in this field normally offers the Commission a guarantee of quality, which assists it in its own selection of projects.

Ref: DELP07-001EN
EU source: European Commission
UN forum:
Date: 26/10/2007

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