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United Nations Development Programme

Annual Report
2023

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foreword                 

Unity will win

With a calendar date that will go down in history as marking the official end of the COVID-19 pandemic – the most simultaneously-felt global disruption since World War II – 2023 should have been a year of pure optimism. Instead, it marked a time in which very little felt safe, secure, or straightforward. Conflict proliferated – from Sudan to Ukraine to Gaza – with the highest number of conflicts worldwide in eighty years. Incredible technological advances exposed their own weaknesses: artificial intelligence-powered misinformation was considered the world’s biggest short-term threat by the business community and the cloud generated a bigger carbon footprint than the airline industry. Important development advances were overshadowed by pervasive inequalities: the gender gap in education narrowed, with some glaring exceptions like Afghanistan, and yet women had equal legal rights to men in only 14 countries in the world.

This was the complex, uncertain context in which UNDP operated in 2023, with multilateralism in a deep state of flux. Throughout, however, we held that international cooperation was deflated, not defeated. The green shoots of development were also visible. A new, highly effective malaria vaccine; a boom of investment in renewable energy overtaking fossil fuel investment for the first time; a doubling since 2021 of the number of countries making scientific knowledge, infrastructure, and data freely accessible to all. Though progress against targets remained stubbornly off track, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) gained traction: three-quarters of investors tracked their investments using the SDGs, a modest but hopeful improvement on previous years.

The people that I met in the course of my travels last year inspired me to redouble our efforts as UNDP: the officials we worked with to raise funds and ideas in the aftermaths of the catastrophic floods in Pakistan and the devastating earthquake in Türkiye; the ecosystem of insurance companies, politicians, sailors and activists that helped to save the FSO SAFER tanker off the coast of Yemen and – against all the odds – avoid a potentially catastrophic environmental disaster in the Red Sea; the innovators and entrepreneurs that I met in Rwanda, a nation that 29 years ago had lost all reason for hope, now creating its future.

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Achim Steiner Photo: UNDP Ukraine/Andriy Krepkykh

Achim Steiner
Administrator
United Nations Development Programme
Achim Steiner signature

Development for all

Discover how UNDP's work tackled the greatest development challenges of 2023 and beyond.

Partnering

Partnering

Let's connect: Our partnerships in 2023 included Member States, UN agencies, international financial institutions, civil society and NGOs, academia, and the private sector.

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Funding

Funding

Thank you to all our 2023 funding contributors and partners - what a difference you have made for people and our planet.

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Our People

Our People

Let's grow: With our 23,000+ personnel and a strong, gender-balanced leadership, UNDP is a place where people can thrive.

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Our Offer,
Our Ambition

Our offer, Our Ambition

Let's build a better world: UNDP's Strategic Plan 2022-2025 is our development promise - driven by our six signature solutions, three enablers, four moonshots, and the 17 SDGs.

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Crisis and Resilience

Crisis and Resilience

Let's recover: UNDP spends 50% of its resources in fragile contexts. Conflict continues in Sudan, Gaza, Ukraine and beyond, but so does our support.

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Our Preformance

Our Preformance

Let's deliver: UNDP is always striving for greater efficiency, integrity, diversity, equality, safety, transparency, accountability, and sustainability.

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Innovation

Innovation

Let's be future-smart: Learn how UNDP is using digital, data and innovation at scale to address exclusion, climate change, and much more.

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Awards

Awards

Our work on development in 2023 was acknowledged by peers and publications aorund the world.

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Our presence

One world

UNDP's 23,000+ personnel are working together across 170 countries and territories – for people and our planet.


  • Latin America and the Carribbean

    Panama Regional Hub

    Argentina

    Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean (covering Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, the British Virgin Islands, Dominica, Grenada, Monserrat, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines)

    Belize

    Bolivia

    Brazil

    Chile

    Colombia

    Costa Rica

    Cuba

    Dominican Republic

    Ecuador

    El Salvador

    Guatemala

    Guyana

    Haiti

    Honduras

    Jamaica (covering the Bahamas, Bermuda, Cayman Islands, Jamaica, Turks and Caicos Islands)

    Mexico

    Panama

    Paraguay

    Peru

    Suriname

    Trinidad and Tobago (covering Aruba, Curacao, Sint Maarten, Trinidad and Tobago)

    Uruguay

    Venezuela

  • Headquarters

    New York headquarters

  • Africa

    Addis Ababa Regional Service Centre

    Angola

    Benin

    Botswana

    Burkina Faso

    Burundi

    Cameroon

    Cape Verde

    Central African Republic

    Chad

    Comoros

    Côte d’Ivoire

    Democratic Republic of the Congo

    Equatorial Guinea

    Eritrea

    Eswatini

    Ethiopia

    Gabon

    The Gambia

    Ghana

    Guinea

    Guinea-Bissau

    Kenya

    Lesotho

    Liberia

    Madagascar

    Malawi

    Mali

    Mauritania

    Mauritius and Seychelles

    Mozambique

    Namibia

    Niger

    Nigeria

    Republic of the Congo

    Rwanda

    São Tomé and Príncipe

    Senegal

    Sierra Leone

    South Africa

    South Sudan

    Togo

    Uganda

    United Republic of Tanzania

    Zambia

    Zimbabwe

  • Arab States

    Amman Regional Hub

    Algeria

    Bahrain

    Djibouti

    Egypt

    Iraq

    Jordan

    Kuwait

    Lebanon

    Libya

    Morocco

    Programme of Assistance to the Palestinian People

    Saudi Arabia

    Somalia

    Sudan

    Syrian Arab Republic

    Tunisia

    Yemen

  • Europe and Central Asia

    Istanbul Regional Hub

    Albania

    Armenia

    Azerbaijan

    Belarus

    Bosnia and Herzegovina

    Cyprus

    Georgia

    Kazakhstan

    Kosovo (as per UN Security Council Resolution 1244 [1999])

    Kyrgyzstan

    Moldova

    Montenegro

    North Macedonia

    Serbia

    Tajikistan

    Türkiye

    Turkmenistan

    Ukraine

    Uzbekistan

  • Asia and the Pacific

    Bangkok Regional Hub

    Afghanistan

    Bangladesh

    Bhutan

    Cambodia

    China

    Democratic People’s Republic of Korea

    India

    Indonesia

    Iran, Islamic Republic of

    Lao People’s Democratic Republic

    Malaysia (covering Brunei Darussalam, Malaysia, Singapore)

    Maldives

    Mongolia

    Myanmar

    Nepal

    Pacific Office in Fiji (covering Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, Kiribati, the Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, Vanuatu)

    Pakistan

    Papua New Guinea

    Philippines

    Samoa (covering Cook Islands, Niue, Samoa, Tokelau)

    Sri Lanka

    Thailand

    Timor-Leste

    Viet Nam

  • Representation Offices

    Brussels Representation Office (covering European Union)

    Geneva Representation Office

    Germany Representation Office

    Nordic Representation Office (covering Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden)

    Tokyo Representation Office

    Washington Representation Office

  • Policy Centres

    Doha (Partnership and Technical Advice Office)

    Istanbul International Centre for Private Sector in Development

    Nairobi Global Centre on Resilient Ecosystems and Desertification

    Oslo Governance Centre

    Rome Centre for Sustainable Development

    Seoul Policy Centre for Knowledge Exchange through SDG Partnerships

    Singapore Global Centre for Technology, Innovation and Sustainable Development



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