Nordic Statement at Executive Board of UNICEF

Mr/Madam President, dear colleagues,

I make this statement on behalf of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and my own country, Sweden.

We thank UNICEF for its work to continuously save lives and alleviate suffering in a challenging global context with a large number of humanitarian emergencies. We have deep appreciation and admiration for all the UNICEF staff that are operating under very difficult circumstances to reach out to children, in Ukraine, in Gaza, in Sudan and in so many other places worldwide. Their commitment and professionalism is making a huge difference.

We welcome the progress made in the implementation of the recommendations from the Humanitarian review which will also be an essential part in the preparations for the next Strategic Plan. The mid-term review findings and recommendations are an important contribution to ensuring that implementation is on track and that the various measures are rightly prioritized. Further information on the status of the different priority areas defined in the review would be appreciated.

Global humanitarian response relies on respect for the humanitarian principles. It is of critical importance that UNICEF places this at the forefront of its strategy and operations in humanitarian programmes. As a dual mandate organisation, principled humanitarian action can be difficult to safeguard in some country situations. It is all the more important that UNICEF prioritises resources, including expert staffing, for humanitarian operations. In this regard, we also recall the commitments by UNICEF given at the Oslo Conference for Protecting Children in Armed Conflict in June 2023. This included to “allocate internal resources equal to fifty per cent of the annual cost of sustaining a minimum level of staffing to monitor, document and verify grave violations against children and to engage with parties to conflict.” We would appreciate information on how work is progressing on this commitment, as well as the other commitments from this conference.

We appreciate that the UNICEF is taking forward the localisation agenda, which is a key part of strengthening mechanisms for accountability to affected populations. UNICEF is providing more funding to local and national actors than any other major humanitarian UN agency. We encourage UNICEF to continue with this model and further develop equitable partnerships with local and national actors.  Partnerships should be based on equal collaboration, transparent strategic decisions, capacity sharing and technical exchanges, not only on financial transactions in order to further the localisation agenda.

Furthermore, adequate support in strengthening risk management systems including security risks and relevant protection for local and national actors staff will also be crucial.  

We appreciate the steps that UNICEF has taken to invest in the Cluster System as part of its engagement with local actors. We believe these aspects should continue to figure high on UNICEF’s agenda. This will undoubtedly strengthen the humanitarian response and coordination in the long run. 

We note that global humanitarian needs are fast outpacing available funding. We also agree that flexible, predictable and multi-year funding is critical to strengthen humanitarian response and to rapidly scale up in new or escalating crises. As humanitarian needs continue to grow in many parts of the world, we believe it is important that donors, including the private sector, make further efforts to provide a considerable share of their humanitarian financing as flexible funding. It is also important that UNICEF continues to work on expanding the donor base for flexible funding. At the same time, in view of the humanitarian financing situation, UNICEF necessarily will have to cooperate ever closer with other agencies, including development agencies, to find ways of delivering cost-effective humanitarian assistance and contribute to durable solutions.

As more and more children are affected by climate change, we also underline the importance of UNICEF’s work in responding to climate emergencies as well as contributing to climate adaptation, including by increasing resilience. We welcome that the midterm review recommends further emphasising climate action as an area of work.

We will continue to follow up on UNICEF’s effectiveness, risk management and transparency, even under difficult circumstances. This is something we expect from the organisation, not only because we are substantive donors, but particularly because it maximizes results for children.

The Nordic countries are committed to continue supporting the crucial work that UNICEF is doing every day, for every child.

Thank you.