A new United Nations online database showcases successful strategies by U.S. and world businesses and communities to adapt to climate change, officials said. The database on the Web site of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change features more than 100 examples from companies such as Coca-Cola Co., Levi Strauss & Co., Microsoft Corp. and Starbucks Coffee Co., sharing the details of their business-friendly adaptation practices, they said.

“By showcasing private sector adaptation success stories, we intend to help both communities and businesses become more climate-resilient and to put the benefits and business sense of adaptation firmly on the agenda of the private sector,” UNFCCC Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres said.

“Climate risks which affect communities around the world are always also business risks,” she said.

Examples in the database include efforts to make drinking water clean and safe in developing countries and efforts to improve the yield of coffee beans in regions that are particularly vulnerable to climate change, China’s official Xinhua news agency reported.

The database is part of an effort by UNFCCC following the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Durban, South Africa, to prioritize adaptation efforts.

Read more: http://www.upi.com/Science_News/2012/01/30/UN-starts-climate-change-strategy-site/UPI-38051327970146/#ixzz1l8r1DXl7

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has appointed Rodney Bent Director of the United Nations Information Centre in Washington, D.C. He assumed his new duties on 26 January.

Mr. Bent has 33 years of experience in the public and private sectors, serving most recently as a Senior Adviser to the United States Deputy Secretary of State, whom he advised on the Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review on management and budget issues. From 2009 to 2011, he was an Executive Adviser at Booz Allen Hamilton with responsibility for international development and health issues.

Before that, Mr. Bent worked as Acting Chief Executive Officer and Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the Millennium Challenge Corporation, where he managed a federal agency that signed grant agreements amounting to nearly $7 billion with more than 35 low-income countries. He also served as the corporation’s Vice-President for Policy and International Relations from 2005 to 2006.

From 2004 to 2005, Mr. Bent worked on the House Appropriations Committee in the United States Congress. He also served in Baghdad as senior adviser to the Iraqi Ministries of Finance and Planning from 2003 to 2004. Before that, he worked at the United States Office of Management and Budget. As its Deputy Associate Director for International Affairs and the senior career executive in charge of international programmes from 1998 to 2003, he prepared budget, management and legislative recommendations for a wide range of agencies, including the United Nations.

Earlier in his career, Mr. Bent was an Assistant Vice-President at Bankers Trust Company from 1982 to 1983, and an international economist at the United States Treasury Department between 1978 and 1982.

Source: UN News Center

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today outlined a series of actions he believes the global community must take over the next five years to build “the future we want.” In a speech to the General Assembly last September Mr. Ban presented five imperatives – or generational opportunities – that must be addressed to ensure a better future for the world’s people.

These are sustainable development; preventing and mitigating conflicts, human rights abuses and the impacts of natural disasters; building a safer and more secure world; supporting countries in transition; and working to engage the talents of women and young people.

“Today I want to share with you an action agenda for the coming five years,” he told the Assembly as he returned to the rostrum to brief Member States on his vision for his second term.

“A plan to make the most of the opportunities before us. A plan to help create a safer, more secure, more sustainable, more equitable future. A plan to build the future we want,” he said.

The “action agenda” presented today describes specific measures regarding each of the five imperatives, including an unprecedented campaign to wipe out five of the world’s major killers – malaria, polio, paediatric HIV infections, maternal and neonatal tetanus, and measles.

Mr. Ban also announced that the UN will work with Member States to make Antarctica a World Nature Preserve and that he will appoint a new special representative for youth.

Among his other proposals is the convening of a first-of-its-kind World Humanitarian Summit to help share knowledge and establish common best practices, and the creation of a New UN Partnerships Facility to harness the full power of transformative partnerships across the world body.

“Waves of change are surging around us,” he told the Assembly. “If we navigate wisely, we can create a more secure and sustainable future for all. The United Nations is the ship to navigate these waters…

“We are the venue for partnerships and action. Now is our moment. Now is the time to create the future we want,” he stated.

Speaking later to reporters, Mr. Ban said that in addition to the core business of the UN, he wanted his team to look deeply at the world and the UN’s work today.

“I wanted to identify areas where opportunity and need come together like never before,” he said. “These are times of austerity. Yet… these are also times of promise. More people are becoming engaged; more people are empowered to make a real difference.

“If we dedicate our energies and mobilize the UN system, we can move the needle for generations to come.”

General Assembly President Nassir Abdulaziz Al-Nasser commended the Secretary-General for his “bold, focused and forward-looking” action agenda, adding that the content, depth and breadth of his envisaged actions are truly relevant for the effectiveness, efficiency and smooth functioning of the UN.

“As this universal global body is experiencing the unfolding of a world with all its complexities and challenges, prospects and potentials, I believe the Secretary-General has courageously articulated a set of action points that addresses the way our Organization, and in particular this Assembly, needs to respond to an ever-evolving global scene,” he told the 193-member body.

Also today, in keeping with the announcement last month that he intends to roll out changes to his senior team as he embarks on his second term, Mr. Ban said that Deputy Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro and Chef de Cabinet Vijay Nambiar will step down from their posts.

Ms. Migiro will stay in office until the end of June to ensure continuity in the preparations for the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20) that will take place in Brazil that month. Mr. Nambiar will serve as the Secretary-General’s Special Advisor on Myanmar, following the transition in the Secretary-General’s Executive Office.

In addition, the Under-Secretary-General for Management, Angela Kane; the Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict, Radhika Coomaraswamy; and the Special Adviser for Prevention of Genocide, Francis Deng, will all be relinquishing their duties during the course of this year.

On January 1, Ban Ki-Moon starts his second term as UN Secretary-General. To leave a lasting mark, Ban needs to go beyond his role as a ‘global bridge-builder’ argues Thorsten Benner in this Transatlantic Voices column.

“This is the World Cup of diplomacy – it’s happening fast and furious.” These are the lines with which a recent UN-produced image video seeks to create excitement about the work of UN chief, Ban Ki-Moon.

Yet, there is precious little excitement to be found as the UN Secretary-General begins his second five-year term this Sunday. Not among UN member states who in a rare show of unity re-elected Ban unanimously in June not least because his unexciting style does not cause them much trouble. Not among UN staff who do not seem to be fired up by the prospect of having Ban as their boss for another half decade.

And not among the world public where Ban’s hard and committed daily work as the UN’s standard-bearer mostly goes unnoticed. Ban’s lack of rhetorical skills tends to make him a non-entity for the global media. Virtually the only one excited seems to be Ban himself. In the promotional video he proclaims: “I start every morning as if this is the first day in my office as Secretary-General.”

Presumably, part of what keeps Ban going is the pride in his record as a self-styled “harmonizer and bridge-builder – among the member states, within the United Nations system and among a rich diversity of global partners.” At a time of momentous geopolitical shifts and global crises, this is no small feat. Unfortunately, this will not be enough to turn himself into an effective leader of the world’s premier universal body for the years to come.

Building bridges is a fine pursuit. But at long as it remains unclear where these bridges lead and as long as the world’s pivotal powers refuse to cross them in the right direction it is also a rather futile activity. Right now, at the UN the old powers of the West all too often cling to their privileges while the rising powers refuse to contribute in a meaningful way to global public goods. All the while the majority of poor countries mostly content themselves with engaging in predictably petty politics of grandstanding and patronage in the fora where they make their voices heard due to the “one country, one vote” principle.

While Ban should continue to seek for common ground among the UN’s 193 member states, for the sake of “we, the peoples,” he should not shy away from calling them out if they are so evidently acting in bad faith. Liberated from the need to curry anyone’s favors in order to win another term, Ban might as well do just that. To this end, Ban can take a leaf from the playbook of his very courageous stance on the Arab uprisings. He called on the region’s rulers to “act boldly, now, before it is too late,” to make use of this “once-in-a-generation opportunity to advance freedom and democracy.”

On Syria, Ban has argued that the killings “cannot go on. In the name of humanity, it is time for the international community to act.” Ban was even bolder on Libya taking sides against the Gadhafi regime early on. In doing so, Ban argues that “we have carved out a new dimension for the responsibility to protect.” He even took the step of defending NATO’s interpretation of the Libya resolution arguing that the “military operation done by the NATO forces was strictly within (resolution) 1973.” Ban might have gotten a bit ahead of himself with this rather one-eyed assessment. Ironically, in this case we might need more of Ban the bridge-builder.

As UN analysts Richard Gowan and Bruce Jones have pointed out, Ban will “need to work hard at generating better understandings between the western and emerging powers on the issues that confront the UN on human rights, responsibility to protect, and the use of force” – while continuing to speak out for universal rights and responsibilities.

But there are a host of other issues where Ban will need to speak out forcefully against conventional UN wisdom. Let us just name three: climate change, peace operations and global development. On climate change, Ban’s signature topic, it becomes increasingly clear that the current multilateral negotiation process in the UN-sponsored UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change – the ed.) will not be able to prevent catastrophic climate change. Rather than claiming that “at Durban, we defied the sceptics,” Ban should advocate for creative ways to complement the UNFCCC process.

On peace operations, the UN’s flagship activity, Ban has demonstrated rather limited interest. It is about time he spelled out a blueprint for a better political and knowledge architecture for these missions while recognizing their limits. On global development, with the UN’s “Millennium Development Goals (MDG)” nearing (and likely missing) their target dates in 2015, there is an urgent need for Ban to spearhead a fundamental re-assessment of global development governance beyond the MDGs.

Ban can only be successful at all this if he also brings his own house in order and reconnects with the UN’s staff. You cannot govern the multinational UN bureaucracy like the Korean foreign ministry but Ban tried exactly that. At a senior management retreat in 2009, Ban complained, “I tried to lead by example. Nobody followed,” without quite understanding why he failed to change an apparatus that indeed urgently needs shaking up. It did not help that he added that “in choosing my senior advisers, I have always cared less about a person’s intellectual attainments than his or her ability to work well with others.”

With that attitude, one can imagine the stimulating exchanges within the UN’s senior leadership team. Committing to a five-year term limit for his senior staff, Ban has vowed to “build a new team that is strong on substance and diverse in composition” for his second term. To this end, he should appoint independent-minded leaders to key positions and encourage them to challenge him. UN member states should take inspiration from Ban’s policy of a five-year term limit for senior staff and in the future also apply it to the position of the UN Secretary-General.

That way, UN leaders can be bold from day one because they will not need to campaign for re-election. And member states might be more open to choosing competent, charismatic and independent personalities for the job. After all, they would only have to live with them for five years.

(*) Thorsten Benner is co-founder and associate director of the Global Public Policy Institute (GPPi) in Berlin and a co-author of “The New World of UN Peace Operations: Learning to Build Peace?”(Oxford University Press 2011).

A very interesting article from the New York Times:

For 17 years, officials from nearly 200 countries have gathered under the auspices of the United Nations to try to deal with one of the most vexing questions of our era — how to slow the heating of the planet.

Every year they leave a trail of disillusion and discontent, particularly among the poorest nations and those most vulnerable to rising seas and spreading deserts. Every year they fail to significantly advance their own stated goal of keeping the average global temperature from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius, or about 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, above pre-industrial levels.

That was the case again this year. The event, the 17th conference of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, wrapped up early Sunday morning with modest accomplishments: the promise to work toward a new global treaty in coming years and the establishment of a new climate fund.

The decision to move toward a new treaty — and toward replacing the 20-year-old system that requires only industrialized nations to cut emissions — was hard-won, after 72 hours of continuous wrangling. But for now it remains merely a pledge, and all details remain to be negotiated.

Negotiators also left for another day the precise sources of the money for the fund and how and by who it would be disbursed. Called the Green Climate Fund, it would help mobilize a promised $100 billion a year in public and private funds by 2020 to assist developing nations in adapting to climate change and converting to clean energy sources.

There is no denying the dedication and stamina of the environment ministers and diplomats who conduct these talks. But maybe the task is too tall. The issues on the table are far broader than atmospheric carbon levels or forestry practices or how to devise a fund to compensate those most affected by global warming.

What really is at play here are politics on the broadest scale, the relations among Europe, the United States, Canada, Japan and three rapidly rising economic powers, China, India and Brazil. Those relations, in turn, are driven by each country’s domestic politics and the strains the global financial crisis has put on all of them. And the question of “climate equity” — the obligations of rich nations to help poor countries cope with a problem they had no part in creating — is more than an “environmental” issue.

Effectively addressing climate change will require over the coming decades a fundamental remaking of energy production, transportation and agriculture around the world — the sinews of modern life. It is simply too big a job for those who have gathered for these talks under the 1992 United Nations treaty that began this grinding process.

Click here to read the article in its entirety.

To know more about the Gstaad Project and the work of the UN on climate change and other issues, click here. We believe UN and humanitarian aid workers on the ground in Africa and other areas of the world affected by poverty and famine — climate related and not — are true heroes… Our new book “Heroes of the United Nations: men and women who made the world a better place” is now available online at Create Space, Amazon, and Barnes and Nobles.

According to an article published by Foreign Policy, UN Secretary-General is about to “clearing house.” Ban — the article reads — put his top advisers on notice that most of those who have served in his inner circle for the more than three and a half years of his run as the U.N.’s chief will have to step down in the coming months, providing him with an opportunity to start his second term with a new stable of younger, reinvigorated leaders, several officials told Turtle Bay.

Ban outlined his plans in a meeting with his top executives early last week, saying that officials at the undersecretary general and assistant secretary general level will likely be asked to either move to another post in the field or leave the organization. The U.N.’s deputy secretary general, Dr. Asha-Rose Migiro, has been tasked with approaching top officials to deliver the bad news. It was unclear whether Migiro, a former Tanzanian foreign minister, would also be asked to leave.

U.N. officials said that Ban has not yet singled out any individuals who would be required to go. But they said that his top team — including his chief of staff, Vijay Nambiar of India; B. Lynn Pascoe, the American undersecretary general for political affairs; Angela Kane, the German undersecretary general for management; Kiyo Akasaka, the Japanese undersecretary general for public affairs; and Muhammad Shaaban, an Egyptian undersecretary general for General Assembly affairs and conference management — were all vulnerable.

Sha Zukang, a former Chinese diplomat who serves as undersecretary general for the department of economic and social affairs, would likely stay through next summer to host the Rio+20 conference on sustainable development, said an official familiar with the plan.

It is not unusual for U.N. secretary generals, like national political leaders, to shake up their top ranks at the start of a second term. Ban has made it clear from early in his administration that he doesn’t like to keep people in the same job for more than five years. But he’s also said that he will keep some top officials, particularly those in the field, in their current assignments, and that some would be reassigned to other tasks. Some would be expected to leave the U.N. system, however, much in the way political appointees in national governments are expected to move on following an election.

It remained unclear whether any officials would be spared, including Kim Wonsoo, who has served as Ban’s right hand man since his years in the Korean foreign ministry. Ban is in talks with key governments, to consider replacements, potentially candidates from the same countries that currently hold top aid posts.

For instance, the U.N. chief recently hired a French diplomat, Herve Ladsous, to head the U.N. Department of Peacekeeping, a job which has been held by a French national since 1997, when the previous UN peacekeeping chief, Ghana’s Kofi Annan, was elected U.N. secretary general. The United States is expected to try to retain the post in the U.N. department of political affairs.

To know more about the UN and its work around the world, read our newly-released book: “Heroes of the United Nations: men and women who made the world a better place.” The book is available online at Amazon (http://www.amazon.com/Heroes-United-Nations-Andreas-Warburg/dp/0615467105). Click here for a review.

To read the article on Foreign Policy, click here.

New bipartisan public opinion research released today by the United Nations Foundation and its sister organization, the Better World Campaign, shows that there is strong support for the United Nations. The majority of Americans said they oppose the proposed legislation in Congress that would cut United States’ funding to the United Nations by 50%, and end funding to UN agencies that respond and take action after a natural disaster or humanitarian crisis, such as UNICEF and the World Health Organization.

The survey conducted by Public Opinion Strategies and Hart Research Associates found that more than eight out of ten voters (86%) say it is important that the United States maintain an active role within the United Nations. Voters across the political spectrum overwhelmingly believe that the U.S. should pay our dues to the UN (64%) and UN peacekeeping operations (71%) on time and in full.

“This polling once again shows that Americans do not want to see the United States go back into debt at the United Nations. While misguided legislation in Congress would cause America to forfeit our leadership at the UN, we see time and time again that the majority of voters across the political spectrum believe the U.S. should have an active role within the UN,” said Timothy E. Wirth, President of the United Nations Foundation. “At a time when the United Nations is more relevant than ever in addressing the world’s greatest peace and security challenges, this survey is evidence that voters believe in the value of the United Nations to American interests.”

Click here to read more about the poll.

To know more about the Gstaad Project and why we believe the US should not cut UN funding, click here. We believe UN and humanitarian aid workers on the ground in Africa and other areas of the world are true heroes… Our new book “Heroes of the United Nations: men and women who made the world a better place” is now available online at Create Space, Amazon, and Barnes and Nobles.

Angelina Jolie is in talks to take on a new and expanded role with the U.N. refugee agency for which she already serves as goodwill ambassador, she told reporters Tuesday.

The actress said that she and the agency are still studying their options and working out the details for her to deal with refugee crises, but haven’t settled on anything because they want to get it right. U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres told the agency’s executive committee Tuesday that the world-famous actress could serve as his special envoy “to mobilize strong international support” during particularly dire situations.

“We are looking at a few countries in the world,” Jolie said in answer to a brief question. “We’re hoping to discuss it in the next few weeks but we want to research it properly and do it well.”

To know more about the Gstaad Project and the work of the UN on the ground, click here. We believe UN and humanitarian aid workers on the ground in Africa and other areas of the world are true heroes… Our new book “Heroes of the United Nations: men and women who made the world a better place” is now available online at Create Space, Amazon, and Barnes and Nobles.

America’s budget crisis at home is forcing the first significant cuts in overseas aid in nearly two decades, a retrenchment that officials and advocates say reflects the country’s diminishing ability to influence the world.

As lawmakers scramble to trim the swelling national debt, both the Republican-controlled House and the Democrat-controlled Senate have proposed slashing financing for the State Department and its related aid agencies at a time of desperate humanitarian crises and uncertain political developments. The proposals have raised the specter of deep cuts in food and medicine for Africa, in relief for disaster-affected places like Pakistan and Japan, in political and economic assistance for the new democracies of the Middle East, and even for the Peace Corps.

The financial crunch threatens to undermine a foreign policy described as “smart power” by President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, one that emphasizes diplomacy and development as a complement to American military power. It also would begin to reverse the increase in foreign aid that President George W. Bush supported after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, as part of an effort to combat the roots of extremism and anti-American sentiment, especially in the most troubled countries.

Given the relatively small foreign aid budget — it accounts for 1 percent of federal spending over all — the effect of the cuts could be disproportional.

To read the article in its entirety, please click here.

To know more about the Gstaad Project and why we believe the US should not cut UN funding, click here. We believe UN and humanitarian aid workers on the ground in Africa and other areas of the world are true heroes… Our new book “Heroes of the United Nations: men and women who made the world a better place” is now available online at Create Space, Amazon, and Barnes and Nobles.

Justin Timberlake has been lauded for his work in music, TV and film. Now he’s about to get an accolade for trying to better the environment. The Environmental Media Association says Timberlake will receive its Futures Award, which represents future environmental leaders in entertainment.

Read the article in its entirety by clicking here.

To know more about the Gstaad Project, click here. Our new book “Heroes of the United Nations: men and women who made the world a better place” is now available online at Create Space, Amazon, and Barnes and Nobles.