AUSTRALIA’S NATIONAL STATEMENT IN RESPONSE TO THE STATEMENT OF THE UNICEF EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
03 September 2024
Statement by H.E. James Larsen, Permanent Representative of Australia to the United Nations
Agenda Item 2: Opening statements by the President of the Executive Board and the Executive Director of UNICEF, UNICEF Executive Board Second Regular Session
Thank you President, and I thank very much the Executive Director for your remarks.
Australia is pleased to be a top government donor of multi-year core funding to UNICEF, contributing to UNICEF’s Strategic Plan and its four-year trajectory.
UNICEF continues to be instrumental to the achievement of the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs.
President,
We would like to first express Australia’s sincere appreciation to the Executive Director and her team for their visit to Australia and the Pacific in July.
It was an important visit and one which we valued very greatly. The visit highlighted the value of UNICEF’s strong partnerships and programmes in our region.
We thank the Executive Director for the high-level advocacy she carried out, which underscored the importance of investment in the Pacific to protect the rights of children in the face of climate change, violence, and poverty.
UNICEF’s role in the delivery of early childhood care and climate adaptation initiatives is key to improving the lives of children and their communities.
And I note, Executive Director, your comments just a few moments ago concerning the critical importance of education.
Following the Executive Director’s visit, we are keen to further strengthen our partnership with UNICEF across a range of measures, including:
- working together through existing regional architecture, such as the
- Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat;
- integrating gender analyses and disaggregated data across activities;
- meeting our locally-led development targets and commitments;
- and ensuring Indigenous knowledge and First Nations perspectives are incorporated across our joint Pacific engagement.
President,
Australia commends UNICEF’s global efforts to support millions of children with lifesaving humanitarian assistance in increasingly complex and violent operating environments, and we fully support the Executive Director’s comments earlier today concerning the need for doing more to protect humanitarian workers in these very difficult circumstances.
We encourage UNICEF to refine its strategy on ‘systems strengthening’ and be clearer on how its emergency responses can evolve into sustainable programs wherever possible.
We also support UNICEF’s aim to refocus attention on ‘forgotten’ emergencies, including the critical circumstances in our region occurring in Myanmar.
Finally, we acknowledge that fulfilling commitments to the UN Funding Compact is critical to addressing unmet development and humanitarian needs, and in this regard, I very much welcome the Executive Director’s commitment earlier today to fully adopt the new Funding Compact.
President,
Australia highly values our partnership with UNICEF. We will work together to make UNICEF as fit-for-purpose and as resilient as possible, to ensure UNICEF can continue to serve children around the world.
Thank you.