Speech by Malcolm Johnson, ITU Deputy Secretary-General
Council Working Group on Financial and Human Resources (CWG-FHR) : Opening Remarks
24 - 26 February 2016, Geneva, Switzerland
Distinguished colleagues,
Ladies and gentlemen,
On behalf of the Secretary-General I am pleased to welcome you to this meeting of the Council Working Group on Financial and Human Resources. Many important Finance and Human resources issues are on the agenda to be discussed in preparation of the Council in May.
We have received many contributions from Members States and a Study Group for this meeting, several focusing on:
- Document access policy;
- Creation of a new membership category for SMEs;
- and ITU participation in MoUs with financial and /or strategic implications.
Progress reports are submitted on:
- Document access policy;
- The actions undertaken pursuant to Resolution 187 (Busan, 2014) on the review of the current methodologies and development of a future vision for the participation of Sector Members, Associates and Academia in the activities of ITU;
- ITU participation in MoUs with financial and /or strategic implications;
- Digital object architecture (DOA) and the master framework agreement between ITU and the Dona Foundation;
The implementation of systematic risk management in ITU.
In addition, this meeting will include discussions on the implications of the decisions of the UN General Assembly on the conditions of service in the UN common system.
The meeting will also discuss the ongoing implementation of the Human Resources Strategic Plan and there will be an update on the implementation of Resolution 48 (Rev. Busan, 2014).
These are important issues for consideration but as those of you that participated in the CWG-HQP yesterday will know, the major financial, and possibly human resource issue on the agenda for this year's Council will be the recommendation to Council to select an option for the new HQ premises.
Council is recommended to consider allocating a maximum financial envelope of CHF 140Million for this decision, on condition the total cost of the project does not exceed CHF 125Million and a maximum annual repayment of loans of CHF2.8M.
The Secretariat is asked to estimate the budgetary impact and advise Council on the measures that might be taken to finance the project and to reduce the cost further, taking into account the latest possible information and guided by cost efficiency.
It would be very helpful if this CWG could find some time to identify some measures that the Secretariat could investigate, as clearly Council is unlikely to take a decision on this unless it is confident of the long term sustainability of the project.
I am aware you already have a very busy meeting ahead of you but as always I am sure we can rely on the Chairman, Bruce Gracie to skillfully lead the meeting to a successful conclusion.
So I leave you in his capable hands and I wish you a very productive and successful meeting.