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Unicef annual report 2017, in 2017, unicef closed one chapter and prepared to open another..

This report details key results achieved in 2017 by UNICEF and partners – including children and young people themselves – and looks to the strategic challenges ahead. Against a backdrop of widespread conflict, instability and displacement, the report highlights UNICEF’s efforts to advance innovation, efficiency, transparency and financial stewardship in 2017. It also takes note of successful advocacy activities focused on child survival and health, early childhood development, violence against children, and child migrants and refugees. The report demonstrates UNICEF’s commitment to investing in the rights of excluded and disadvantaged children and young people, and providing them with opportunities to grow up healthy, educated and protected.

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2017 Annual Results Reports

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Report on Regular Resources 2017

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Compendium of Resource Partner Contributions 2017

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Sustainable Development Goals Report 2017

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UNISDR annual report 2017

The 2017 Annual Report is the final report of the 2016-17 biennium and provides an overview of the results achieved by UNISDR against its Work Programme 2016-2019.

In this first biennium since the adoption of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030 and of the Transforming our World: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development , UNISDR led the global disaster risk reduction community in transitioning from implementation of the Hyogo Framework for Action to implementation of the Sendai Framework in the context of the overall 2030

Development Agenda. Throughout the course of the biennium, the global community increasingly underscored the interconnected nature of humanitarian, development and climate action.

To effectively focus its action, UNISDR launched a Strategic Framework 2016-2021 and Work Programme 2016-2019 and underwent a multi-faceted change process to align its organisational structure to the Strategic Objectives of its Framework for greater focus, resource efficiency and accountability.

To deliver its Work Programme UNISDR provided key actors and stakeholders at all levels and sectors with the tools, information, platforms, technical expertise and incentives, to translate the Sendai Framework into concrete actions and contribute to achieving: the substantial reduction of disaster risk and losses in lives, livelihoods and health and in the economic, physical, social, cultural and environmental assets of persons, businesses, communities and countries.

This report shares UNISDR’s progress in relation to the three Strategic Objectives and two Enablers of its Work Programme 2016-2019:

• SO1- Strengthen global monitoring, analysis and coordination of Sendai Framework implementation;
• SO2- Support regional and national Sendai Framework implementation;
• SO3- Catalyse action through Member States and Partners;
• Enabler 1- Effective knowledge management, communication and global advocacy;
• Enabler 2- Strengthened organisational performance.

Although all UNISDR Regional Offices contribute to the achievement of all of UNISDR’s Strategic Objectives, this report also highlights specific achievements by the five UNISDR Regional Offices in Africa, the Arab States, the Americas, Europe and Asia-Pacific.

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• UNISDR 2017 Annual progress report against output indicators , English

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Annual Report

• Introduction

UNDP Administrator

When I joined UNDP as Administrator in June of 2017, I was pleased to be taking the helm at the world’s leading development organisation. I had inherited from my predecessor, Helen Clark, a strong organisation that was recognized the world over for its transparency and bold action.

It was then, and is still, an organisation with a proud history of more than a half-century of helping countries in every corner of the world to fight poverty, create jobs, administer elections, prevent disaster, and recover after crisis. Our thousands of staff dedicate themselves every day to working with partners to achieve this and more.

As we continue this work, the world is facing a set of unprecedented challenges.

A staggering 650 million people are living in extreme poverty — about 16% of them in fragile countries. Three billion people are using dirty sources of energy for cooking and heating. Every year, US $1.26 trillion is lost to corruption. In the past decade, 700,000+ people have been killed in climate-related disasters. There has been a 50% increase in CO 2 emissions since 1990. Only 23.5% of the world’s parliamentarians are women.

The challenges we face can seem overwhelming, and the temptation to give in to a dark vision of our future is great.

But there is much room for optimism. We can take heart that every country in the world has committed to a bold plan — the Sustainable Development Goals set out in the 2030 Agenda — to end poverty, fight inequality and tackle climate change. Recognizing this context, the United Nations, led by Secretary-General António Guterres, is undergoing system-wide reforms to remain effective even as more and different demands are made of it.

The universal commitment to the Sustainable Development Goals and UN reform together present UNDP with a tremendous opportunity to help countries become more peaceful and prosperous.

That’s why UNDP is transforming for a new era of sustainable development. Our innovations and reform are described in our new Strategic Plan 2018-2021, the frst plan to be conceived and carried out entirely in the era of the Sustainable Development Goals. The Plan identifes six ‘Signature Solutions’ that build on our strengths as an organisation; we will use these solutions to focus our resources and expertise, and make a real impact on poverty, governance, energy, gender, resilience, and the environment.

We understand that development does not happen overnight, but is nevertheless urgent. With a network encompassing 170 countries and territories, we are supporting governments across the globe as they transform societies.

UNDP will do this work with the rest of the UN system and our partners. We remain committed to the highest standards of transparency and accountability to the people, governments, institutions, and organisations with which we work.

With a more dynamic UNDP offering even more support to countries on the frontlines of the biggest challenges, we will take another step towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.

A new plan for a new era

UNDP Strategic Plan 2018–2021

FROM HELPING PARTS of Iraq to stabilize after conflict, to supporting historic open elections in Zimbabwe, to our work in the Maldives on climate change, and building a lasting peace in Colombia, UNDP helps 170 countries to reach their development priorities so that no one is left behind.

The Strategic Plan is an essential tool for UNDP to continue to evolve and adapt over the next four years to drive strong progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

UNDP and the UN Sustainable Development Group

UNDP plays an essential role in the development work of the larger UN system.

The UNDP Administrator is the Vice-Chair of the UN Sustainable Development Group, which unites the funds, programmes, specialized agencies, departments and offices of the UN system that play a role in development. The UN Sustainable Development Group is instrumental in enabling action on the ground and ensuring that UN Country Teams have the support, guidance and impartial oversight required as they help governments deliver on the 2030 Agenda.

UNDP’s new Strategic Plan heralds some big changes to help countries meet the SDGs by the target date of 2030. These include:

SIGNATURE SOLUTIONS

A set of integrated responses to development in the following areas: poverty, governance, resilience, environment, energy access, and gender equality. Each Solution includes a mix of policy advice, technical assistance, finance, and programmes. Today’s challenges are complex and each country is different. That’s why we tailor our work to fit the needs of the countries we serve.

GLOBAL AND COUNTRY PLATFORMS

Support within and across countries: Our new Global Platform leverages expertise from around the world to support individual countries, and a Country Support Platform in each country harnesses the collective policy and covening power of the UN, and ramps up innovations for development.

DOING BUSINESS BETTER

We’re boosting our performance to maximize return on every dollar invested. What’s more, we’re harnessing cutting-edge technologies and research to generate new ideas to test and scale up.

The road to success:

Signature Solutions

To better focus its resources and expertise to deliver on the 2030 Agenda, UNDP has identifed a set of approaches that we call our Signature Solutions. No one solution will succeed on its own. We need all of them to achieve the SDGs. Each solution has the potential to unlock the path to sustainable development.

UNDP’s Signature Solutions are cross-cutting approaches to development— for example, a gender approach or resilience approach can be applied to any area of development, or to any of the Sustainable Development Goals. The matrix above shows how the Signature Solutions interact with our work on the SDGs.

On the following pages, you’ll see stories of the six Signature Solutions at work. Spanning the five regions where we work, these stories illustrate the experience, dedication, and innovation that UNDP applies to the task of achieving the SDGs.

Today, 650 million people live in extreme poverty, while another 800 million are at risk of falling back. People stay in or fall back into poverty because of a range of factors—where they live, their ethnicity, gender, a lack of opportunities, and others.

Ending poverty is UNDP’s primary focus and features in our work with governments, communities, and a wide range of partners in all of the 170 countries and territories where we operate. UNDP interventions help eradicate poverty, such as by creating decent jobs and livelihoods, providing social safety nets, boosting political participation, and ensuring access to services like water, energy, healthcare, credit, and productive assets.

Our Signature Solution on poverty cuts across our work on all the SDGs, whether it’s decent work or peace and justice.

In the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, UNDP and the government set up an ambitious programme to help long-term unemployed people start their own businesses through coaching and start-up grants. Since 2007, nearly 10,000 new businesses have been created, 35% of them run by women entrepreneurs and 31% by young people. A remarkable 70% of these companies have remained active beyond the initial five years, and many have expanded. In 2017, the scheme accounted for 15% of new private-sector firms registered in the country.

Even before conflict erupted in 2015, Yemen was one of the poorest countries in the Arab region. Now, after three years of fighting, there is widespread hunger. UNDP’s cash-for-work projects get people back to work and help restore roads and other infrastructure. In partnership with UNICEF, we’ve helped create short-term jobs for over 400,000 people, boost small businesses in agriculture and fishing, and train young people as health and sanitation promoters. That way, Yemenis can look forward to a safer and better future.

The Government of India has an ambitious plan to build 30 million houses by the year 2022. With UNDP’s support, the government is creating 130 designs for houses to fit India’s diverse housing needs and that use local materials to reduce the environmental footprint of housing. Thirteen states are now building “demonstration” houses to encourage families to adopt locally appropriate building materials. Engineers and architects are offering various styles that can be adapted by families so their houses feel more like homes.

COLLABORATING WITH ACADEMIA

On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the Human Development Report, UNDP partnered with the UK based Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative to develop the Multidimensional Poverty Index to make more sophisticated measurements of global poverty.

UNDP is partnering with the World Inequality Lab, based at the Paris School of Economics, to promote research on global inequality dynamics, such as the World Inequality Database and the biennial World Inequality Report.

Innovation story

GROWING YOUNG ENTREPRENEURS

UNDP works with partners in Rwanda to inspire, and train young entrepreneurs and provide them with the tools they need to succeed through the YouthConnekt project. The project offers a boot camp on business skills, and an annual competition for cash awards and other support to help the best business plans scale up; it has created nearly 4,000 jobs. UNDP is now supporting expansion of the project to 14 other African countries.

People’s lives are better when government is efficient and responsive. When people from all social groups are included in decision-making that affects their lives, and when they have equal access to fair institutions that provide services and administer justice, they will have more trust in their government. The benefits of our work on governance are evident in all the areas covered by the SDGs, whether it’s climate action or gender equality.

UNDP’s governance work spans a wide range of institutions, from national parliaments, supreme courts, and national civil services through regional and local administrations, to some of the geographically remotest communities in the world. We work with one out of every three parliaments on the planet, and assist in an election somewhere in the world on average every two weeks. We help countries expand spaces for people’s participation, and improve how their institutions work, so that all people can aspire to a sustainable future with prosperity, peace, justice and security.

More than three decades of armed civil conflict in Guatemala left hundreds of thousands of people dead or missing, and generations of people scarred. UNDP is supporting government and non-profit organisations to reconcile with this violent history. One UNDP-supported project, “The Room of Absences,” is part museum, part educational centre, and part memorial. Visitors leave the experience transformed and committed to helping build a lasting peace. The project is part of UNDP’s work in the country to strengthen institutions and popular support for peace and human rights.

The Amazon is populated by thousands of indigenous communities, some of them extremely isolated and under constant threat. A key step to help indigenous peoples defend their territories is the recognition of their land rights. UNDP is working with the government of Peru and communities to secure recognition of land rights for nearly 70 indigenous communities in three regions of the Peruvian Amazon, helping to conserve more than 300,000 hectares of forest. By recognizing communities’ rights over their ancestral territories, Peru is also fighting against climate change by avoiding deforestation.

In 2017, UNDP launched “Journey to Extremism: Drivers, Incentives, and the Tipping Point for Recruitment,” a seminal report on violent extremist groups in Africa, which were responsible for 33,000 deaths between 2011 and 2016. The report was the result of a two-year study that explored the life histories and personal perspectives of extremists. The study showed that the more prosperous and fair the community, the less likely it is to produce violent extremists. UNDP uses research, public education and other methods to tackle the root causes of violent extremism in Africa. In tandem with the report launch, UNDP also released Stories of Survivors, a hardcover book of photos and testimonials.

COLLABORATING WITH THE EU

UNDP has a longstanding partnership with the European Union (EU) to promote good governance and make societies more inclusive and resilient. Together, UNDP and the EU are among the largest providers of electoral assistance worldwide, helping countries carry out credible elections and boost women’s participation as voters and candidates. This partnership helps millions of people worldwide gain better access to justice and public services, especially in areas affected by conflict or crises.

BIOMETRICS FOR BETTER GOVERNANCE

In Malawi, UNDP is the lead partner supporting the Government’s new system to register and provide identifcation to the country’s residents. Using the latest biometric technology, the new system will help guarantee that all Malawians can enjoy access to services and the full rights of citizenship. Registration began in May 2017, with the target of registering 9 million Malawians above the age of 16 by year’s end, and creating an automatic registration process for the future. This landmark project will serve as a model for other countries that wish to use biometric technology to register citizens.

Crises know no borders. During the past decade, over 1.5 billion people have been affected by disasters, and that number is likely to increase with climate change. More people have been uprooted from their homes by war and violence and sought sanctuary elsewhere than at any time since the Second World War. Poverty, population growth, weak governance and rapid urbanization are driving the risks associated with such crises. UNDP helps reduce these risks by supporting countries and communities to better manage conflicts, prepare for major shocks, recover in their aftermath, and integrate risk management into their development planning and investment decisions.

The sooner that people can get back to their homes, jobs, and schools, the sooner they can start thriving again. Resilience building is a transformative process of strengthening the capacity of people, communities, institutions, and countries to prevent, anticipate, absorb, respond to and recover from crises. By implementing this Signature Solution, we focus on capacities to address root causes of conflict, reduce disaster risk, mitigate and adapt to climate change impacts, recover from crisis, and build sustainable peace. This has an impact that not only prevents or mitigates crises, but also has an effect on people’s everyday lives across all SDGs.

After Georgia was hit by major flash floods, UNDP helped develop a flood resistance plan for the Rioni River basin, the most flood-prone area in the country. The programme has helped set up a modern early-warning system, built dikes along the river banks, planted forests, and created a zoning plan to climate-proof buildings and farms. The initiative paved the way for a programme to protect 1.7 million people from floods and other climate risks.

UNDP is supporting recovery efforts by the Government of Iraq in the country’s second largest city, Mosul, recently freed from the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant. Among many other projects, UNDP is helping rehabilitate buildings at the University of Mosul, a vital road from the city to a nearby hospital, and water treatment plants that provide safe water to over 600,000 people. All told, these projects are giving the people of Mosul more reasons to return home, and the basic services they need to stay.

Because of climate change, 80% of the islands in the Maldives are only one metre above sea level, and scientists predict that most of the islands will be submerged by 2050. Traditional risk maps provide essential data required to inform emergency-response plans, but they take a long time to create. UNDP and the Government of Maldives are working together to use drones for mapping — a much faster process that yields 3D maps. Drone mapping will provide critical information to help protect the 400,000 residents of the Maldives.

COLLABORATING WITH THE PRIVATE SECTOR

UNDP and Germany’s Deutsche Post DHL Group are partners in Getting Airports Ready for Disaster (GARD), an initiative that trains airport managers on keeping these vital hubs functioning in tsunamis, earthquakes, and other crises, so they can process incoming humanitarian relief supplies. Nearly a thousand people at 40 airports worldwide have been trained.

ASSESSING DISASTER DAMAGE

Two massive hurricanes unleashed fury in the Caribbean, causing catastrophic damage in September 2017. To kick-start recovery in the region, UNDP helped inspection teams in Dominica and Barbuda assess damage using high-tech tools to collect data in real time — assessing a building in an average time of seven minutes. All the structures in Barbuda were assessed in five days — a fraction of the usual time. UNDP is now scaling up the technology to provide country offices with the tools to gather, analyse and act on real-time data, expediting the disaster recovery process.

Healthy ecosystems are at the heart of development, underpinning societal well-being and economic growth. Through nature-based solutions, such as the sustainable management and protection of land, rivers and oceans, we help ensure that countries have adequate food and water, are resilient to climate change and disasters, and can sustain work for billions of people through forestry, agriculture, fisheries and tourism.

An important part of this work involves helping governments to access global financing facilities established to advance environment-related challenges like climate change, clorofluorocarbon emissions or loss of biodiversity. UNDP manages the second-largest portfolio of projects funded by the Green Climate Fund, for example. In 2017 alone, UNDP country ofices have managed 840 environment projects in 141 countries, valued at $3.6 billion, and leveraged another $15 billion in co-financing for environment and sustainable development priorities in these countries. With these funds, UNDP creates nature-based solutions that balance two imperatives: secure, restore and sustainably manage natural resources, while also protecting the environment that enables human life to flourish. The environment affects all areas of life, and so our work in this area means progress on all the SDGs.

Worldwide, 100 million tonnes of peat are sold to heat homes, fertilize fields, and produce electricity. It’s big business — and a devastating one. That’s because peat traps carbon, up to 500 million tonnes of it in Belarus alone. The fewer peatlands there are, the more carbon is released into the atmosphere. A grassroots movement has successfully pressed for strict limits on peat mining. With support from UNDP, Belarus is expanding its network of natural reserves, and preserving the environment.

Perched in the Himalayas, the country of Bhutan is vulnerable to health risks posed by changes in its climate — diarrheal diseases are now widespread, and dengue fever, never detected in the country before 2004, is now endemic during monsoon season. With support from UNDP, the government is tracking data on the links between climate and disease. The result is a national health system with more advance warning for climate-sensitive diseases, and a country with greater resilience to climate change.

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, UNDP supports a solidarity group that has rallied support among the indigenous peoples of Momboyo forest to protect 2,000 hectares of forest from which they derive their income. A regional coordinator of that group, Régine Mboyo, also won an Equator Prize for her work as head of a network of 43 indigenous peoples’ organisations nationwide. That network helped stop concessions for over 600,000 square kilometres of forest and maintain a moratorium on the allocation of extractive industry concessions in the rainforest.

COLLABORATING WITH THE UN SYSTEM

The Poverty-Environment Initiative of UNDP and the UN Environment Programme provides financing and technical support to countries the world over to help government decision-makers and other stakeholders manage the environment in a way that improves people’s livelihoods and leads to sustainable growth. So far, the initiative has provided support to 47 national development plans and over 4,400 local plans in 17 countries.

NEW APPROACH TO AN OLD PROBLEM

Azerbaijan’s economy depends heavily on oil and gas, leading to high levels of carbon dioxide emissions. UNDP collaborated with the country’s state oil company to introduce environmentally-friendly driving habits through training and smart technologies, such as an eco-driving simulator, which was tested by the company’s fleet of 1,000 drivers. The drivers reduced fuel consumption by up to 15%, preventing 1,500 tonnes of carbon dioxide from entering the atmosphere. Given its early success, the programme is set to expand nationally.

People can’t prosper without reliable, safe, and affordable energy to power everything from lights to vehicles to factories to hospitals. And yet more than 1 billion people worldwide have no access to energy, and nearly 3 billion people use solid fuels to cook or heat their homes, exposing their families to grave health hazards and contributing to vast deforestation worldwide. In these and other ways, energy is connected to every one of the Sustainable Development Goals.

UNDP helps countries transition away from the use of finite fossil fuels and towards clean and sustainable sources of energy. Our sustainable energy portfolio spans more than 110 countries, representing around $1 billion in grant financing, and leveraging close to $6 billion more for this goal from public and private sources.

For years, Moldova struggled with the rising costs of importing 97% of its energy, most of it imported gas. UNDP launched the country’s most ambitious renewable energy project, introducing biomass energy — which uses locally-produced, carbon neutral agricultural waste — to hundreds of schools and other public institutions. So far, over 190,000 people across 216 villages and towns have switched to green technologies, creating nearly 800 new jobs, and reducing heating bills by 20%. Whereas in 2011, only 3% of Moldova’s energy consumption came from renewable sources, that proportion is now 15%.

One in seven people in Lebanon lives without electricity. UNDP is working with the UN Refugee Agency and the Lebanese Government to provide affordable energy and encourage the use of renewables. These investments are going towards streetlights that make women feel safe at night, lights at home so people can study and work, and heat so that families can stay healthy. In another project, UNDP is helping provide stoves and environmentally friendly briquettes to the most vulnerable people in the North and Bekaa regions.

UNDP is helping distribute 1 million portable solar lanterns donated by Panasonic to schools and health centres in northern Kenya, making it possible for kids to read at night and patients to get care. The lanterns can get recharged only at school during the day, providing an incentive for students to attend. The lanterns are clean and safe, and are replacing kerosene lamps that pose a fire risk and health hazard; they’re expected to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 30,000 tonnes through 2018 alone.

COLLABORATING WITH FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS

With funding from the Green Climate Fund, UNDP partnered with the European Investment Bank on a project to retrofit public buildings and apartment buildings in Armenia, to make them more energy efficient, thereby reducing an estimated 5 million tonnes of CO 2 emissions over the life of the project.

THE POWER OF HYDROGEN

China is the world’s largest consumer and producer of energy, and the largest emitter of greenhouse gas — 30% of the global total. The country’s demand for energy is increasing, especially in the transport sector. Clean hydrogen can be made from renewable resources and has zero emissions. UNDP worked with the Government to test hydrogen fuel cell-powered buses, and now five more cities are joining the effort to test such vehicles. UNDP’s initial investment has helped hydrogen fuel cells grow into a $12.6 billion industry in the country.

Women and girls make up a disproportionate share of people in poverty, and are more likely to face hunger, violence, and the impacts of disaster and climate change. They are also more likely to be denied access to legal rights and basic services. Women’s participation in all areas of society is essential to make big and lasting change not only for themselves, but for all people.

As the UN’s leading development agency, UNDP has the ability and responsibility to integrate gender equality into every aspect of the development effort. Gender equality and women’s empowerment is a guiding principle that applies to everything we do. Our work on gender ranges from the political to the economic and beyond. It includes support in more than 60 countries to end gender-based violence. We are also working in more than 40 countries to advance women’s political participation as parliamentarians, elected officials, in climate action and disaster risk reduction efforts, and in mediation and peace processes. We also work at the community level, such as by supporting women in starting their own businesses and helping women farmers gain equal access to and control of resources, financing and land. UNDP pushes for gender-responsive budgeting at all levels of government, making sure that the needs and contributions of women are taken into consideration in all development policies and plans.

During Colombia’s long civil conflict, sexual violence was prevalent in areas with armed fighters — as many as a half-million during the first decade of the century. With the conflict now over, UNDP is supporting survivors of sexual violence to rebuild their lives with dignity, by providing them with access to health, protection, psychosocial and legal care, and other forms of reparation. The project has trained officials on how to investigate sexual violence, documented over 1,600 cases, and promoted reparations or compensations for nearly 1,000 survivors.

Educational opportunities for women and girls in Afghanistan are paltry; school enrollment for girls is only 36%, and higher education is just as limited, especially in rural areas. With UNDP support, Kabul University launched the country’s first-ever master’s degree programme in Gender and Women’s Studies. The course aims to produce a cadre of gender equality champions who will fill posts in politics, education and other sectors. In 2017, the first class of 28 students graduated from the two-year programme. Demand for spots in the programme is high and is expected to grow.

With support from UNDP, the number of women in positions of political leadership in Algeria has soared in recent years. The country’s 2008 constitution promised to secure equal access for women to leadership positions, and, since 2010, UNDP has backed Algeria’s efforts to fulfill that pledge. Our expertise in support of a law to improve women’s participation in government, among other efforts, helped increase the number of women elected to local government posts from 1% to 18%, and the number of women in the national assembly quadrupled. Today, with over a quarter of the 462 seats in the National People’s Assembly held by women, Algeria ranks second in the region in women’s political participation.

With European Union funding of €500 million, UNDP works with UN Women, the UN Population Fund, and other partners on the Spotlight Initiative to End Violence Against Women. The initiative responds to all forms of violence against women and girls, recognizing that this effort is essential to achieving Agenda 2030.

WOMEN’S ENTREPRENEURSHIP

UNDP partnered with Microsoft and the National Council for Women (NCW) in Egypt to launch Social Innovation Hubs for Women in Cairo and Ismailia, and a third is planned for Alexandria. Each hub promotes entrepreneurship, social impact projects, and income-generating opportunities for women. The effort aims to reach 5,000 women initially, and then expand to districts nationwide. In addition, UNDP partnered with NCW to launch an innovation camp for young people to help design an app to report violence against women.

• Partnerships

No single entity alone can achieve the 2030 Agenda — the Sustainable Development Goals are a declaration of interdependence. Delivering on the promise of the SDGs will involve or affect every country, every economy, every private company, every non-governmental organisation, every academic institution, and every UN agency.

The breadth and depth of UNDP’s partnerships is already unparalleled. Few organisations work as closely as UNDP does with such a wide mix of partners — public and private — across so many different contexts. But the challenges the world faces requires even more. To better help the countries and people we serve, UNDP will build new and stronger partnerships with governments, the private sector, international financial institutions, non-profit organisations, academia, and others. The 2030 Agenda, with its targets and deadline, gives us a clear foundation on which to forge longer-term partnerships.

For over 50 years, UNDP has valued the trust of all its partners, and understands that such trust must be earned.

From artificial intelligence to climate change, the world is on the cusp of dramatic changes. For this reason, a dynamic, effective and future-focused UNDP is needed now more than ever. That kind of UNDP — the one we envision in the new Strategic Plan — will be possible only with the continued support and close collaboration of our valued partners.

PARTNERSHIPS IN COUNTRIES

UNDP focuses on helping countries achieve their development goals. Countries are at the centre of our partnerships. From Afghanistan to Zimbabwe, UNDP provides expertise, networks, and other resources to 170 countries as they face their own specifc challenges.

PARTNERSHIPS ACROSS THE UN SYSTEM

UNDP plays a vital role as part of the UN family and the development system, providing world class advice, services and support across the broad spectrum of settings in which we operate. Among our partners within the UN system are:

PARTNERSHIPS WITH ACADEMIA

UNDP recognizes the important role that academia can play in understanding and addressing the world’s most pressing development challenges. We partner with top academic institutions in Africa, Asia, Europe, and North America.

PARTNERSHIPS WITH REGIONAL ORGANISATIONS

UNDP partners with regional associations such as the African Union, the European Union, and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). These partnerships are tailored to the needs of the region and the partners, and focus on a range of issues, such as public health, good governance, disaster risks and resilience, human rights and the rule of law, access to justice, and gender equality.

PARTNERSHIPS WITH THE PRIVATE SECTOR

UNDP’s private sector experience is underpinned by strong relationships with governments, deep understanding of development, and expertise in sustainable business. In 2017, we worked with thousands of businesses, from the largest of global brands like Microsoft and Visa, to small companies, social enterprises, and local cooperatives. These partnerships mean more effective action in all the programme areas in which UNDP works.

PARTNERSHIPS WITH INTERNATIONAL FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS

UNDP’s engagement with international financial institutions (IFIs) is critical to help governments leverage additional financing, expertise and advocacy for greater development impact. UNDP currently works with 15 IFIs (including multilateral, regional and national development banks with international objectives), such as the World Bank, the Islamic Development Bank, and the Asian Development Bank.

Partnering with the world

PREVENTING CONFLICT

Established in 2004, the Joint UNDP-UN Department of Political Affairs Programme on Building National Capacities for Conflict Prevention brings together the development and political arms of the UN to enhance the organisation’s support to countries in sustaining peace. The Joint Programme has worked with over 50 countries and supported national architectures for peace, mediation, and dialogue. It brings a multi-faceted approach to conflict prevention, capitalizing on the diversity of the UN system. For example, UNDP and DPA have been working closely together with the Government of Papua New Guinea and the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) in preparing the steps for a referendum on the future constitutional status of Bougainville, to be held by the end of 2020.

CREATING JOBS AND RESTORING SERVICES

In Yemen, UNDP received a $300 million World Bank International Development Association grant for a three-year project (2016-2018), providing short-term employment and service restoration in over 300 districts, supporting local institutions to create over 9 million working days for 400,000 families, and helping 2.5 million Yemenis access basic services.

INSURING FARMERS AGAINST CLIMATE CHANGE

Agriculture is a main source of income in Ethiopia, and farmers are vulnerable to erratic rainfall, crop failure, and other effects of climate change. UNDP collaborated with government ministries and two insurance firms in Ethiopia, Oromia and Nyala , to provide farmers with crop insurance. If rainfall is below a certain threshold, the company pays insurance claims while UNDP covers the insurance premium. Over 12,000 smallholder farmers have already benefited.

In 2017, after a mudslide in Sierra Leone killed hundreds and displaced thousands, UNDP worked with government agencies such as the Office of National Security and UN entities such as UNOPS. Here and elsewhere, UNDP works with partners of all kinds to ensure the best results.

Hosting specialized functions of the UN system

UNDP is a vital part of the UN family, and facilitates much of the work of other UN agencies. We administer payroll for approximately 17,700 non-UNDP personnel across the system. We provide shared premises and common services for agencies in 113 countries, and close to $700 million in financial services to the system. In addition, UNDP administers the UN Capital Development Fund (UNCDF) and UN Volunteers (UNV), and hosts the UN Office of South-South Cooperation (UNOSSC) and the Multi-Partner Trust Fund (MPTF) Office.

In this and other ways, big and small, UNDP is essential to the entire UN system’s efforts to achieve the SDGs.

UNITED NATIONS CAPITAL DEVELOPMENT FUND

The UN Capital Development Fund, administered by UNDP, makes public and private finance work for the poor in the world’s 47 least developed countries.

UN VOLUNTEERS

UNDP administers the UN Volunteers programme, which in 2017 mobilized nearly 25,000 UN Volunteers in 131 countries and online; they represented 159 nationalities.

UN OFFICE FOR SOUTH-SOUTH COOPERATION

Hosted by UNDP since 1974, the UN Office for South-South Cooperation promotes, coordinates and supports South-South and triangular cooperation globally and within the United Nations system.

MULTI-PARTNER TRUST FUND OFFICE

UNDP houses the Multi-Partner Trust Fund Office, which allows multiple donors to pool their funding to support large-scale projects and initiatives of the UN system and national governments.

• Progress in numbers

UNDP results 2014-2017

UNDP is rightly judged by those we serve and partner with on how well we’re able to measure and deliver results. This level of transparency and accountability is a hallmark of UNDP.

But UNDP is not content to rest on the progress that we’ve worked with countries to achieve. That’s why in UNDP’s new Strategic Plan we commit to enhance our business model, cultivate new partners, and, as always, work globally across sectors and the Sustainable Development Goals.

That means ever-greater results in the years to come, and maximum impact for every dollar invested.

Our intiatives assisted:

Nearly 170M NEW VOTERS to register in 52 countries

37.3M PEOPLE to benefit from improved livelihoods

More than 6.7M PEOPLE to have improved access to energy in 55 countries

4.1M PEOPLE to gain access to legal aid services in 39 countries, 51% of them women

Nearly 3M PEOPLE to find new jobs, 41% of them women

2M PEOPLE to receive antiretroviral treatment in 22 countries (as of mid-2017)

104 COUNTRIES to implement low-emission and climate-resilient measures

In 2017, contributions totalled $4.9 billion, an increase of 1% over 2016.

UNDP distinguishes between regular resources, contributed annually for its core activities and functioning, and earmarked resources, contributed for a specifc activity, project, or theme.

In 2017 as compared to 2016:

• Regular resources decreased to $0.612 billion from $0.618 billion.
• Earmarked resources, excluding reimbursable support services, increased to $4.22 billion from $4.16 billion. This includes contributions from programme country governments to projects in their own countries (government cost sharing), which grew to $1 billion from $892 million.

Contributions by Funding Channel in 2017

Thematic Funding Windows

In 2016, UNDP launched a number of Thematic Funding Windows. Through these Funding Windows, contributors can invest in a particular thematic area while allowing UNDP to allocate the funds to the activities and locations where they are needed the most. The Funding Windows also make for lower transaction costs on financial contributions as compared to other earmarked modalities. Flexibility and lower costs means better results.

Total contributions of $99 million have been received through the Thematic Funding Windows since their launch.

Top 30 Government Contributors to UNDP in 2017

Global events in 2017.

OCEAN CONFERENCE

June 2017 marked the historic Ocean Conference, with its powerful message about global interconnectivity: the ‘seven seas’ are, in fact, one shared ocean. With the support of UNDP, this game-changing event secured more than 1,300 commitments from the international community to protect the ocean. UNDP works with over 100 countries to restore and protect life under water, and better manage marine resources. From reducing the risks of marine-invasive species to creating protected areas in Belize, or safeguarding fishing livelihoods in India, UNDP is tackling many urgent threats to our life-sustaining ocean.

THE GLOBAL GOALS WORLD CUP

UNDP is a major partner in the Global Goals World Cup, an open women’s soccer tournament that fuses sport, teamwork, and advocacy for the Sustainable Development Goals. In September 2017, the winning teams from each tournament met in New York City for the 2nd Global Final, helping to kick-off UN General Assembly Week. Participants included a team from Liberia championing universal access to clean water, a team from Ecuador fighting for quality education, and a local East Harlem team striving to end inequality.

GENERAL ASSEMBLY 2017

UNDP leaders were active in events in and around the 2017 UN General Assembly. UNDP Administrator Achim Steiner hosted a high-level side event on “The SDGs in Action,” and also presented the awards to the 15 winners of the 2017 Equator Prize for climate action, at a ceremony at The Town Hall theatre in New York. Also during GA Week, UNDP released a landmark report on income inequality in Africa as well as a short film on the joint work of humanitarian and development actors in Somalia.

PLEDGING CONFERENCE FOR THE CARIBBEAN

In November 2017, UN headquarters held the CARICOM-UN High-Level Pledging Conference — an event to engender support to build more climate resilience across Caribbean countries. With over 400 high-level representatives from governments, multilateral and civil-society organisations and the private sector in attendance, UNDP emphasized the need for a new financing architecture to address Small Island Developing States (SIDS), such as the ones affected by Hurricanes Irma and Maria earlier in the year. The conference’s message to “Build Back Better” resonated; participants made over $1.3 billion in pledges, and over $1 billion in loans and debt relief.

THE UN CLIMATE CHANGE CONFERENCE

In November 2017, the Conference of the Parties (COP23) was held at the World Conference Center in Bonn, Germany, under the Presidency of Fiji. UNDP’s delegation — led by Administrator Achim Steiner — participated in 30 key events during the conference. With the Paris Agreement and national climate targets in place, UNDP’s focus has transitioned to supporting countries’ shift into accelerated action and implementation. In conjunction with COP23, UNDP also helped initiate the Pathway to Paris “Chorus for Climate Action,” a star-studded, sold-out concert at Carnegie Hall in New York City.

SOCIAL GOOD SUMMIT

In September 2017, the Social Good Summit (SGS) examined how we can unlock technology’s potential to make the world a better place. Held annually during UN General Assembly Week, SGS unites a dynamic community of global citizens and progressive thought leaders around the theme of #2030NOW. Organized by UNDP in partnership with the UN Foundation and Mashable, the Summit featured a flagship event in New York City, with five panels led by UNDP leaders or Goodwill Ambassadors, and events in 87 other countries, from Madagascar and to Albania, Myanmar, Tunisia, El Salvador, and others.

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Resolutions and decisions of the Security Council 2017: S/INF/72   

Index to proceedings of the Security Council:  72nd year (2017)

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World Happiness Report 2017

The first World Happiness Report was published in April, 2012, in support of the UN High Level Meeting on happiness and well-being. Since then the world has come a long way. Increasingly, happiness is considered to be the proper measure of social progress and the goal of public policy. In June 2016 the OECD committed itself “to redefine the growth narrative to put people’s well-being at the center of governments’ efforts”. In February 2017, the United Arab Emirates held a full-day World Happiness meeting, as part of the World Government Summit. Now on World Happiness Day, March 20th, we launch the World Happiness Report 2017 , once again back at the United Nations, again published by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network, and now supported by a generous three-year grant from the Ernesto Illy Foundation.

Read the Report

• Chapter 1 Overview
• Chapter 2 Social Foundations of World Happiness
• Chapter 3 Growth and Happiness in China, 1990-2015
• Chapter 4 ‘Waiting for Happiness’ in Africa
• Chapter 5 The Key Determinants of Happiness and Misery
• Chapter 6 Happiness at Work
• Chapter 7 Restoring American Happiness
• Download the Report

Appendices & Data

Norway tops the global happiness rankings for 2017.

Norway has jumped from 4th place in 2016 to 1st place this year, followed by Denmark, Iceland and Switzerland in a tightly packed bunch. All of the top four countries rank highly on all the main factors found to support happiness: caring, freedom, generosity, honesty, health, income and good governance. Their averages are so close that small changes can re-order the rankings from year to year. Norway moves to the top of the ranking despite weaker oil prices. It is sometimes said that Norway achieves and maintains its high happiness not because of its oil wealth, but in spite of it. By choosing to produce its oil slowly, and investing the proceeds for the future rather than spending them in the present, Norway has insulated itself from the boom and bust cycle of many other resource-rich economies. To do this successfully requires high levels of mutual trust, shared purpose, generosity and good governance, all factors that help to keep Norway and other top countries where they are in the happiness rankings.

All of the other countries in the top ten also have high values in all six of the key variables used to explain happiness differences among countries and through time – income, healthy life expectancy, having someone to count on in times of trouble, generosity, freedom and trust, with the latter measured by the absence of corruption in business and government. Here too there has been some shuffling of ranks among closely grouped countries, with this year’s rankings placing Finland in 5thplace, followed by the Netherlands, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia and Sweden tied for the 9th position, having the same 2014-2016 score to three decimals.

Happiness is both social and personal

This year’s report emphasizes the importance of the social foundations of happiness (see Chapter 2). This can be seen by comparing the life experiences between the top and bottom ten countries in this year’s happiness rankings. There is a four-point happiness gap between the two groups of countries, of which three-quarters is explained by the six variables, half due to differences in having someone to count on, generosity, a sense of freedom, and freedom from corruption. The other half of the explained difference is attributed to GDP per capita and healthy life expectancy, both of which, as the report explains, also depend importantly on the social context.

However 80% of the variance of happiness across the world occurs within countries. In richer countries the within-country differences are not mainly explained by income inequality, but by differences in mental health, physical health and personal relationships: the biggest single source of misery is mental illness (see Chapter 5). Income differences matter more in poorer countries, but even their mental illness is a major source of misery.

Work is also a major factor affecting happiness (see Chapter 6). Unemployment causes a major fall in happiness, and even for those in work the quality of work can cause major variations in happiness.

People in China are no happier than 25 years ago

Our China chapter is led by Richard A. Easterlin, who pioneered the economics of happiness more than 40 years ago. It contrasts the sharply growing per capita income in China over the past 25 years with life evaluations that fell steadily from 1990 till about 2005, recovering since then to about the 1990 levels. They attribute the dropping happiness in the first part of the period to rising unemployment and fraying social safety nets, with recoveries since in both (see Chapter 3).

Much of Africa is struggling

The Africa chapter, led by Valerie Møller, tells a much more diverse story, as fits the African reality with its great number and vast range of experiences. But these are often marked by delayed and disappointed hopes for happier lives (see Chapter 4).

Happiness has fallen in America

The USA is a story of reduced happiness. In 2007 the USA ranked 3rd among the OECD countries; in 2016 it came 19th. The reasons are declining social support and increased corruption (see Chapter 7) and it is these same factors that explain why the Nordic countries do so much better.

• Our work is public. Data for Figure 2.1 for each corresponding year are freely downloadable. The survey measure of SWB (Subjective Well-being) is from the Gallup World Poll (GWP). Please reference the report accordingly (see Citation).
• Executive Summary
• Chapter 2. Online Data
• Chapter 2. Statistical Appendix
• Chapter 2. NSO Data Collection
• Chapter 2. Final Data for Figures in Chapter 2
• Chapter 3. Appendix
• Chapter 4. Appendix
• Chapter 5. Appendix
• Chapter 6. Appendix

John Helliwell, Richard Layard, Jeffrey Sachs, Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, Haifang Huang and Shun Wang

Helliwell, J., Layard, R., & Sachs, J. (2017). World Happiness Report 2017, New York: Sustainable Development Solutions Network.

Acknowledgments

World Happiness Report management by Sharon Paculor. Copy editing by Mariam Gulaid, Saloni Jain and Louise Doucette. Design by John Stislow and Stephanie Stislow.

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The current world population of 7.6 billion is expected to reach 8.6 billion in 2030, 9.8 billion in 2050 and 11.2 billion in 2100, according to a new United Nations report being launched today. With roughly 83 million people being added to the world’s population every year, the upward trend in population size is expected to continue, even assuming that fertility levels will continue to decline.

The World Population Prospects: The 2017 Revision , published by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, provides a comprehensive review of global demographic trends and prospects for the future. The information is essential to guide policies aimed at achieving the new Sustainable Development Goals.

Shifts in country population rankings

The new projections include some notable findings at the country level. China (with 1.4 billion inhabitants) and India (1.3 billion inhabitants) remain the two most populous countries, comprising 19 and 18% of the total global population. In roughly seven years, or around 2024, the population of India is expected to surpass that of China.

Among the ten largest countries worldwide, Nigeria is growing the most rapidly. Consequently, the population of Nigeria, currently the world’s 7th largest, is projected to surpass that of the United States and become the third largest country in the world shortly before 2050.

Most of the global increase is attributable to a small number of countries

From 2017 to 2050, it is expected that half of the world’s population growth will be concentrated in just nine countries: India, Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Pakistan, Ethiopia, the United Republic of Tanzania, the United States of America, Uganda and Indonesia (ordered by their expected contribution to total growth).

The group of 47 least developed countries (LDCs) continues to have a relatively high level of fertility, which stood at 4.3 births per woman in 2010-2015. As a result, the population of these countries has been growing rapidly, at around 2.4 % per year. Although this rate of increase is expected to slow significantly over the coming decades, the combined population of the LDCs, roughly one billion in 2017, is projected to increase by 33 % between 2017 and 2030, and to reach 1.9 billion persons in 2050.

Similarly, Africa continues to experience high rates of population growth. Between 2017 and 2050, the populations of 26 African countries are projected to expand to at least double their current size.

The concentration of global population growth in the poorest countries presents a considerable challenge to governments in implementing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which seeks to end poverty and hunger, expand and update health and education systems, achieve gender equality and women’s empowerment, reduce inequality and ensure that no one is left behind.

Slower world population growth due to lower fertility rates

In recent years, fertility has declined in nearly all regions of the world. Even in Africa, where fertility levels are the highest of any region, total fertility has fallen from 5.1 births per woman in 2000-2005 to 4.7 in 2010-2015.

Europe has been an exception to this trend in recent years, with total fertility increasing from 1.4 births per woman in 2000-2005 to 1.6 in 2010-2015.

More and more countries now have fertility rates below the level required for the replacement of successive generations (roughly 2.1 births per woman), and some have been in this situation for several decades. During 2010-2015, fertility was below the replacement level in 83 countries comprising 46 % of the world’s population. The ten most populous countries in this group are China, the United States of America, Brazil, the Russian Federation, Japan, Viet Nam, Germany, the Islamic Republic of Iran, Thailand, and the United Kingdom (in order of population size).

Lower fertility leads also to ageing populations

The report highlights that a reduction in the fertility level results not only in a slower pace of population growth but also in an older population.

Compared to 2017, the number of persons aged 60 or above is expected to more than double by 2050 and to more than triple by 2100, rising from 962 million globally in 2017 to 2.1 billion in 2050 and 3.1 billion in 2100.

In Europe, 25% of the population is already aged 60 years or over. That proportion is projected to reach 35% in 2050 and to remain around that level in the second half of the century. Populations in other regions are also projected to age significantly over the next several decades and continuing through 2100. Africa, for example, which has the youngest age distribution of any region, is projected to experience a rapid ageing of its population. Although the African population will remain relatively young for several more decades, the percentage of its population aged 60 or over is expected to rise from 5% in 2017 to around 9% in 2050, and then to nearly 20% by the end of the century.

Globally, the number of persons aged 80 or over is projected to triple by 2050, from 137 million in 2017 to 425 million in 2050. By 2100 it is expected to increase to 909 million, nearly seven times its value in 2017.

Population ageing is projected to have a profound effect on societies, underscoring the fiscal and political pressures that the health care, old-age pension and social protection systems of many countries are likely to face in the coming decades.

Higher life expectancy worldwide

Substantial improvements in life expectancy have occurred in recent years. Globally, life expectancy at birth has risen from 65 years for men and 69 years for women in 2000-2005 to 69 years for men and 73 years for women in 2010-2015. Nevertheless, large disparities across countries remain.

Although all regions shared in the recent rise of life expectancy, the greatest gains were for Africa, where life expectancy rose by 6.6 years between 2000-2005 and 2010-2015 after rising by less than 2 years over the previous decade.

The gap in life expectancy at birth between the least developed countries and other developing countries narrowed from 11 years in 2000-2005 to 8 years in 2010-2015. Although differences in life expectancy across regions and income groups are projected to persist in future years, such differences are expected to diminish significantly by 2045-2050.

The increased level and reduced variability in life expectancy have been due to many factors, including a lower under-five mortality rate, which fell by more than 30 % in 89 countries between 2000-2005 and 2010-2015. Other factors include continuing reductions in fatalities due to HIV/AIDS and progress in combating other infectious as well as non-communicable diseases.

Large movements of refugees and other migrants

There continue to be large movements of migrants between regions, often from low- and middle-income countries toward high-income countries. The volume of the net inflow of migrants to high-income countries in 2010-2015 (3.2 million per year) represented a decline from a peak attained in 2005-2010 (4.5 million per year). Although international migration at or around current levels will be insufficient to compensate fully for the expected loss of population tied to low levels of fertility, especially in the European region, the movement of people between countries can help attenuate some of the adverse consequences of population ageing.

The report observes that the Syrian refugee crisis has had a major impact on levels and patterns of international migration in recent years, affecting several countries. The estimated net outflow from the Syrian Arab Republic was 4.2 million persons in 2010-2015. Most of these refugees went to Syria’s neighbouring countries, contributing to a substantial increase in the net inflow of migrants especially to Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan.

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Emerging Drug Trends

• Emerging drugs, which include designer drugs and new psychoactive substances , are substances that have appeared or become more popular in the drug market in recent years.
• Emerging drugs have unpredictable health effects . They may be as powerful or more powerful than existing drugs, and may be fatal.
• Because drug markets change quickly, NIDA supports the National Drug Early Warning System (NDEWS) , which tracks emerging substances. NIDA also advances the science on emerging drugs by supporting research on their use and on their health effects.

What are emerging drugs?

Emerging drugs are mind-altering substances that have become more common in recent years. They may be sold in drug markets or at convenience stores and online. Since 2013, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime has identified more than 1,000 emerging drugs worldwide. 1

These substances, which include designer drugs and new psychoactive substances , come from many sources. Some were first developed as potential treatments or research chemicals. Others originate in illicit labs and are created to mimic the effects of drugs regulated under the Controlled Substances Act . These emerging substances often produce similar effects and/or are chemically similar to illegal or prescription opioids, stimulants, benzodiazapines (“benzos”), or other existing types of drugs.

People may seek out these drugs for recreation or use them to self-medicate without medical supervision. They may also be added to other drugs without a buyer knowing it. As a result, the health effects of emerging drugs are largely unknown, potentially posing a public health threat and contributing to the overdose crisis . 2,3

NIDA monitors emerging drug trends through its Designer Drug Research Unit and through support for the National Drug Early Warning System (NDEWS) , which tracks drug-related emergency calls.

What are the effects of emerging drugs?

An emerging drug’s effects depend on the type of substance it is—for instance, if it is a new type of opioid , depressant , synthetic cannabinoid , psychedelic , or stimulant. Its effects may be unpredictable and unwanted, especially if it is an unknown ingredient in another drug. A person may not know what substance or substances they have really taken. And because these substances are new to the drug market, clinicians or researchers may not know their effects or how potent (powerful) they are until people begin to visit emergency departments or clinics with symptoms of negative health effects. 4

In addition, emerging substances are usually not included in emergency department drug tests and are not routinely included in the toxicology tests used after a fatal overdose. The delay in this data means there is also a delay in understanding how widespread use of the drug is, why and how these drugs have their effects, and how to care for people who experience negative effects of those substances.

NIDA researchers and grantees collaborate to identify how these emerging drugs work and their potential health effects, including those that have the potential to impact the overdose crisis. NIDA also supports the National Drug Early Warning System (NDEWS) to track emerging substances and their impact on drug-related emergency calls.

What are nitazenes?

Nitazenes are a class of lab-made (synthetic) opioids that may be as powerful or more powerful than fentanyl. 4   They were developed in research labs in the 1950s as potential pain relievers but never marketed. Nitazenes are most often sold as a white powder or tablets. People may not be aware that they have taken nitazenes, as they may be added to other substances, including fentanyl, heroin, and benzodiazepines. 5

Nitazenes began to re-emerge in the drug supply in 2019, after the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration banned fentanyl-related substances. 6,7 Researchers and authorities are monitoring nitazenes, including isotonitazene, protonitazene, etonitazene, N-piperidinyl etonitazene, and metonitazene. Many nitazenes are listed as Schedule 1 drugs under the Controlled Substances Act. 

Like all opioids , nitazenes can slow breathing, blood pressure, and heart rate to dangerously low levels, potentially contributing to overdose . Preliminary NIDA-supported research shows that the opioid overdose reversal medication naloxone is effective with isonitazene, metonitazene, and etonitazene, though it may require repeated doses. More research is needed to confirm these findings with additional nitazenes and in larger groups of people. Fentanyl test strips do not detect nitazenes.

What is tianeptine?

Tianeptine is an antidepressant medication that is not approved for use in the United States. NIDA-funded research suggests that most people take tianeptine in dietary supplements marketed as cognitive enhancers or nootropics, often sold in convenience stores and online. It may be blended with or taken at the same time as other nootropics (like phenibut and racetams) and is also used with substances such as kratom , kava, and gabapentin.

Tianeptine is not an opioid but at high doses it can have opioid-like effects, such as dangerous drops in blood pressure, heart rate, or breathing rate. Research shows that other effects include problems with brain, heart, and digestive function.

Research has shown that tianeptine can cause symptoms of a substance use disorder, including tolerance—which is when you need to take more of a drug for it to have the same level of effect—and withdrawal. Withdrawal from tianeptine has been associated with pain and problems with brain, heart, and digestive function. Early evidence suggests that tianeptine-related substance use disorder can be treated with medications for opioid use disorder , such as buprenorphine. 8

What are new psychoactive substances?

“New psychoactive substances” is a term used to describe lab-made compounds created to skirt existing drug laws . The category may include medications created by pharmaceutical companies or researchers that were never meant to reach the public .

These substances belong to a number of drug classes:

• Synthetic opioids. These drugs are chemically different from existing lab-made opioids like fentanyl . They include brorphine and U-47700. Researchers first identified brorphine in the unregulated drug supply in 2018. New synthetic opioids may slow breathing, blood pressure, and heart rate to dangerously low levels, potentially contributing to overdose. Emerging opioids can be as powerful or more powerful than fentanyl, which itself is 50 to 100 times more powerful than morphine.
• Synthetic cannabinoids , sometimes called “K2” or “Spice.” Lab-made cannabinoids are chemically similar to the cannabis plant but may have very different effects. Newer synthetic cannabinoids include ADMB-5,Br-BUTINACA and MDMB-4en-PINACA. MDMB-4en-PINACA has been associated with hallucinations, paranoia, and confusion. These substances have been found in people who died from accidental overdose. 9
• Synthetic cathinones , also known as “Bath Salts.” Lab-made cathinones are stimulants that are chemically related to, but not derived from, the khat plant. People sometimes take synthetic cathinones as a less expensive alternative to other stimulants, but cathinones have also been found as an added ingredient in other recreational drugs. Emerging cathinones include eutylone, N,N-dimethylpentylone (dipentylone), and pentylone. These substances have been found in people who died from overdose. 10
• Synthetic benzodiazapines. Benzodiazapenes are a class of lab-made depressants that include prescription medications such as diazepam (sometimes sold as Valium), alprazolam (sometimes sold as Xanax), and clonazepam (sometimes sold as Klonopin). Recent data show that new versions of recreationally manufactured bezodiazapines include bromazolam, disalkylgidazepam, and flubromazepam. 11

How does NIDA support research into emerging drugs?

NIDA supports research tracking the emergence of new drugs into the unregulated drug supply, including via the National Drug Early Warning System (NDEWS) , collaboration with other researchers, partners around the world, and social media. The Institute studies or supports research on changes in the lab-made drug supply and how these emerging substances work in the brain, as well as their health effects and potential as therapeutic treatments.

NIDA also researches ways to prevent substance use and misuse , and studies whether and how harm reduction methods may prevent, reverse, or reduce rates of overdose.

Latest from NIDA

Law enforcement seizures of psilocybin mushrooms rose dramatically between 2017-2022

Can science keep up with designer drugs?

Xylazine appears to worsen the life-threatening effects of opioids in rats

Find more resources on emerging drugs.

• See recent data on Overdose Rates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). 
• Stay up to date on new and emerging substances at the National Drug Early Warning System website
• Early warning advisory on new psychoactive substances. United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Accessed April 15, 2024. https://www.unodc.org/LSS/Page/NPS
• Singh VM, Browne T, Montgomery J. The emerging role of toxic adulterants in street drugs in the US illicit opioid crisis . Public Health Rep . 2020;135(1):6-10. doi:10.1177/0033354919887741
• Gladden RM, Chavez-Gray V, O'Donnell J, Goldberger BA. Notes from the field: overdose deaths involving eutylone (psychoactive bath salts) - United States, 2020 . MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep . 2022;71(32):1032-1034. Published 2022 Aug 12. doi:10.15585/mmwr.mm7132a3
• Pergolizzi J Jr, Raffa R, LeQuang JAK, Breve F, Varrassi G. Old drugs and new challenges: A narrative review of nitazenes . Cureus . 2023;15(6):e40736. Published 2023 Jun 21. doi:10.7759/cureus.40736
• Ujváry I, Christie R, Evans-Brown M, et al. DARK classics in chemical neuroscience: Etonitazene and related benzimidazoles . ACS Chem Neurosci . 2021;12(7):1072-1092. doi:10.1021/acschemneuro.1c00037
• Benzimidazole opioids, other name: nitazenes. Drug Enforcement Agency. Issued January 2024. Accessed April 15, 2024. https://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/drug_chem_info/benzimidazole-opioids.pdf
• Papsun DM, Krotulski AJ, Logan BK. Proliferation of novel synthetic opioids in postmortem investigations after core-structure scheduling for fentanyl-related substances . Am J Forensic Med Pathol . 2022;43(4):315-327. doi:10.1097/PAF.0000000000000787
• Trowbridge P, Walley AY. Use of buprenorphine-naloxone in the treatment of tianeptine use disorder . J Addict Med . 2019;13(4):331-333. doi:10.1097/ADM.0000000000000490
• Simon G, Kuzma M, Mayer M, Petrus K, Tóth D. Fatal overdose with the cannabinoid receptor agonists MDMB-4en-PINACA and 4F-ABUTINACA: A case report and review of the literature . Toxics . 2023;11(8):673. Published 2023 Aug 5. doi:10.3390/toxics11080673
• Ehlers PF, Deitche A, Wise LM, et al. Notes from the field: Seizures, hyperthermia, and myocardial injury in three young adults who consumed bromazolam disguised as alprazolam - Chicago, Illinois, February 2023 . MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep . 2024;72(5253):1392-1393. Published 2024 Jan 5. doi:10.15585/mmwr.mm725253a5

UNRWA report: UN chief stands with agency, backs findings of probe into 7 October attacks in Israel

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UN chief António Guterres issued an appeal on Monday to “actively support” the UN agency for Palestinians, UNWRA, adding that he accepted the final findings of an independent probe into the organization, launched in response to unproven allegations that UNRWA staff had participated in the 7 October attacks against Israel.

The final report, led by former French foreign minister Catherine Colonna, was due to be released later on Monday. Ms. Colonna was also preparing to speak to journalists at a  scheduled noon briefing in New York as Chair of the Independent Review Group on UNRWA . 

“The Secretary-General accepts the recommendations contained in Ms. Colonna's report,” Mr. Guterres’s Spokesperson said in a statement. “He has agreed with (UNRWA) Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini that UNRWA - with the Secretary-General’s support - will establish an action plan to implement the recommendations contained in the Final Report.”

The independent review group presented interim report findings and recommendations to the UN Secretary-General four weeks ago. These included evidence that UNRWA had “a significant number of mechanisms and procedures to ensure compliance with the humanitarian principle of neutrality”, although “critical areas…still need to be addressed,” Mr. Guterres’s office noted at the time. 

The review panel – working with respected research organizations the Raoul Wallenberg Institute, the Chr. Michelsen Institute and the Danish Institute for Human Rights – announced that it would proceed with developing concrete and realistic recommendations to strengthen and improve the agency.

Gaza, West Bank violence unabated

The development came amid reports of further Israeli bombardment across Gaza at the weekend and concerning levels of violence in the West Bank.

In Rafah, the southernmost city in the Gaza Strip, the UN sexual and reproductive health agency, UNFPA , reported on Monday that a baby had been saved by emergency Caesarean section after its mother was critically injured in an airstrike and later died.

“Doctors in Gaza were able to save the life of the baby from the womb of the mother as she passed away from the head injury she'd sustained,” said Dominic Allen, UNFPA Representative for Palestine. The mother was 30 weeks pregnant when she died, along with her husband and the baby’s siblings, Mr. Allen noted.

Waiting for bombs to fall

In Geneva, the  UN Special Rapporteur on the right to health highlighted the huge toll on mental health that recent months and decades of violence have taken on the enclave’s besieged population and medical professionals. 

“Imagine living under the constant anticipation of a bomb or a gun, or being shot while you're trying to get food or water or play. That is in itself a form of violence,” said Dr Tlaleng Mofokeng. “To anticipate that your life could be extinguished in any moment and for children to grow up with that level of trauma is not normal. But for decades, that has been normalized for the people of Occupied Palestinian Territory.”

On a daily basis life continues to worsen for ordinary Gazans after nearly seven months of constant Israeli bombardment and a ground operation, launched in response to Hamas-led terror attacks in southern Israel that left some 1,200 dead and more than 250 taken hostage.

A child dies every 10 minutes in the enclave, UNRWA  said at the weekend, in a fresh call to end the violence and allow desperately needed humanitarian aid into the enclave.

To date, Gazan health authorities report that more than 34,000 Palestinians have been killed and some 77,000 wounded in Israeli attacks on Gaza since 7 October. 

Underscoring the looming health dangers from warmer spring conditions, UNRWA expressed renewed concerns over poor waste management and disease. In a post on X, formerly Twitter, Scott Anderson, Senior Deputy Director of UNRWA Affairs in Gaza,  warned that substandard water and sanitation were far below what the population needed to stay healthy.

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Turnout in U.S. has soared in recent elections but by some measures still trails that of many other countries

Voter turnout in the 2020 U.S. general election soared to  levels not seen in decades , fueled by the bitter campaign between Joe Biden and Donald Trump and facilitated by  pandemic-related changes  to state election rules. More than 158.4 million people voted in that election, according to a Pew Research Center tabulation of official state returns, amounting to 62.8% of people of voting age, using Census Bureau estimates of the 2020 voting-age population.

The 2020 voting surge followed unusually high turnout in the 2018 midterm elections , when about 47.5% of the voting-age population – and 51.8% of voting-age citizens – went to the polls.

This year, some political analysts are  predicting another heavy turnout  in this month’s midterms. According to a recent Center survey , 72% of registered voters say they’re “extremely” or “very” motivated to vote this year, and 65% say it “really matters” which party wins control of Congress – a level roughly on par with the run-up to the 2018 vote.

As the 2022 midterm elections draw near, Pew Research Center decided to revisit its occasional comparisons of U.S. turnout rates with those of other countries.

For our comparison group, we began with the 37 other countries in the  Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development  (OECD), a group of mostly highly developed, mostly democratic states. For greater diversification, we added to that group the six current candidates for OECD membership (Argentina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Croatia, Peru and Romania), as well as six other economically significant electoral democracies (India, Indonesia, the Philippines, South Africa, Taiwan and Uruguay), for an even 50 countries.

Political scientists often define turnout as votes cast divided by the estimated number of  eligible  voters. But eligible-voter estimates are difficult or impossible to find for many nations. So to compare turnout calculations internationally, we used two different denominators – the estimated voting-age population and the total number of registered voters, because they’re readily available for most countries.

Using both denominators, we calculated turnout rates for the most recent national election in each country as of Oct. 31, 2022, except in cases where that election was for a largely ceremonial position (such as president in a parliamentary system) or for European Parliament members, as turnout is often substantially lower in such elections. In countries that elect both a legislature and a head of state, we used the election that attracted the most voters. Voting-age turnout is based on estimates of each country’s voting-age population (VAP) by the  International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA). Registered-voter turnout is derived from each country’s reported registration data. (In some countries, IDEA’s VAP estimates are lower than the reported number of registered voters due to methodological differences.)

For most countries, we gathered vote totals from national election authorities or statistical agencies. For the U.S., which has no central elections authority, we compiled the total votes cast in the 2020 presidential election from each state’s election office, and checked them against figures compiled by the  Office of the Clerk of the U.S. House of Representatives (read more about the methodology ). We also drew data on reported registrations from the  U.S. Census Bureau .

One unknown factor, though, is how the many state voting-law changes since 2020 will affect turnout. While some states have  rolled back  early voting, absentee or mail-in voting, and other rule changes that made voting easier in 2020 – or adopted new rules that make voting more difficult or inconvenient – other states have expanded ballot access .

Even if predictions of higher-than-usual turnout come to pass, the United States likely will still trail many of its peers in the developed world in voting-age population turnout. In fact, when comparing turnout among the voting-age population in the 2020 presidential election against recent national elections in 49 other countries, the U.S. ranks 31st – between Colombia (62.5%) and Greece (63.5%).

The Center examined the most recent nationwide election results for 50 countries, mostly with highly developed economies and solid democratic traditions. The clear turnout champion was Uruguay: In the second, decisive round of that nation’s 2019 presidential election, 94.9% of the estimated voting-age population and 90.1% of  registered  voters cast ballots.

Uruguay’s voting-age turnout was followed by Turkey (89% in the 2018 presidential election) and Peru (83.6% in last year’s presidential election). All five countries with the highest voting-age turnout have presidential, as opposed to parliamentary, systems of government, and four of the five have – and enforce – laws making  voting compulsory .

In Switzerland, by contrast, just 36.1% of the voting-age population turned out in the 2019 parliamentary elections, the lowest among the 50 countries in our analysis. But that may have less to do with voter apathy than with demographics: More than a quarter of Switzerland’s permanent resident population (25.7%) are  foreign nationals , and hence ineligible to vote in Swiss elections .

When turnout is calculated as a share of  registered  voters, Swiss turnout rises to 45.1% – still the second-lowest among the 50 countries we examined. In Luxembourg, by comparison, changing the metric makes a dramatic difference: The tiny country’s voting-age turnout was just 48.2% in its 2018 parliamentary election, but 89.7% of registered voters went to the polls. Why?  Nearly half  of the population (47.1%) are foreigners.

Those examples illustrate how turnout comparisons between countries are seldom clean and often tricky. Another complicating factor, besides demographics, is how countries register their voters.

In many countries, the national government takes the lead in getting people’s names on the voter rolls – whether by registering them automatically once they become eligible (as in, for example,  Sweden  or Japan ) or by aggressively encouraging them to do so (as in the  United Kingdom ). In such countries, there’s often little difference in turnout rates among registered voters and the voting-age population as a whole.

In other countries – notably the United States – it’s largely up to individual voters to register themselves. And the U.S. is unusual in that voter registration is not the job of a single national agency, but of individual states, counties and cities. That means the rules can  vary considerably  depending on where a would-be voter lives.

It also means there’s no single, authoritative source for how many people are registered to vote in the U.S. The  Census Bureau  estimates that in 2020, 168.3 million people were registered to vote in 2020 – or at least said they were. Even so, that figure represents only about two-thirds of the total voting-age population (66.7%) and 72.7% of citizens of voting age. By comparison, 91.8% of the UK’s voting-age population was registered to vote in that country’s 2019 parliamentary election; the equivalent rates were 89.1% in Canada, 94.1% in New Zealand and 90.7% in Germany for those countries’ most recent national elections.

In the U.S., there’s a huge gap between voting-age turnout (62.8% in 2020) and registered-voter turnout (94.1% that same year). In essence, registered voters in the U.S. are much more of a self-selected group than in other countries – already more likely to vote because, in most cases, they took the trouble to register themselves.

Some states are trying to reduce that gap. As of this past January, 19 states and the District of Columbia  automatically register  people to vote (unless they opt out) when they interact with the state motor vehicles department or other designated state agencies. Three other states are on track to fully implement automatic registration in the next few years. And  North Dakota  doesn’t require voter registration at all.

Another complicating factor for cross-national turnout comparisons: According to the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA), 27 countries (and one Swiss canton, or member state of the Swiss Confederation) have laws making voting compulsory , including 12 of the 50 countries examined here. Overall, 14 of those 27 countries actively enforce their laws, with penalties including fines, inability to access certain public services, or even imprisonment.

How much difference such laws make is unclear. On the one hand, four of the five countries with the highest turnout rate (whether measured as a share of the total voting-age population or of registered voters) have and enforce such laws. In the eight countries examined that enforce compulsory-voting laws, voting-age turnout averaged 78.2% in the most recent election, compared with 57.6% in the four countries that have such laws on the books but don’t actively enforce them. But in the remaining 38 countries and Switzerland, which have no national compulsory-voting laws, turnout averaged 65%.

Although there aren’t many examples, there’s some indication that too many elections in too short a time can dampen voters’ enthusiasm. Consider Bulgaria, which has had four parliamentary elections in the past 18 months, as the leading parties have repeatedly tried and failed to form a stable governing coalition. Turnout was 58.3% of voting-age Bulgarians in the first election (April 2021), but steadily fell to 45.8% in the most recent one (45.8% earlier this month). And with a  splintered parliament  as yet unable to agree on a new government, weary Bulgarians may yet have to trudge back to the polls sooner rather than later.

Israelis had to go the polls four times between April 2019 and March 2021 before lawmakers were able to agree on a governing coalition; turnout among voting-age Israelis rose from 74.6% in the first election to 77.9% in the third, before falling back to 73.7% in the March 2021 vote. But the coalition that emerged nearly three months after that election fell apart barely a year later , and Israel is holding yet another election today, Nov. 1.

• Political & Civic Engagement
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• World Elections

Tuning Out: Americans on the Edge of Politics

Attitudes on an interconnected world, turnout in 2022 house midterms declined from 2018 high, final official returns show, what makes someone a good member of society, most americans say it’s very important to vote to be a good member of society, most popular.

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