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The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted access to water and sanitation as the first line of defence, enabling people to frequently wash their hands in line with good hygiene practices. Governments must take all efforts to ensure equitable access, especially for vulnerable groups (people living in…
Accelerating the transition to more sustainable and transparent global value chains needs to be at the heart of the fashion industry’s response to the severe socio-economic challenges and supply chain disruptions caused by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. According to the ILO, the COVID-19 crisis…
While the world is attempting to address major environmental problems of our times, such as climate change, biodiversity loss and deforestation, nitrogen pollution remains a major unresolved challenge, but has, so far, received very little attention from decision-makers. Everyone knows about…
The automation of information flows along digital trade and transport corridors has the potential to strengthen supply chains and help countries deal with the COVID-19 pandemic. Since May 2019, UNECE and its partners promoting trade facilitation in Ukraine, as well as Azerbaijan, Belarus, and…
By UNECE Executive Secretary Olga Algayerova and UN Women Regional Director for Europe and Central Asia Alia El-Yassir
Since the global outbreak of COVID-19, essential workers have been risking their lives in order to protect ours. No expense should be spared to ensure the availability and…
The UNECE region, in particular Europe and North America, has become the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition to the devastating impact on lives and health, countries in the region are suffering heavy socio-economic consequences. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is projected to fall by…
A new policy brief launched today by the Secretary-General highlights the particular risks COVID-19 presents to older persons. As has been widely reported, the fatality rate for older people is higher than for younger age groups and reaches five times the global average for those aged 80 and over…
Just about 6 months after the entry into force of amendments to the Gothenburg Protocol, representing an important step in international efforts to address the air pollution challenge, several expert groups under the UNECE Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution met virtually this…
We are living in one of those moments which define history. As it is always the case in such moments, the promise and peril of international cooperation, solidarity and multilateralism inevitably come under the spotlight, as evidenced by the overwhelming media attention given to governments’…
In the global fight against COVID-19, how can we reconcile reducing physical interactions to limit virus transmission with the need to keep supply chains operating efficiently? This is particularly important for essential products like medical supplies and food. However, keeping goods moving…
UNECE and the European Union continue to support pilot applications of the Strategic Environmental Assessments (SEA) in Belarus and Georgia in the framework of the European Union Water Initiative Plus programme for the Eastern Partnership Countries (EUWI+). SEA is an essential planning tool for…
The current medical and economic emergency has sharply questioned the preparedness of our infrastructure to provide acute healthcare and other critical services. Could it have helped, if Governments, the private sector and civil society had at their disposal a tool to determine if they are…
We live in a world designed by men, for men. Women are widely under-represented in the committees that develop standards that lay out the specifications for products that we consume every day, for personal protective equipment and for the infrastructure on which economies depend upon.…
Informal settlements are a significant problem for Kyrgyzstan’s capital Bishkek. According to the estimates shared by the city government, between eighteen and twenty-five percent of almost one million inhabitants of the city live in the forty-seven informal settlements around Bishkek. These…
To mark the 25th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action on gender equality, the latest UNECE Policy Brief on Ageing, developed in collaboration with the Government of France, explores the challenges of addressing gender gaps in ageing societies, providing recommendations…
Meeting in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States of America, 3 - 6 March 2020, PPP experts from around the world identified concrete steps for integrating resilience into infrastructure and PPP projects. The 10 PPP experts, representing the 8 Specialist Centres affiliated to UNECE (in China,…
On 8 March, we celebrate International Women’s Day with this year’s theme “I am Generation Equality: Realizing Women’s Rights”. We still have a long way to go. In October 2019, UNECE hosted a regional meeting to review the progress and discuss the challenges in the implementation of the most…
Bosnia and Herzegovina is taking action to improve its road safety situation. This is reflected in the country’s decreasing rate of road traffic fatalities – from 17.7 per 100,000 population in 2013, to 15.7 in 2016 (below the average for middle income countries of around 19 deaths per 100,000…
Representatives from the six countries in Eastern Europe and South Caucasus (EESC) and international experts met to discuss the preliminary results and recommendations of UNECE’s Subregional Innovation Policy Outlook (IPO) at the second meeting of the IPO national focal points, this week in…
Forests are high on the political agenda of Kazakhstan. The country has been developing a strategic document for the country’s forest sector, in collaboration with the Joint UNECE/FAO Forestry and Timber Section and international consultants, namely the draft of the “Master Plan for the…
The global garment and footwear industry is at a crossroads. Faced with growing economic uncertainty linked to global trade trends, the industry must also urgently become more sustainable and face up to its responsibility for the climate crisis. Total greenhouse gas emissions from textiles…
Ministers of Transport and high-level officials from across the globe will gather in Geneva from 25 to 28 February for the 82nd Session of the Inland Transport Committee (ITC). The meeting will discuss the greatest challenges of the modern world, in particular combatting climate change and…
The transport costs of the world`s 32 Landlocked Developing Countries (LLDCs) are on average 50% higher than developing countries that have access to the open sea. If containerized imports are considered, LLDCs have costs that are 85% higher than the world average. As a result, LLDC exports are…
Fisheries provide highly important social and economic benefits: global fish production is estimated at over 170 million tonnes, supplying around 21 kg per capita and year. As such fish and seafood consumption accounts for 20% of humans’ animal protein intake.Yet global fish stocks are under…
Excessive and inappropriate speed is one of the most important factors contributing to road fatalities and injuries in many countries. For the Philippines, the WHO Global Status Report on Road Safety 2018 rated national speed limit law enforcement at only 5 out of 10, indicating a critical gap…