The General Assembly held consultations of the plenary on System-wide Coherence on 13 March 2009, at UN Headquarters in New York, US.

The newly appointed Co-Chairs, Kaire Mbuende (Namibia) and Juan Antonio Yáñez-Barnuevo (Spain), announced the meeting through a letter dated 10 March 2009, and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon addressed participants, emphasizing the importance of coherence to improve the UN’s efficiency and efficacy, as well as the need to strengthen and simplify the funding system, including through providing predictability. Participants discussed, inter alia: finance; forthcoming substantive papers from the Secretary-General, as requested in Resolution 62/277, on finance and governance; the need to have a strong UN to respond to the economic crisis; and the need to strengthen the UN’s approach to gender.
Links to further information
Co-Chairs’ Letter, 10 March 2009
UN Secretary-General’s Noon Briefing, 13 March 2009