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PACIFIC LINK
Australian Permanent Delegation Newsletter to the Pacific Community of UNESCO
Issue 21, 1/2006

2/2

Message from Ms Susan Pascoe
Chair, Australian National Commission for UNESCO

Ms Susan Pascoe

I am honoured and delighted to take on the role of Chair of the Australian National Commission for UNESCO. Most of you would know the former Chair, Prof Ken Wiltshire, who gave Australia and UNESCO distinguished service for many years. Ken has forged strong links within the Pacific and I am keen to maintain them.

He was also a champion of youth, and the Australian National Commission will continue his initiative in this area. Indeed we are pleased to be participating in the forthcoming Pacific Youth Forum.

I look forward to the meeting of Pacific countries on 5 June 2006 in Hanoi, before the ASPAC Regional Consultation on the Medium Term Strategy. It will be a good opportunity for people like me to get to know others and to identify areas of common interest for programmes and budgets for 2008-2013.

The original mandate of UNESCO has as much currency today as it did sixty years ago. We are privileged to have the opportunity to work collectively to promote peace and educational, scientific, cultural, communication and youth endeavours on a global scale.

Message from H.E. Mr S.T.Cavuilati
Ambassador, Permanent Delegate of Fiji to UNESCO

The Director-General’s commitment to the effective operation of the Tsunami Facility through its joint programme with the IOC, as well as to the Mauritius Strategy for the Sustainable Development of Small Islands Developing States, is greatly appreciated. The agenda, noble as it may sound, will however come to nought if efforts and the enthusiasm of the UNESCO staff responsible are not supported by the commensurate level of resources necessary for its implementation.

Initiatives such as those of the E-9, Cuba and other Latin American countries in pursuit of South-South Cooperation are indeed laudable. Such initiatives including efforts towards capacity building in the developing states members, are to be encouraged. The key role of National Commissions here cannot be over-emphasized just as much as the effective coordination they should have with respective cluster offices. The exchanges and sharing of experiences through such linkages would augur well for small countries like mine I believe who could do with practical and relevant strategies to help us expedite our agenda at the local level.

Being my first Board meeting, the experience was indeed an educational one. It was indeed more than a handful (and earful) for just one session! In any case, a consistent treatment of the array of subjects as they appear in documents that keep coming our way no doubt will help refine and deepen one’s understanding and commitment to the core themes of UNESCO. Human Nature and Human Life are everyone’s business: to enlighten and change for the better, protect and nurture.

I am indebted to all the Australian and New Zealand UNESCO Mission staff for their guidance and support and to Ms Anne Siwicki specifically for keeping us abreast of ASPAC activities and for the utility of Pacific Link. To the ASPAC Group members, we are also grateful especially for their leadership in the Board particularly on matters quite dear to us as a group. No doubt the Fiji team for the autumn session of the Board will come to find our friends’ support indispensable just as Ms Lisa Chang’s, the second Fiji Alternate, was to me during the 174th session; ‘vinaka vakalevu’ Lisa.

With that very brief comment on the recent Executive Board session, may I wish Pacific Link continued success and its readers enjoyable and informative reading always.


EXECUTIVE BOARD DECISIONS AT A GLANCE

The 174th session of the Executive Board, 28 March to 13 April 2006, urged the Director-General to continue to improve and develop the Draft Global Action Plan to achieve the Education for All (EFA) goals in two main ways:

(a) firstly, to develop a more specific and action-oriented plan with clear time-frames for action and, taking into consideration the mandate and contributions of each, determine a clear vision of responsibilities among EFA convening agencies;
(b) secondly, to include all relevant initiatives such as strategies, advocacy, capacity development, mobilization of resources, systems for monitoring and evaluation, exchange and dissemination of best practices, mechanisms for coordination and governance etc, into the action-oriented plan to make it as comprehensive and inclusive as possible.

• Reiterated the need for UNESCO to reinforce alignment of its programme activities in an intersectoral and cross-sectoral manner in order to bring about synergies bolstering effective capacity building; and to ensure that the elaboration of a concrete and coherent cross-sectoral capacity-building scheme is included in the preparation of documents 34 C/4 and 34 C/5.
• Requested that all appropriate steps are taken to assure that full implementation of the modalities of cooperation between National Commissions, UNESCO field offices and Headquarters, including consultation, be undertaken and assiduously followed.
• Requested that a compilation and comprehensive study be undertaken of all existing relevant international instruments and that means and modalities of action available to UNESCO be proposed for the purpose of furthering mutual understanding in order to overcome the still prevailing ignorance of each other’s ways and lives and of promoting peace, tolerance and dialogue among civilizations, cultures, peoples and religions.
• Noted with satisfaction the strategic approach agreed between the sectors of UNESCO concerned and the ongoing elaboration of an intersectoral action plan on an education programme for the sustainable management of freshwater resources and recommended that it should particularly incorporate knowledge of traditional systems of water management.


Australian Permanent Delegation to UNESCO
Jane MADDEN, Permanent Delegate
William THORN, Deputy Permanent Delegate
Tracey HAINES, Deputy Permanent Delegate
Anne SIWICKI, Policy Officer

4, rue Jean Rey, 75724 Paris Cedex 15
Tel: (33 1) 40 59 33 44
Fax: (33 1) 40 59 33 53
Email: anne.siwicki@dfat.gov.au
<http://www.france.embassy.gov.au>



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