2007 Annual Report

Spanish Secretary of State for International Cooperation Leire Panjín (left) and UNDP Administrator Kermal Dervis (right) sign an agreement for a new fund affirming the benefits of multilateral cooperation.

The move signaled Spain’s commitment to multilateral cooperation and the future of the UN at the country level. The MDG Fund supports programmes in a number of countries jointly implemented by UN country teams. It emphasizes high-impact development policies, the scaling up of proven strategies and innovations in development practices.

The fund brings together knowledge and skills from across the UN system in the service of national strategies. It targets issues fundamental to the accomplishment of the MDGs and other internationally agreed development goals, including gender equality, culture and development, economic governance, youth employment and social integration, migration and the environment.

Spain has steadily increased its multilateral development assistance in recent years, giving the UN particular priority and integrating the Millennium Declaration into its own national policy. “(W)e are working together with an effective instrument, the United Nations system, and in particular UNDP,” says Spanish Secretary of State for International Cooperation Leire Pajín Iraola. “Only through a common effort—that of multilateral institutions, led by the UN, together with bilateral donors—will it be possible to realize the noble obligation assumed by all of us in 2000, the Millennium Development Goals.”