Asia and the Pacific is a region of contrasts. It’s even a stretch to call it ‘a region’, given its size and spread. It boasts a rising middle class and some of the world’s fastest-growing economies. It hosts 66% of the world’s informal workers, millions still living in extreme poverty. It has some of the fastest growing centers of technological excellence. And it bears the brunt of over 40% of global natural disasters. These contradictions demand more than country-by-country solutions. They call for regional responses that are bold, collaborative, and future-facing. 

This is where UNDP comes in. The newly approved Regional Programme for Asia Pacific (2026–2029) is not just another development plan. It is an open platform, an invitation to rethink how we work together across borders to tackle the region’s most pressing multi-country and transboundary challenges. From climate resilience and biodiversity loss to digital transformation and human mobility, the issues we face do not stop at national borders. Nor do we. 

This Regional Programme is grounded in the realities of the region and shaped by over 100 consultations with governments, civil society, the private sector, and the UN family. It draws on independent evaluations, foresight tools, and multiple sources of data that help us anticipate where regional public goods will evolve over the next four years. It is aligned with UNDP’s new Strategic Plan (2026–2029) in its emphasis on integrated, systemic, and inclusive development solutions in the priority areas of UNDP’s offer. So, let’s unpack that. 

At its core, the Regional Programme is UNDP’s primary instrument to drive regional, sub-regional, and transboundary cooperation. It is designed to unlock investments and partnerships that exist largely—almost solely—at this level. It promotes and scales regional public goods and services that have the support and backing of governments, businesses, and communities alike and that benefit from multi-country perspectives and experiences. 

This is not theory. It is already happening. The Regional Programme incubated and now scales initiatives co-designed with national and regional partners, such as the Climate Finance Network operating in 18 countries; and the regional Business and Human Rights initiative active in 15 countries in the region. UNDP’s regional youth entrepreneurship and innovation platform has grown to become the UN’s largest and most dynamic youth programme, working with 30 countries in Asia and the Pacific. These are not pilot projects. They are proven models ready to grow. 

The Regional Programme is not an isolated, standalone initiative. It connects UNDP’s work at global, regional and country levels. At its best, it opens new avenues of engagement on tough-to-abate issues, it complements and amplifies the work of UNDP’s country offices in the region, and it provides platforms for knowledge exchange, and South-South and triangular cooperation in very hands-on ways. And, most importantly, it is how UNDP supports cross-border collaboration and joint responses to transboundary development challenges, that are often in politically and geographically hard-to-reach places.  

Why does this matter now?  

This is a moment to think and act “Asia-Pacific.” The Regional Programme brings together regional partners and coalitions to explore what human development needs to look like over the next five years, serving as a platform for shared ambition, investment, and accountability.  

With the deceleration of multiple development markers over the past few years, yes, including human development, the region is at an inflection point of great disruption. Deepening inequalities, exposure to economic shocks, exponential technological change as well as widening gaps in social protection, gender equality and climate resilience threaten to further reverse human development progress.  

Our Regional Programme offers a way to address these challenges together and to come together to collectively invest in the future.  

We already have several exciting initiatives that will reach new heights as part of this programme: 

• Youth Moonshot: In a region with 600 million youth, our future depends on how we invest in their potential. Youth Co:Lab is now entering a bold new phase—a big bet on scaling thousands of youth-led innovations into something more that helps to positively reshape societies and economies. As a one-stop hub supporting youth across 30 countries, we aim to reach 700 million youth through leadership and innovation programmes.
• Pacific Green Transformation: We are helping the Pacific to transform their energy future. UNDP is driving green, resilient growth in Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Timor-Leste, and Vanuatu by expanding access to clean energy, powering public institutions with solar, and equipping youth with climate action skills—with plans to scale up to more countries. Through this effort, in PNG for example, farms today deliver electricity at just 8 cents per kilowatt-hour - a reduction of 92% from the 2005 rate of $1.00 per kWh - making solar power more accessible and affordable than ever before.
• Future Ready Cities: Thirty cities across Asia-Pacific—including Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, and Vietnam—could accelerate circular and green urban transitions as part of our urban governance work. In partnership with Japanese municipalities, we will launch a city-to-city platform for inclusive, sustainable cities starting April 2026. And this is based on a  foundation of a Mayor’s Forum and our goal is now to support over 30 cities to co-create sustainable and inclusive urban futures and empowering over one million people to shape solutions for resilient urban living.
• B.R.E.A.T.H.E. (Mekong Air Pollution): This new initiative tackles air pollution in five Mekong countries by strengthening climate finance, building institutional capacity, and delivering cross-border solutions—putting communities at the center and scaling up clean air for millions.
• Project Vision: Leveraging our Economists Network, we are helping governments turn ambitious development strategy goals into measurable impact for the most marginalized, using anticipatory planning and advisory services so countries can invest in transformative “big bets.” The focus here is on the governance and implementation of economic reforms that work with and through multiple sectors, where the returns on human development are highest. 

We don’t do this alone. We work with governments, donors, the private sector, multilateral development banks, civil society and other UN entities. We are deeply grateful to our current regional programme funding partners—EU, Japan, Republic of Korea, Sweden, UK, the Netherlands and the GEF—and to our regional philanthropic and private sector partners. Their support is a vote of confidence in the power of regional cooperation.  

And we look to many more to partner with us on this high-value, high-return engagement that is UNDP’s Regional Programme – a platform that invests in the future by learning from the past and engaging boldly on the present.