Trends and opportunities

UNDP’s Funding Windows support good development outcomes for youth across the world. Resources are channeled to initiatives that provide young people with the skills, resources and opportunities needed to lead productive lives and contribute to their communities. Young people are often best placed to identify the challenges they face and develop effective solutions. Accordingly, many Funding Windows initiatives prioritize building the capacity and confidence of young people and youth-led organizations, including through innovative approaches and the use of technology and digital platforms to engage and empower young people. By investing Funding Windows resources in youth-focused initiatives, UNDP is not only creating positive development outcomes for young people today but also building a brighter future for generations to come.

In Djibouti, UNDP helped to develop a National Strategy for Youth and Culture. This strategy represents a milestone for the recognition of the rights and potential of young people, especially young women, as key development actors. Through the strategy, young people receive increased opportunities and tools necessary to play their role in promoting social cohesion throughout the country to the fullest. The recognition of the role of youth has generated a new dynamic for this critical group of citizens who are now able to engage more directly with local and national authorities in support of a sustainable social contract.

The rapid evolution of digital technology and digitalization has had a profound impact on international development, transforming the way development interventions are designed, implemented and monitored. In 2022, UNDP launched an updated Digital Strategy to “help create a world in which digital is an empowering force for people and planet.”

In the Republic of Moldova, Funding Windows resources allowed UNDP to advise the government to elaborate a new Digital Transformation Strategy. This strategy will help usher in an inclusive, gender responsive digital transformation process. In 2022, in support of these efforts, UNDP conducted a Digital Readiness Assessment for Moldova and partnered with the International Telecommunication Union to create a Digital Transformation Compact for Moldova. Additionally, UNDP facilitated a digital transformation simulation to showcase to national partners how digitalization can accelerate development in Moldova.

UNDP is committed to facilitating learning to enhance its development work around the world. UNDP's approach to learning is multifaceted, with the aim of – for instance – identifying emerging trends and technologies at the highest levels that could impact UNDP’s work, implementing a problem-driven approach to identify key challenges facing countries, testing and piloting new tools and methodologies for monitoring and evaluation (allowing UNDP to learn from its successes and failures), and building internal networks to enhance institutional capabilities for innovation and knowledge management.

In Morocco, through the Funding Windows-supported “Youth Aspirations and Abilities to Advance Nationwide Innovation” (YA3NI) UNDP helped to build the highly desired capabilities of young leaders in two fields: leadership and emotional intelligence, and business innovation. UNDP built digital capacity and ability to innovate of 150 young leaders through tailored training and mentoring programmes. A total of 95 percent of beneficiaries were satisfied with the capacity-building experience, and 97 percent reported that they can use the new knowledge and capabilities to provide innovative solutions in their work.

The interconnection between prevention, resilience, and the need to mitigate and minimize environmental stressors – including those stemming from private sector operations – came into sharper focus in the Funding Windows portfolio of initiatives in 2022. Efforts to foster prevention, peacebuilding, resilience and accountability through work related to climate and the environment are helping to ensure that related resources do not become conflict stressors, that actors are held accountable to do no harm, and that equitable, just approaches are applied to access and distribution.

For example, the Justice Futures CoLab developed UNDP's Environmental Justice Strategy and a programming guidance note to support countries in using a human rights-based approach for environmental action in order to reduce inequalities and reach those furthest behind. Catalytic seed funding was provided to five Country Offices to test and implement the new strategy.

In several contexts, the Funding Windows supported initiatives that cross-cut key demographic groups to root out causes of discrimination and inequality, including in situations where exclusion can spark violence.

In 2022, with support of the Funding Windows, UNDP improved the regional and municipal elections in Peru by helping to strengthen the Election Management Bodies legal and institutional framework. The efforts contributed to a more inclusive political and democratic electoral process, especially in comparison to previous sub-national elections held in 2018. For instance, the number of women candidacies for regional governor increased by 20 percent, and the number of women running for councilors at regional, provincial and district levels increased by 48 percent. Additionally, the 2022 regional and local elections resulted in the highest proportion of elected Indigenous authorities at the regional council level (14 percent). UNDP placed a special focus on under-represented populations such as women, youth and Indigenous Peoples​, which has resulted in a more effective exercise of their political and civic rights. UNDP supported the design, improvement and implementation of existing legal and regulatory frameworks – such as gender parity and alternation law, law to prevent harassment against women, and other actions to ensure that quota for Indigenous Peoples and youth were respected.