United Nations, New York

United Nations, New York (main building)

United Nations, New York

United Nations, New York (close up of the flags - NZ in the distance)

Today I visited the United Nations, specifically the ‘Office in Charge of the National Information, Monitoring and Outreach Branch of the Division for Sustainable Development for the Department for Economic and Social Affairs’ – which was over the road from the main building (see far left). I was fortunate that one of the staff had read our draft reports 4, 4a and 5 on the Monday and the response was very positive. There were no factual errors nor was there any issue with the overall context. We did discuss the structures and best practice commonly adopted to progress National Sustainable Development Strategies and found that it was nearly always led by the entity directly assisting the Prime Minister (our equivalent of the DPMC in New Zealand). This information helped shape one of the final recommendations in report 4 – so the meeting was very useful. After this meeting I had the opportunity to meet other officials in different areas of the same Division and the Division’s Librarian.

Outside the United Nations

Outside the United Nations