Excellencies, distinguished delegates, colleagues and friends,
Good morning and welcome to the nineteenth meeting of the Subcommittee on Policy and Programme Development and Management.
Over the next two days, you will review our programme performance, financing, future programme budgets and evaluation. Your guidance will help ensure that WHO continues to focus its efforts and resources where they make the greatest difference for our Member States.
Excellencies,
Over the past eighteen months, you have accompanied us through a period of significant change.
Together, we have responded to an increasingly challenging financial environment. Together, we have taken difficult decisions to ensure that WHO remains efficient, agile and fit for purpose. Throughout this process, we have remained guided by one simple principle: countries come first.
When you approved the Programme Budget, we committed to allocating 75 per cent of our resources directly to country offices. I am pleased to report that, by the end of June, we had gone even further. Seventy-eight per cent of allocated resources had been provided to countries.
At a time when every dollar counts, I believe this sends an important message. Even in times of financial constraint, we have protected country support because that is where WHO creates the greatest value.
But protecting resources alone is not enough. We must also ensure that every resource achieves greater impact.
The challenges facing our Region are evolving rapidly. Climate change, demographic change, new technologies, changing patterns of disease and an increasingly complex financing landscape all require us to adapt. If we are to deliver greater impact with limited resources, we also need to change the way we work.
That is the purpose of the Banyan Framework.
The Banyan Framework is not about launching initiatives for their own sake. It is about using practical initiatives to change the way WHO works, so that we become a faster, stronger and more responsive partner for Member States.
Some of these initiatives create new opportunities for countries.
Others transform the way WHO itself operates.
Together, they help us deliver better results.
We want to strengthen partnerships—not only among Member States, but also with development banks, academia, civil society and, where appropriate, the private sector. Many of the challenges we face are regional, and many of the solutions are stronger when we develop them together.
We want to move beyond fragmented, programme-by-programme approaches. Countries do not experience health through WHO programmes. They need integrated solutions that strengthen health systems while addressing multiple priorities at the same time.
And we want WHO to become faster and more responsive to country needs. Every Member State is different. Our support must therefore become more tailored, drawing on the best expertise across the Region and delivering it rapidly when countries need it. At the same time, we are simplifying internal processes and making better use of digital technologies and artificial intelligence so that more of our time is spent supporting countries and less on administration.
You have already begun shaping this new way of working during the High-Level Preparatory Meeting.
You endorsed the establishment of a regional collaboration on digital health and artificial intelligence. Our ambition is not simply another network. It is to help countries develop common approaches, learn from one another and accelerate the safe and responsible use of these technologies.
You also supported the development of a regional platform for health security. Diseases do not respect borders. By strengthening surveillance, intelligence and preparedness together, every country becomes stronger.
We are also strengthening regional collaboration on health systems, bringing countries together to address shared challenges in areas such as the health workforce and access to essential health products, so that countries can learn from one another and solve common problems together.
And we are transforming the way WHO supports countries. We are strengthening regional expert networks, simplifying processes, making better use of artificial intelligence and building a more agile support model so that countries receive faster, more tailored and higher-quality technical assistance. This work is already well underway, and we will continue to accelerate it in the lead-up to the Regional Committee.
Excellencies,
For me, this is the real purpose of the Banyan Framework.
Strategies will evolve. Priorities will adapt. New Regional Directors will quite rightly bring new ideas and new areas of emphasis.
But our commitment to working differently should not.
I hope we continue to ask ourselves one simple question:
How can WHO become an even better partner for Member States?
If we continue to ask that question—and continue adapting the way we work in response—I am confident that this Region will continue to deliver better health for the nearly two billion people we collectively serve.
I look forward to your guidance over the next two days and wish you productive deliberations.
Thank you.