About the Event
The Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation, together with the Permanent Mission of Mexico and the Netherlands to the UN, convened a side event during the 2026 ECOSOC Operational Activities Segment. The event adressed one of the most persistent questions in UN development financing: why pooled funds and joint programmes still account for such a small share of country level funding, despite repeated global commitments.
The discussion took place against a backdrop of growing pressure on the multilateral system, and brought together Resident Coordinators, Member States and UN funding experts. As development financing becomes more constrained, funding continues to be heavily skewed towards earmarked and single-agency contributions, limiting flexibility, weakening national ownership, and making it harder for the UN to respond in an integrated way to country priorities.
Participants highlighted that pooled funds are valued not only for the resources they provide, but also for their ability to mobilise additional financing, enable innovation and risk-taking, and support more integrated responses to complex challenges. A key message was the need to shift the focus from “how much money goes to the UN” to “how much money does the UN help mobilise towards achieving the global goals. It was also underlined that commitments made at headquarters matter only if they are translated into decisions, partnerships and financing practices at country level.
Participants further stressed that national governments’ engagement is essential to advancing both quality funding and more coherent UN support. Drawing on findings from the 2026 qualitative review of the UN Funding Compact, the discussion pointed to a familiar but unresolved gap between global endorsement of pooled and flexible funding, and the incentives that still drive bilateral, earmarked and agency-specific funding in practice.
The programme opened with remarks by Programme Director Peter Linnér, followed by a presentation of the findings from the Funding Compact review by Programme Manager Sergiy Prokhoriv. Together with a panel with Resident Coordinators Pauline Tamesis, Stephen Jackson and Mohamed El Zarkani, as well as Member State perspectives from Mexico and the Netherlands, the discussion helped frame a forward-looking agenda for strengthening pooled funding, improving coherence between policy commitments and field practice, and shaping debate on the future of the Funding Compact beyond 2027.