About the report
Financing the UN Development System: Keeping the Promise is the 12ᵗʰ edition of this annual report series. It provides a comprehensive overview of how the UN Development System is financed, drawing on high-quality, disaggregated financial data and expert analysis.
The report comes at a critical moment. As global needs continue to grow, the resources available to address them are falling short. At the same time, the multilateral system meant to bridge this gap is under strain, facing eroding political support, declining legitimacy and increasing financial pressure.
Keeping the promise requires more than mobilising additional financial resources – it calls for improved quality of the funding. Predictable, flexible and well-aligned funding is essential for enabling the system to work coherently, plan for the long term and deliver effectively.
Part One: United Nations Resource Flows
Part one presents disaggregated financial data on the UN development system. It examines funding sources, allocation patterns, and emerging challenges.
Drawing on data from across UN entities, the analysis shows that funding to the UN Development system is declining and raises concerns around quality, predictability, and concentration of funding. The analysis aims to support informed decision-making towards robust funding arrangements for Agenda 2030.
Part Two: The Marketplace of Ideas
Part two brings together expert perspectives on the future of financing for the United Nations Development system.
The articles examine what is at stake as funding cuts affect the UN’s development work and consider how different funding modalities – including core, earmarked and pooled funding – shape the system’s effectiveness, responsiveness and resilience.
Together, the contributions look beyond immediate resource constraints to ask how the UN can be funded more strategically in the years ahead. They consider the implementation of the Funding Compact, the future role of European Union funding, innovative approaches such as restitution-based development financing, and the importance of political knowledge and oversight in sustaining support for multilateral financing.
The production of the annual report and the maintenance of the associated financingun.report website is a partnership initiative between the Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation and the UN Multi-Partner Trust Fund Office, including the UN Development Programme. The initiative is supported by a grant from the Swedish government.