© UN Resident Coordinator Bosnia and Herzegovina 

Dr. Macdonald, you assumed the post of the UN Resident Coordinator in Bosnia and Herzegovina at the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Now, a few months later, the crisis is still here and no one knows when it will end. How do you see the role of the UN in addressing this crisis?

I was appointed as the United Nations Resident Coordinator for BiH in March, just as the pandemic was taking hold across the world. Eight months later, the pandemic unfortunately continues to dominate every aspect of our lives and has had a devastating toll on the lives and livelihoods of so many, especially those who were already the most vulnerable and marginalized in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Yet, we have also seen great community resilience and innovation, not least from health care and other frontline workers. The role of the UN has been significant in fostering or advancing such community response across the world.

The United Nations in Bosnia and Herzegovina has worked hard with our local and national counterparts in support of people across the country to address COVID19 impacts in almost all aspects of life, from health, education, social and economic recovery, migration, women’s empowerment and so forth. The UN in BiH has come together as a team to counter disinformation and provide verified information, technical guidance, policy recommendations and direct assistance. We conduct large-scale procurement of essential medical supplies and personal protection equipment; provide critical trainings and guidelines for medical health workers. We support education authorities and institutions with guidance and equipment; deliver assistance to the most vulnerable and at-risk groups; support women and children impacted by the escalation in domestic violence; and conduct economic, social and education assessments that provide the basis for targeted programmes and policy recommendations. We reprogrammed 41 million USD to support the COVID-19 response, and developed Concept Notes for further socio-economic support amounting to 26 million USD. We are currently working with the authorities on all levels to integrate socio-economic recovery plans.

What happens now with the UN 2030 Agenda and is it realistic to expect to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030?

We started 2020 aware that global projections showed the risk of not achieving the SDG targets by 2030. This is why we launched the Decade of Action to accelerate our efforts. However, the COVID-19 pandemic not only threatens to reverse some of the hard-won SDG gains, but also exposed some of the greatest disparities and inequities in our societies. COVID-19 revealed some of the weakest links in health, social and economic systems, including in areas of employment and work. At the same time, the pandemic presents us with a one in a generation opportunity to harness the recovery to build forward better with the SDGs at the core of our efforts. At the United Nations this requires that we work even more closely together across all of the agencies, funds and programmes – leveraging partnerships and financing with governments, international financing institutions (IFIs), civil society and the private sector. I am very proud to see how the UN Country Team (UNCT) in BiH, including the ILO Representative, have come together to develop an excellent COVID-19 recovery offer. Similarly, building upon each other’s strengths and programmes presents many possibilities for accelerating SDG delivery. For example, in BiH we clearly saw during the lockdown the untapped potential of local agriculture/food production, developing the eco-economy, domestic tourism, and enhancing innovation in business. Youth are also increasingly raising their voice, demanding a seat at the decision-making table and the opportunity to define their own future.

How can the ILO contribute to the overall UN efforts in addressing the socio-economic consequences of the COVID-19 crisis?

The ILO is an important member of the UNCT in Bosnia and Herzegovina and a key part of our ‘One UN’ COVID-19 response and recovery efforts. Due to various restrictions put in place to protect public health, sources of income for ordinary people and business sustainability have been unintentionally impacted. Job losses and high levels of economic recession means that poverty and inequalities have dramatically risen.

The UN is working hard to find a balance between protecting public health and promoting economic stability. ILO’s leadership in world of work issues, structured around the four key dimensions of rights at work, employment creation, social protection and social dialogue, have been indispensable in helping the UN, the authorities, the private sector and ordinary people move towards this balance. ILO has supported the UNCT in BiH to develop an integrated and coherent response to the crisis by focusing on workers’ safety and the sustainability of businesses and jobs.

ILO’s work with its tripartite constituents, namely the authorities, employers’ organizations and trade unions, has also been indispensable in ensuring an inclusive and multi-sectoral approach to the socio-economic recovery efforts. It is also important to acknowledge that in several countries ILO is supporting small businesses and their workers, working with other UN entities and authorities, to safeguard people’s livelihoods. ILO interventions help prevent women and men from sliding into poverty by working to promote gender responsive job recovery, noting how women are impacted differently than men during the pandemic.

Under the UN reform, the UN Resident Coordinator plays quite an important role in coordinating and representing all UN agencies in a country. How will you interpret this role?

As UN Resident Coordinator, my role is to represent the UN Secretary-General and the UN system more broadly, and to support and coordinate the wide scope of activities that our UN team does in BiH, especially the promotion of the SDGs. The UN is the sum of its parts, and these parts are linked together in BiH through the Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework: a 5-year joint plan signed with the BiH Council of Ministers and implemented in cooperation with all levels of authorities in the country. My role is to support and facilitate bringing together of the various parts of our system, to strengthen the complementary and coherence of our support and actions in country, thereby amplifying the impact of our contribution to the progress of the country.

I hope that through bringing our programmatic work together, we can also help communities and citizens across BiH recognize that they all have the same aspirations, needs and goals no matter their background. They can, and they should be able to, play a more active role in determining what kind of society and what kind of future they want for their communities and their country. This is where I see the driving force of my position and my office.

What have you done before coming to Sarajevo?

Before Sarajevo, I was the Deputy Director of Operations covering the Asia Pacific region with UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), and before that, Head of OCHA in Ukraine. I also served as a Director with the Peer-2-Peer Team where I supported Humanitarian Coordinators and country teams to strengthen their collective delivery of humanitarian response. Prior to the United Nations, I worked extensively with the international NGOs, with leadership positions in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Norway, Geneva, Sudan and throughout the Asia Pacific. One of my most interesting positions was as the Oxfam Mining Ombudsman from 2001 to 2005, where I investigated the human rights grievances of communities against mining companies across the Asia Pacific and Latin America.