The UNESCO Office, Jakarta is one arm of the global UNESCO body that is confronting the human challenges of the 2000s, an arm with reach over UNESCO’s full programme in all Sectors for the subregional cluster of Member States, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines (and from 2003, Timor Leste), as well as an arm that provides strength in science-based activities across the whole region as UNESCO’s Regional Science Bureau for Asia and the Pacific. Towards making these arms of UNESCO strong in meeting the needs of our Member States, the Director-General, Mr Koïchiro Matsuura, has embarked on a strategy of strengthening UNESCO’s decentralization of activities and relations to Member States. The idea followed of ‘Cluster Offices’ as the main platform for delivery of UNESCO programmes. These are offices that are multi-disciplinary so they can cover all aspects of UNESCO activity, and are directly responsible for (and can better serve) a small number, or sub-regional ‘cluster’, of Member States. During 2002 the UNESCO Office, Jakarta – in collaboration with the other UNESCO Field Offices through the Asia-Pacific (ASPAC) region, placed particular emphasis on drawing our respective clusters of Member States into the design of our shared medium term strategies for the region.
The first half of 2002 therefore involved proactive consultations with each of our Member States and rolling development and amendment, based on these interactions, of our Regional Medium Term Plan for ASPAC. In June, all of the UNESCO National Commissions of ASPAC Member States then met to review this Plan as well as to make inputs to the next two-year programme, the 32 C/5. The UNESCO Office, Jakarta, hosted this meeting in Jakarta at a small boutique hotel where emphasis could be placed on closer interactions and building the ASPAC UNESCO community. The meeting was successful in achieving aims of both strategic direction for the region – within the framework of UNESCO’s global objectives, and development of a greater sense of shared community.
The directions identified for UNESCO focus principally address the dynamics that have led to the legacy of intolerance and violence that has had such a poisoning effect on our world in 2002.
