Information and Communications Technology, Enterprise Resource Planning, and Security, Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity

A/RES/63/262View PDF

Who created this mandate?

A Resolution of the General Assembly, under agenda item 118Programme budget for the biennium 2008-2009, published in 2008.

Who cites this mandate in the budget?

6 entities

A dot marks an entity citing this document in its “Mandates and background” narrative rather than only its Legislative mandates list. Many do both.

Extracted automatically from each entity’s budget submission.

Which reports were submitted under this mandate?

2 reports of the Secretary-General submitted under this mandate, 2009–2010.

2010A/65/491Status of implementation of the information and communications technology strategy for the United Nations Secretariat report of the Secretary-General
2009A/64/477Report on the enterprise content management and customer relationship management systems and proposal for a unified disaster recovery and business continuity plan revised estimates relating to the proposed programme budget for the biennium 2010-2011 under sections 28D, Office of Central Support Services, 29, Office of Information and Communications Technology, and 36, Staff assessment : report of the Secretary-General

Identified automatically from the metadata in each report’s UN Digital Library catalogue record.

What does this mandate say?

95 operative paragraphs

Reaffirms that the Fifth Committee is the appropriate Main Committee of the General Assembly entrusted with responsibilities for administrative and budgetary matters;

Recalls the role of the Secretary-General as the Chief Administrative Officer of the Organization, in accordance with the provisions of Article 97 of the Charter of the United Nations;

Recognizes the need for central authority to set common standards, provide an Organization-wide perspective, optimize use of resources and improve information and communications technology services;

Also recognizes the need for an integrated, global information system that makes possible the effective management of human, financial and physical resources and that is based on streamlined business processes and best practices;

Further recognizes the need for a global operational framework to enable the United Nations to respond effectively to emergency situations that may impair the operations of critical elements of its information and communications technology infrastructure and facilities;

Endorses the conclusions and recommendations contained in the reports of the Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions,, subject to the provisions of the present resolution;

IInformation and communications technology strategy and governance

Recognizes that the successful integration of central information and communications technology functions across the Secretariat is essential to achieving coherence and coordination in the work of the Organization and between the Secretariat and the funds, programmes and specialized agencies;

Notes the intention of the Secretary-General to establish the Office of Information and Communications Technology in a budget-and-staff-neutral manner;

Stresses the need for a simple and operationally effective information and communications technology governance structure with clear lines of authority and accountability;

Decides to establish the Office of Information and Communications Technology as an independent organizational unit under a separate budget section, to be headed by the Chief Information Technology Officer at the level of Assistant Secretary-General;

Emphasizes that there is no single governance model for information and communications technology that can be assumed to be solely appropriate for the United Nations;

Notes the considerable level of expertise in the International Computing Centre, and requests the Secretary-General to continue to utilize the services of the Centre in supporting the information and communications technology activities of the United Nations;

Requests the Secretary-General to ensure that the centralization and integration of the information and communications technology functions in the Office of Information and Communications Technology do not have any negative impact on the support provided to field operations worldwide;

Encourages the Secretary-General, as Chairman of the United Nations System Chief Executives Board for Coordination, to foster deeper coordination and collaboration among United Nations organizations in all matters related to information and communications technology;

Requests the Secretary-General, in accordance with its resolution 58/269 of 23 December 2003, to submit a revised strategic framework to the Committee for Programme and Coordination at its forty-ninth session in the light of the programmatic aspects of the revision arising from the creation of the Office of Information and Communications Technology;

Also requests the Secretary-General to report to the General Assembly at the main part of its sixty-fifth session on his information and communications technology strategy, including on:

Any necessary adjustments to the governance structure to make it simpler and operationally effective as a policy setting and management instrument;

An update on such management and reporting arrangements;

An in-depth assessment of the organizational arrangement, including the possibility of changing the placement of the Office of Information and Communications Technology in the structure of the Organization;

A comprehensive inventory of information and communications technology capacities across the Secretariat, including dedicated and part-time personnel;

More precisely identified and quantified efficiency gains or benefits expected from the implementation of the information and communications technology strategy;

The methodology and benchmarks used to identify and measure those benefits;

The roles and responsibilities of the Office of the Chief Information Technology Officer and the Department of Field Support of the Secretariat regarding information and communications technology activities, including on lines of authority, accountability and the division of labour set out in the new organizational structure;

IIEnterprise resource planning project

Recalls section II, paragraph 4, of its resolution 60/283, in which it decided to replace the Integrated Management Information System with a next-generation enterprise resource planning system or other comparable system;

Stresses that the implementation of the enterprise resource planning system should aim at consolidating the management of all financial, human and physical resources under a single integrated information system for the entire Organization, including for peacekeeping and field missions;

Recognizes the considerable operational and financial risks involved in the implementation of the enterprise resource planning system, and stresses the need for the Secretary-General to ensure full accountability and clear lines of responsibility for the project;

Notes the intention of the Secretary-General to implement the functionalities of the United Nations enterprise resource planning system in ways that would mitigate organizational and managerial risks;

Stresses the need to implement the various functions of the enterprise resource planning system across the global range of United Nations offices in a well-planned, step-by-step manner that ensures adequate preparation and training for each location and that minimizes the burden of change on the Organization and its resources, in order to further mitigate organizational and managerial risks;

Notes that the enterprise resource planning system provides for an integrated suite of information technology applications, as outlined by the Secretary-General in paragraph 20 of his report,3 and requests the Secretary-General to report on those applications to the General Assembly at its sixty-fourth session;

Approves the proposed governance framework of the enterprise resource planning project;

Notes that the enterprise resource planning governance structure proposed by the Secretary-General is distinct from the information and communications technology governance structure;

Recognizes that the successful implementation of the enterprise resource planning project requires the full support and commitment of senior management, as well as close and continuous engagement with key stakeholders;

Emphasizes that the enterprise resource planning project should be viewed primarily as a business project driven by business process demands and delivered through complex information technology systems requiring a high level of technical expertise;

Recalls that the objective of the enterprise resource planning project is to enhance the effective and transparent use of the resources of the Organization and, in that regard, emphasizes the need to identify tangible and measurable efficiency and productivity gains arising from the project;

Requests the Secretary-General to limit customization of the enterprise resource planning software to the extent feasible in order to ensure cost-effectiveness as well as flexibility in upgrading to new versions of the software and to report on any necessary customization with full justification of rationale and cost;

Also requests the Secretary-General, where customization for a particular function is unavoidable, to consider enhancing existing systems or using specialized software that can integrate with the enterprise resource planning system where it is more cost-effective in the long-term;

Stresses that changes to the working practices and business processes of the Secretariat should always be considered before undertaking customization;

Expresses its readiness to consider any duly justified proposal aimed at reducing customization, stressing that any proposed changes to the United Nations regulations must have prior approval of the General Assembly;

Stresses that, as a later adopter of the enterprise resource planning system, the United Nations can benefit from the lessons learned by other entities of the United Nations system that have implemented such systems;

Takes note of the overall resource requirements for the implementation of the enterprise resource planning systems for the United Nations as contained in the relevant report of the Secretary-General;

Approves the amount of 20 million United States dollars, comprising 5,110,000 dollars to be funded from the regular budget for the biennium 2008–2009, 7,050,000 dollars from the support account for peacekeeping operations for the period from 1 July 2008 to 30 June 2009 and 7,840,000 dollars from extrabudgetary resources for the biennium 2008–2009 for the implementation of the enterprise resource planning system;

Decides to approve the utilization of the amount of 2,346,000 dollars of interest accrued under the Integrated Management Information System Fund available as at 31 December 2007 to offset the regular budget requirements for the enterprise resource planning project approved in paragraph 18 of the present section;

Requests the Secretary-General to meet the regular budget share of requirements for the enterprise resource planning system in the amount of 2,764,000 dollars from the overall resources appropriated for the biennium 2008–2009 for the regular budget and to report the related expenditure as necessary in the second performance report for the biennium 2008–2009;

Authorizes the Secretary-General to enter into commitments in a total amount not to exceed 7,050,000 dollars for the support account for peacekeeping operations for the period from 1 July 2008 to 30 June 2009 in respect of the support account share for the enterprise resource planning project;

Takes note that an estimated amount of 7,840,000 dollars will be financed from extrabudgetary resources for the biennium 2008–2009;

Endorses the cost-sharing arrangement for the financing of the enterprise resource planning project proposed by the Secretary-General in paragraph 79 of his report;

Decides not to suspend the provisions for the application of credits under regulations 3.2 (d), 5.3 and 5.4 of the Financial Regulations and Rules of the United Nations, regarding the use of available balances in the surplus account of the General Fund and the unencumbered balance of active peacekeeping operations;

Authorizes the Secretary-General to establish a multi-year special account to record income and expenditures for this project;

Requests the Secretary-General to keep the enterprise resource planning governance structure under review and to report to the General Assembly at the main part of its sixty-fourth session on the enterprise resource planning project, including:

An assessment of the organizational arrangements;

A revised enterprise resource planning project implementation and updated budget, taking stock of the design phase, with a full and detailed justification of the resources needed;

An updated business case, including details on tangible and measurable efficiency and productivity gains in the areas of operation and administration to be achieved through the implementation of the enterprise resource planning system, as well as benchmarks for measuring progress and the anticipated return on investment;

Highlighting those modules that are essential for the implementation of the International Public Sector Accounting Standards;

An update on the implementation of the customer relationship management and enterprise content management systems, including further resources required, as well as the cost-sharing arrangement for their continued implementation;

Justification of the need, and options for, contingency resources, including a possible budgetary alternative;

Options for a reduced enterprise resource planning package at lower cost;

IIICustomer relationship management and enterprise content management systems

Recognizes the benefits of the implementation of the customer relationship management and enterprise content management systems, and requests the Secretary-General to continue to implement those applications throughout the Organization, as appropriate;

Stresses that the customer relationship management and enterprise content management systems shall be developed and implemented under the authority of the Chief Information Technology Officer in order to ensure a coordinated approach to the development of enterprise systems;

Emphasizes the need to ensure complementarity between the customer relationship management and enterprise content management systems with the forthcoming enterprise resource planning system;

Decides to approve additional resource requirements for the enterprise content management project in the amount of 2 million dollars, and requests the Secretary-General to meet the requirements from within the overall resources appropriated under the programme budget for the biennium 2008–2009 and to report on the related expenditure, as necessary, in the second performance report on the programme budget for the biennium;

Notes that implementation of the customer relationship management and enterprise content management systems is already in progress, and that at the time of the inception of those projects, the Secretary-General had not made a full proposal to the General Assembly;

IVSecurity, disaster recovery and business continuity

Emphasizes the need for appropriate information and communications technology security, disaster recovery and business continuity plans;

Requests the Secretary-General to consolidate systems in central data centres in order to strengthen disaster recovery and business continuity and to minimize the size of local primary and secondary data centres;

Also requests the Secretary-General to prioritize systems in order to minimize the cost of disaster recovery and business continuity;

Recalls section XV of its resolution 60/266 of 30 June 2006, and stresses the need to ensure timely and secure communications and information exchange within and between duty stations, as well as to ensure that a robust and fault-tolerant infrastructure is in place to continue or restart operations in the event of a natural or a man-made disaster or disruption;

Notes that the Secretariat lacks an Organization-wide approach to disaster recovery and business continuity, thereby exposing the Organization to considerable risks, and, in this regard, welcomes the development of a unified approach to disaster recovery and business continuity activities throughout the Secretariat;

Encourages the Secretary-General to take a unified approach to disaster recovery and business continuity, utilizing all available infrastructure, in order to achieve economies of scale and cost efficiencies;

Deeply regrets that the Secretary-General entered into a long-term lease for the proposed Long Island City data centre before the viability of the site as a secondary data centre for United Nations Headquarters had been fully established, and urges the Secretary-General to explore alternative uses for the leased space as a matter of urgency;

Notes with concern that the delay this caused may lead to further cost escalation, including to the capital master plan, and risk to data;

Notes the particular challenge of providing disaster recovery and business continuity to customized departmental information and communications technology systems, and encourages the Secretary-General to pursue an enterprise information and communications technology approach wherever possible;

Requests the Secretary-General to ensure that the United Nations uses enterprise data centres rather than local data centres as far as possible;

Decides not to approve the proposal of the Secretary-General for a new secondary data centre at this stage, and requests him to report to the General Assembly at the first part of its resumed sixty-third session on the risk mitigation measures to be taken during the relocation of the primary data centre to the North Lawn;

Requests the Secretary-General to submit a unified disaster recovery and business continuity plan, including a permanent solution for Headquarters;

Also requests the Secretary-General to fully explore the possibilities for consolidating and using the most reliable and cost-effective solution for data storage, business continuity services and hosting of enterprise systems, drawing on the experience of other United Nations entities and global developments in information and communications technology, and to report thereon to the General Assembly at the main part of its sixty-fourth session;

Encourages application and data re-engineering where it supports the long-term goal of managing data recovery and business continuity in system-wide enterprise data centres and where, from a long-term perspective, it is more cost-effective than hosting them at a local data centre;

Notes with appreciation the commitment of the Government of Spain, and approves the related proposal to host a secondary active telecommunications facility at Valencia, Spain, to support peacekeeping activities;

Decides not to proceed at this stage with plans to host computing and data storage equipment relating to Secretariat business continuity operations and enterprise solutions at the secondary active communications facility at Valencia;

Requests the Secretary-General to include, in the report requested in paragraph 13 of the present section, plans to reduce the number of local data centres at Headquarters, offices away from Headquarters and peacekeeping missions;

Endorses the cost-sharing arrangement proposed by the Secretary-General for the new primary data centre of the United Nations Headquarters;

Requests the Secretary-General to submit a proposal on cost-sharing arrangements in the context of the report requested in paragraph 11 of the present section on the new secondary data centre;

Takes note of the intention to meet the estimated requirements in the amount of 149,400 dollars for the establishment of the secondary active telecommunications facility at Valencia for the period from 1 July 2008 to 30 June 2009 from within resources approved for the same period for the United Nations Logistics Base at Brindisi, Italy;

Approves the amount of 7,145,500 dollars for the establishment of a new primary data centre on the North Lawn at Headquarters, of which 5,716,400 dollars is to be funded from resources appropriated under the programme budget for the biennium 2008–2009, and authorizes the Secretary-General to report the related expenditure, as necessary, in the context of the second performance report on the programme budget for the biennium;

Authorizes the Secretary-General to enter into commitments in a total amount not to exceed 1,429,100 dollars for the support account for peacekeeping operations for the period from 1 July 2008 to 30 June 2009 in respect of support account share for the establishment of a new primary data centre on the North Lawn;

Takes note of paragraphs 89 and 96 of the report of the Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions, and decides to approve the amount of 2.5 million dollars, to be funded from the regular budget for the current biennium, for the provision of disaster recovery and business continuity services to Headquarters, offices away from Headquarters and field missions, and requests the Secretary-General to meet the above requirements from within the overall resources appropriated for the biennium for the regular budget and to report the related expenditures, as necessary, in the second performance report for the biennium;

VInternational Public Sector Accounting Standards

Takes note of the first progress report of the Secretary-General on the adoption of the International Public Sector Accounting Standards;

Endorses the conclusions and recommendations contained in the report of the Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions;

Recalls that the General Assembly, in its resolution 60/283, approved the adoption of the International Public Sector Accounting Standards by the United Nations;

Underlines that the adoption of the International Public Sector Accounting Standards will improve governance, accountability and transparency in the United Nations system;

Recognizes that the enterprise resource planning system will serve as the backbone for implementation by the United Nations of the International Public Sector Accounting Standards;

Encourages the Secretary-General, as Chairman of the United Nations System Chief Executives Board for Coordination, to work within the Board to monitor the application of the International Public Sector Accounting Standards to ensure consistency within the United Nations system as a whole;

VICost accounting

Endorses the report of the Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions, subject to the provisions of the present resolution;

Takes note of paragraphs 12, 17 and 18 of the report of the Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions;

Notes that cost accounting is more suitably applied to the support services of the Organization and may not be suitable for use in the substantive work of the Organization;

Requests the Secretary-General to continue to improve the methods for calculating costs of support services, including through a framework for cost accounting in order to standardize current costing practices, and to report thereon to the General Assembly at its sixty-fifth session;

Also requests the Secretary-General to include, in the report requested in paragraph 4 of the present section, an analysis of other areas within the support services of the Organization in which cost accounting could be applied.

Paragraph content is machine-extracted from UN documents. For authoritative content, please refer to the official UN document.