Human Resources Development

A/RES/72/235View PDF

Who created this mandate?

A Resolution of the General Assembly, under agenda item 23cHuman resources development, published in 2017.

What other versions does this mandate have?

12 versions · 2002–2024

This is an older version — the most recent is A/RES/79/224

2024A/RES/79/224Human resources developmentLatestCompare with previous version
2022A/RES/77/182Human resources developmentCompare with previous version
2020A/RES/74/236Human resources developmentCompare with previous version
2018A/RES/72/235Human resources developmentCompare with previous version
2016A/RES/70/220Human resources developmentCompare with previous version

Versions are identified automatically by matching titles within the same organ (~97% accuracy on a manual audit).

What subjects does this mandate have?

4 topics

Development Strategies Economic Development Human Resources Training Programmes

What does this mandate say?

32 operative paragraphs

Takes note of the report of the Secretary-General;

Calls upon the international community to place human resources development at the core of economic and social development and to develop short-, medium- and long-term strategies to effectively enhance human resources capacities, as educated, skilled, healthy, capable, productive and adaptable workforces are the foundation for achieving sustained, inclusive and equitable economic growth and development;

Encourages giving appropriate consideration to human resources development strategies in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development;

Stresses the need for Member States to emphasize and integrate human resources development into national development strategies, including national development policies and strategies to eradicate poverty and achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, in order to address structural and multidimensional challenges to enhancing national productive capacities and to ensure that human resources development implications are taken into account by all national development stakeholders;

Recognizes that comprehensive approaches to human resources development that address poverty eradication and the creation of a skilled workforce are also critical in reducing unemployment and brain drain and in promoting greater social inclusion;

Also recognizes that the future of work, impacted by progress in science and technology, requires adaptability and faster learning of new skills, which, in turn, require a shift towards early childhood education, lifelong learning and a comprehensive life-cycle approach to education and training, enabled, inter alia, through increased investment in teacher training and improved access to digital learning resources, especially in developing countries;

Takes note with appreciation of the establishment of the Global Commission on the Future of Work by the International Labour Organization;

Encourages States, the private sector and other relevant stakeholders to take appropriate steps, in accordance with their plans and policies, to help individuals to make well-informed choices in education, training and careers, develop an integrated system of quality education and training that responds to constantly evolving needs, promote employer recognition and career development based on skills and mastery and foster a culture that supports and celebrates lifelong learning, in order to provide opportunities for all to develop their fullest potential throughout life, regardless of their starting points, thereby improving their chances of staying gainfully employed, and calls for more effective support for developing countries in this regard, including from the United Nations system;

Encourages Member States to adopt and implement comprehensive human resources development strategies premised on national development objectives that ensure a strong link between quality education, training and employment, help to maintain a productive and competitive workforce and are responsive to the needs of the economy;

Stresses that human resources development policies should focus on supporting the emergence of a sufficiently wide and flexible pool of skilled human resources, especially among women and youth, to support all sectors of the economy and be matched with present and future workforce needs, which requires well-sequenced investments in basic education, vocational training, on-the-job training and more advanced managerial, engineering and scientific education to increase the supply of technological knowledge that can be absorbed by national innovation systems;

Emphasizes the need to adopt cross-sectoral approaches and mechanisms to identify human resources development needs in the medium and long term for all sectors of the economy and to formulate and implement policies and programmes to address those needs;

Recognizes that comprehensive and flexible science, technological knowledge and innovation strategies that encompass all sectors of the economy are critical to ensuring that skills are matched with labour market demand and ready to adapt to and benefit from a constantly evolving technology landscape;

Emphasizes that, when science, technological knowledge and innovation and human resources development approaches are mutually reinforcing, they can lead to a virtuous circle of economic growth, human progress and sustainable development;

Stresses that investment in human resources development should be an integral part of national development policies and strategies, and in this regard calls for the adoption of policies to facilitate investment focused on physical and social infrastructure, including education, in particular skills upgrading and vocational training in areas such as science and technology, including information and communications technology, as well as in capacity development, health and sustainable development;

Encourages Member States, as appropriate, to continue to implement nationally appropriate social protection systems and measures for all, including social protection floors, to adopt policies that strengthen existing safety nets and protect vulnerable groups and to take other appropriate actions, including boosting national economic performance, recognizes that social protection floors, defined according to national priorities and the individual circumstances of States, can provide systemic approaches to addressing poverty and vulnerability and can contribute significantly to successful human resources development strategies, acknowledges, in this regard, that many developing countries lack the necessary financial resources and capacity to implement such countercyclical measures, and in this regard recognizes the need for continued mobilization of additional domestic and international resources, as appropriate;

Encourages States to consider policies consistent with the International Labour Organization Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work and their obligations under all relevant ratified conventions of the International Labour Organization, and recalls the importance of promoting decent work for all and of increasing quality jobs, including through measures aimed at ensuring occupational health and safety and through working relationships based on effective social dialogue;

Stresses that human resources development strategies should include measures aimed at reducing unemployment and underemployment among young men and women and the long-term unemployed, who have been disproportionately affected by slow growth in jobs recovery, and to integrate underutilized human resources into the labour market through policies that promote skills development and productivity and reduce barriers to employment, including gender barriers, including by providing incentives, as appropriate, for recruiting, retaining and retooling, assistance in job-finding, job-matching and vocational and on-the-job training, and by promoting, inter alia, youth entrepreneurship, noting in this regard the call for action by the International Labour Conference in 2012;

Also stresses the need for Member States to retain and further enhance national human resources by boosting job-rich recovery and promoting decent work, including by adopting policies and incentives that enhance labour productivity and stimulate private investment and entrepreneurship and strengthen the role of labour administration and institutions in order to foster job creation, address the gender wage gap, reduce occupational segregation and increase the participation of vulnerable groups, including workers in the informal economy;

Emphasizes the need to address the interlinkages among human resources development, energy and food security, agriculture and rural development, and encourages countries to strengthen capacity in agriculture and rural development;

Encourages Member States to facilitate access to and apply environmentally sound technologies, and welcomes the launch of the Technology Facilitation Mechanism established in the Addis Ababa Action Agenda, based on a multi-stakeholder collaboration among States, civil society, the private sector, the scientific community, United Nations entities and other stakeholders, in order to support the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals;

Stresses that sustainable development is dependent, inter alia, on healthy human resources, calls upon Governments to continue their efforts to strengthen national health systems, urges the further strengthening of international cooperation in the area of health, inter alia, by considering the promotion of universal health coverage and through the exchange of best practices in the areas of strengthening health systems, access to medicines, expanding and transforming the health workforce, recruitment, training and development of health personnel, transfer of technology on mutually agreed terms and production of affordable, safe, effective and good-quality medicine, and in this regard also stresses that international cooperation and assistance, in particular funding, need to become more predictable and to be better aligned with national priorities and channelled to recipient countries in ways that strengthen national health systems;

Calls upon the international community, including the relevant entities of the United Nations system, to support the efforts of developing countries to address the adverse effects of HIV and AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis and other infectious diseases and to halt the spread of epidemic diseases, as well as the prevention and control of non-communicable diseases in Africa, Asia and other regions, and their effects on human resources;

Encourages Governments to facilitate investments in education, skills and decent job creation in the health and social sectors by taking note of the recommendations of the Secretary-General’s High-level Commission on Health Employment and Economic Growth and to avert the shortfall of 18 million health workers by 2030, building the human capital required to accelerate universal health coverage and global health security, recognizes that these actions are not only essential to the achievement of the health-related Sustainable Development Goals but will also generate benefits across the Goals, including the creation of decent jobs, the reduction of youth unemployment, the enhancement of women’s economic empowerment and participation and inclusive growth;

Calls upon relevant United Nations entities to support national efforts to build institutional capacities to address long-term national human resources development needs in addition to providing training to individuals;

Calls upon the international community to assist developing countries in the implementation of national human resources development strategies and encourages the international community, including the private sector and relevant civil society actors, to provide and mobilize financial resources, capacity-building, technical assistance and technology transfer on mutually agreed terms and to supply expertise from all sources, as available;

Calls for steps to integrate gender perspectives into human resources development, including through policies, strategies and targeted actions aimed at promoting women’s capacities and access to productive activities, and in this regard emphasizes the need to ensure the full participation of women in the formulation and implementation of such policies, strategies and actions;

Stresses the important contributions of the public and private sectors, respectively, in meeting national training and education needs to support the efficient functioning of enterprises and matching the needs of a rapidly changing economy, and encourages the integration of those contributions, including through the greater use of public-private partnerships and incentives;

Calls for actions at the national, regional and international levels that will give high priority to improving and expanding literacy, as well as science proficiency, including by providing tertiary, technical vocational and adult education, and stresses the need to ensure that, by 2030, children everywhere, girls and boys alike, will be able to complete free, equitable and quality primary and secondary education, leading to relevant and effective learning outcomes;

Encourages Governments to consider appropriate measures at the national level, such as upgrading human skills, better aligning educational and training systems to labour market needs and strengthening labour institutions and regulations to respond to economic downturns;

Encourages countries to maintain or consider enhancing measures to boost job-rich recovery, such as policies and incentives to enhance labour productivity and stimulate private investment, in addition to efforts to reduce budget deficits in the long term, as appropriate;

Encourages efforts by Member States and the international community to promote a balanced, coherent and comprehensive approach to international migration and development, in particular by building partnerships and ensuring coordinated action to develop capacities, including for the management of migration, and in this regard reiterates the need to consider innovative measures to maximize the benefits of migration while minimizing the negative effects of the migration of both highly skilled and low-skilled workers from developing countries;

Requests the Secretary-General to submit to the General Assembly, at its seventy-fourth session, a report on the implementation of the present resolution, and decides to include in the provisional agenda of its seventy-fourth session, under the item entitled “Eradication of poverty and other development issues”, the sub-item entitled “Human resources development”.

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