Medium-Term Strategy 2002 - 2007 (31 C/4) UNESCO's Medium-Term Strategy outlines the Organization's major objectives for a six-year period. It is formulated around a single unifying theme – UNESCO contributing to peace and human development in an era of globalization through education, the sciences, culture and communication. It seeks to create a link between UNESCO’s mandate and role on the one hand and globalization with a human face on the other.

 

The 31 C/4 gives the Organization's five programmatic Sectors a common purpose and defines – for the first time – a limited number of strategic objectives, around which are built two cross-cutting themes. A substantive innovation built into the current Medium-Term Strategy is the mainstreaming of certain priority areas, namely Africa, the least developed countries, women and youth. UNESCO's Medium-Term Strategy is complemented by Regional Strategies that were developed with the contribution of all stakeholders in each region and which relate the Organization’s global strategy to the particular needs and specificities of its various geographic regions and subregions. The Medium-Term Strategy for 2002-2007 has a clear and direct relationship with the biennial Programme and Budget (document C/5) of the Organization. The Medium Term Strategy is elaborated by the Bureau of Strategic Planning, in collaboration with the Organization's various Sectors and in consultation with all Member States of UNESCO. It is approved during the meeting of the Organization's highest Governing Body, the General Conference.