Ashgabat, 11 May 2018: United Nations Development Program (UNDP) launched a new project “Empowering CSOs to participate in policy making and social service delivery” for implementation of Turkmenistan’s National Human Rights Action Plan for 2016-2020, adopted in 2016. The project is co-funded by the Federal Republic of Germany and Government of Finland.

The main objective of the project is to promote enabling environment at the national level and building capacity of CSOs to engage effectively in social service sector of Turkmenistan to implement and monitor laws, national programmes and strategies in a participatory manner in line with the country’s human rights commitments.

The event took place with participation of over 10 public associations and development partners of UNDP in Turkmenistan.

At the opening ceremony, Ms. Elena Panova, UNDP Resident Representative in Turkmenistan stated “UNDP supports strengthening of the democratic principles of governance in Turkmenistan through backing of the national institutions, developing human capital and supporting the civil society in the country. We are happy to see our international development partners supporting our efforts and actions in reaching SDG 16.”

The project aims at reaching two main results: first, conducting the baseline analysis of the social service sector, which foresees a study on the current supply and demand in social services sector. Second, strengthening of the capacity of CSOs on provision of social services and promoting the dialogue between the Government and CSOs, which will be done through the national forum on the role of NGOs in policy implementation and trainings on developing the skills and expertise of the CSOs.

The project also includes a study visit for experience exchange on the operation of the civil society sector in the field of social services provision and additional training on the national legislation for public organizations and procedures for engaging in public procurement.