UNGASS Guidelines on Construction of Core Indicators for 2010 reporting.
To assist Member States in preparing and submitting their 2010 Country Progress reports, UNAIDS has released the new UNGASS Guidelines on Construction of Core Indicators for 2010 reporting.
In adopting the 2001 Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS, Member States committed themselves to regularly report to the United Nations General Assembly on the progress made in their country’s response to the AIDS epidemic. The UN Secretary-General assigned the UNAIDS Secretariat the responsibility of developing the reporting process, accepting reports from Member States on his behalf, and preparing a regular report for the General Assembly. Member States submit Country Progress reports to the UNAIDS Secretariat every two years.
The new guidelines provide essential information on the composition of core indicators for reporting including the purpose of the indicator, methods of measurement and a summary interpretation of the indicator. The guidelines are also intended to ensure consistency of information across countries for accurate global progress analysis.
At country level, the progress reports are used to inform programmatic decisions, review national strategic plans and to inform resource mobilization efforts such as the development of proposals for the Global Fund. Furthermore, the country reports have also helped countries identify their gaps and weaknesses regarding data monitoring and evaluation. Country reports also enable open discussion and assessment of progress between the governments, civil society and other key stakeholders engaged in the national AIDS responses.
The data submitted in the next round of reports will be used by UNAIDS to monitor the progress made by countries towards achieving universal access to HIV prevention, treatment and care in 2010 and eventually in reaching the Millennium Development Goal of arresting and halting the spread of HIV by 2015. The data will also form the basis of a number of regular reports including the UN Secretary-General’s report to the General Assembly, the UNAIDS Report on the Global AIDS epidemic and the HIV section of the annual Millennium Development Goals monitoring report.
The 2010 reporting round
While there have been no changes to the UNGASS indicator set from the 2008 round, a number of changes have been made to the reporting process. Amongst these are the new reporting deadline of March 31st 2010, and the development of a system that allows on-line submission of reports through the UNGASS reporting web site. It is anticipated that these two changes will allow for more rigorous data analysis at country level prior to submission, and will streamline the cleaning and reconciliation of all data received.
The new UNGASS Guidelines on Construction of Core Indicators for 2010 reporting are now available electronically - printed copies and translations into French, Spanish and Russian will follow shortly.
Please direct all queries on UNGASS reporting to: ungassindicators@unaids.org.
