On 7 March 2017, UNPOG received the study visit from the Afghan delegation which is composed of 6 government officials from the Office of the President and Ministry of the Interior Affairs and 4 experts from the UNDP Kabul. This visit was the second cooperation activity with UNDP Seoul Policy Centre which is the main organizer of the Afghan delegation’s two-week long study tour to Korea for having hands-on experiences with regard to ICT and e-government development in Korea. UNPOG’s first cooperation with the UNDP Seoul Policy Centre was made in 2013 when it received the study visit from the Iraqi delegation.

During the half-day training session, UNPOG made two presentations on i) building effective, accountable transparent and inclusive public institutions for the SDG implementation focusing on institutional arrangements; and ii) mobilizing ICTs and e-government for delivering the SDGs based on the results of the UN E-Government Survey 2016. In particular, Mr. Chung in his opening speech introduced UNPOG’s new approach to capacity development activities, which will firstly focus on development of the training modules after conducting capacity needs assessment of Member States and later on provide the module-based intensive training 6 to 8 target countries in next 3 to 4 years. He emphasized that this approach will for sure make sustainable and measurable impact on capacity enhancement of the UNPOG’s target countries by enabling systemic and regular trainings. There was also fruitful discussion on enhancing institutional coordination for the SDG implementation and further ICT and e-government development in Afghanistan. 

Due to the lack of the rule of law, weak democracy, and suffering from corruption, which severely hinder the SDG implementation in the country, the delegation expressed its strong wish to become UNPOG’s long term partner and receive capacity development support from UNPOG on a sustainable basis to help them strengthen public institutions. One delegate from UNDP Kabul Office also committed that he will work in collaboration with UNPOG to support Afghan government in capacity building of public institutions.

Mr. Balázs Horváth, the Director of UNDP Seoul Policy Center, also appreciated UNPOG's support and expressed his wish to continue to work with UNPOG if similar capacity development activities may happen in the future.