Duty of Care Task Force (now Occupational Health and Safety Forum)

In 2014, HLCM established a Working Group on “Reconciling Duty of Care for UN personnel while operating in high-risk environments” to launch a holistic examination (including fact-finding missions) of the programmatic need to “Stay and Deliver”, to assess how to achieve an appropriate balance between carrying out essential work in high risk environments and at the same time, preserving the safety and security of personnel delivering in those environments.

Following the work of the Working Group, in March 2016, HLCM established a cross-functional inter-agency Task Force chaired by UNHCR and co-chaired by UNICEF to implement the recommendations that had emerged from the previous stages of the work.

The Task Force identified a set of deliverables covering psychosocial support, health, human resources and administration and, safety and security. These deliverables covered the preparation, incumbency/during and post phases of deployment and were applicable to all UN personnel.

In 2019, during the second phase of its work, the Task Force’s terms of reference were expanded to encompass all environments and other categories of personnel as well as to integrate its work into a risk management framework.

The Task Force completed its work in October 2019.

mandates and sources

• Conclusions of the High-level Committee on Management at its 31th session (CEB/2016/3)
• Conclusions of the High-level Committee on Management at its 35th session (CEB/2018/3)
• Conclusions of the High-level Committee on Management at its 38th session (CEB/2019/5)

Relevant HLCM reports and documents

Please find the relevant HLCM reports and documents following the links below.