Ms. Kanni Wignaraja began her role as UNDP’s Assistant Administrator and Director of the Regional Bureau for Asia and the Pacific in November 2019. Before, Ms. Wignaraja served as the Acting Assistant Administrator and Director of UNDP’s Bureau of Management Services and as Special Adviser to the UNDP Administrator. Prior to this she was the Director of the UN Development Operations Coordination Office (UNDOCO) from 2014 to 2018 and the UN Resident Coordinator/UNDP Resident Representative in Zambia.
Ms. Wignaraja has over twenty-five years of experience with the UN and UNDP, working on the sustainable development agenda. She has a deep knowledge of the Asia-Pacific region, as well as the global, regional and country level workings of UNDP, across policy, programme, management and operations.
Prior to joining the UN, Kanni worked with the Ford Foundation in New York. Kanni has contributed to numerous papers, articles and conferences in areas of public policy, institutional reform, capacity development, human rights and leadership.
Ms. Wignaraja holds a Master’s degree in Public Administration (Development Economics) from Princeton University and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Bryn Mawr College.
When UNDP, the UN's development arm, opened its premises in the Maldives in the 1970s, the threat of "disappearing" was farthest from people’s everyday worries or development discourse. T...
アジア太平洋地域では、これまで数十年間進めてきた貧困と飢餓の削減に遅れが出ています。食糧安全保障を脅かし、かつてない規模で人々の移住を引き起こしているのが、気候に関連した深刻な災害です。
The Asia-Pacific region is faltering on decades of progress in reducing poverty and hunger. Increasingly, severe climate-related hazards are threatening food security and triggering human...
In the vast expanse of the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region, the pressing need to tackle the dual challenges of environmental sustainability and economic growth has reached a critical juncture....
Asia and the Pacific are often singled out as star performers in terms of poverty reduction. No statistic better illustrates this than the region’s monumental achievement of pulling 1.5 b...
At 4,200 metres above sea level, the remote highland community of Lunana – made up of a cluster of 17 villages – is a place almost untouched by visitors.
危机管理的第一条规则：当你发现自己跌落洞中时，第一件要做的事就是停止挖掘。
危機管理における第一のルールは、穴にはまったことに気付いたら、掘るのをやめること。
Rule number one of crisis management: When you find yourself in a hole, first, stop digging.
