(Commonwealth)__The High Commissioners of the 56 member countries of the Commonwealth endorsed a new five-year strategic plan to guide the Commonwealth Secretariat between 2025 and 2030. The plan will ensure more competent, effective, and strategic assistance to the 2.7 billion people in the member countries of the association.
Development of the plan included extensive consultations with the member states, accredited bodies, development partners, staff, and other stakeholders. The goal of the open process was to ensure that the new direction accurately reflected the aspirations and expectations of the multiracial Commonwealth family. The exercise is also a realization of the vision of the Secretary-General, Hon. Shirley Botchwey, who, within her first few weeks in office in April 2025, reissued the challenge of the Secretariat to serve more and serve better in a world faced with common challenges.
The new paradigm rests upon three interconnected pillars that are democratic resilience, economic resilience, and environmental resilience. These three pillars collectively form the basis of the Secretariat’s activities in supporting inclusive, sustainable, and long-term development across the Commonwealth.
The Secretariat’s mandate will prioritize democracy resilience, placing the advancement of human rights, the rule of law, and good governance at the top. The overall mission to deliver democracy to all member states will consolidate the electoral processes and strengthen institutional accountability.
The second pillar that is crucial is economic resilience. The Secretariat will strengthen the efforts of promoting more balanced access to finance, inclusive trade, and sustainable debt management. These efforts should permit large and small states to achieve more balanced economic opportunities while providing them with resilience to external shocks such as global financial volatility or geopolitical conflict.
Ecological resilience will inform the Secretariat’s response to combat climate change, conserve oceans, and maintain natural resource use. The most vulnerable small island developing states to sea-level rise, natural disasters, and pollution will benefit most from this project.
The Secretariat will prioritize youth, women, and small states under each of the three pillars. The Secretariat formulates policies and activities with the interests of these groups in mind. Some of the key priorities under this policy are initiatives to enhance youth digital literacy through distance learning, promote youth entrepreneurship, and inspire girls to study science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.
To enable successful delivery, the strategic plan includes performance enablers and accelerators. The initiatives are making the Secretariat more effective by leveraging technology to enhance connections and innovation, as well as establishing partnerships to increase impact. The partnerships will particularly be important in tackling those that are interconnected, like health, education, and disability inclusion.
The strategy also depends on the close collaboration between the Secretariat and member states. Built on this new foundation of partnership, the strategy should create a space to drive development in the Commonwealth and entrench shared values of democracy, equality, and sustainability.
Its execution will be ensured by comprehensive project plans formulated by program teams to translate the strategic priorities into tangible life. The projects are quantified and phased in a manner that progress will be gauged and calibrated accordingly. The Secretariat will also continue to mobilize stakeholders and development partners to marshal the resources and expertise required to realize the plan’s ambitious objectives.
As the implementation phase of the strategic plan was reached, the Commonwealth Secretary-General took on the task of leading the recruitment of new international partners and marketing the new vision. In the weeks ahead, she will be leading a round of high-level meetings in pursuing Secretariat priorities and again looking for support on a wider basis. She will take the Secretariat team to the 25th Commonwealth Foreign Affairs Ministers Meeting (CFAMM) and related meetings on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York this month.
The 2025–2030 strategy plan signing off is a landmark for the Commonwealth Secretariat. In matching its programmes to the pressing priorities of its member states, the Secretariat has mapped out a vision for building democratic, economic, and environmental resilience. Underpinned by a commitment to inclusivity, innovation, and partnership, the strategy will be aimed at making a real difference to the people and the planet and cementing the Commonwealth’s relevance in an ever more complex and rapidly changing world.
