Core resources remain the bedrock of UNCDF funding. They allow UNCDF to plan for strategic, integrated country presence in Least Developed Countries (LDCs) and bring a range of tools to help governments achieve their Agenda 2030 Commitments.

• They allow UNCDF to pilot and test innovative new models. UNCDF’s current core funding seeds the innovations that will be the flagship programs of the future.
• They fund the organizational backbone of UNCDF, help ensure the highest standards of transparency and accountability, enable rigorous monitoring and evaluation, assure retention of high-quality staff with deep technical expertise, and provide seed capital for our programs.
• They also UNCDF to maintain an on-going country level presence for the required duration of our maturity model. Our experience has shown that we need, on average, 12 to 18 months to develop a new programme, secure government and other stakeholder support, establish the multi-stakeholder partnerships needed to keep the programme running.

The target in UNCDF’s Strategic Framework for 2014-2017 is $25 million annually to ensure programme operations in 40 LDCs and support UNCDF’s work to leverage official development assistance (ODA) to secure additional public and private resources for investment.

UNCDF’s four window funding architecture provides maximum flexibility for contributing partners and is designed to allow robust and scaled-up programming in up to 40 LDCs: