Oshan Gunathilake is a national UN Volunteer Specialist serving as Volunteer Management and Community Engagement Specialist with the project Youth Participation and Engagement for a Healthier, Equitable, Safer and United Sri Lanka. 

The UN system in Bolivia is implementing the UN Peacebuilding Initiative through the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and UN Women. Under the leadership of the Resident Coordinator's Office a

Bobae Lee is a Regional Gender and Climate Change Expert serving with UN Women Asia and the Pacific Regional Office. Her assignment is fully funded by the Government of Korea. 

The fourth State of the World’s Volunteerism Report (SWVR), Building Equal and Inclusive Societies, is designed to strengthen understanding on volunteerism and demonstrate its universality, scope, and reach in the twenty-first century.

Women's rights have been on the agenda of the whole UN system and its agencies over many years. Emanating from its triple mandate, UN Women has several key aims for their projects, focusing on empowering women, increasing women's political involvement, mainstreaming gender in national processes, greater economic security for women and ending gender-based violence. 

The report reveals that cooperation between volunteers and governments helps build collaborative decision-making. Despite the socio-economic impacts of the pandemic, global interest in volunteering has not waned, and volunteering in communities has endured, notwithstanding limited mobility and resources. While restrictions have prevented many people from volunteering in person, many have switched to volunteering online.

Bénédicte Kindji, from Benin, is an international UN Volunteer with UN Women. She supports the dissemination and availability of information, and is responsible for monitoring the office's legal issues. Additionally, Bénédicte assists in the management of administrative issues related to human resources, and promotes knowledge building and management.

I have always been interested in women's rights, gender equality and volunteerism. My first volunteer experience goes back to my undergraduate days when I joined the university's official volunteer programme, Ugnayan ng Pahinungod, which nurtures volunteers working with the Philippines' local communities. I also worked as an intern for the Huairou Commission in New York, which provided me with ample exposure to women's rights issues and an understanding of key global issues.

The COVID-19 Response Programme is jointly implemented by the UN Development Programme (UNDP), the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) and UN Women. The programme is supported by the governments of Finland, Italy and Sweden with the consent to remobilize USD 3.1 million to respond to the pandemic in Kenya.

Across the region, people volunteered to raise awareness of the need for urgent action for humanity’s future. Thousands more pledged to continue volunteering every year. UN Volunteers are important to our work with forcefully displaced persons in the region – thanks to them, we are able to reach people in need. --Ms Clementine Nkweta-Salami, Regional Bureau Director for the East, Horn and Great Lakes Regions of Africa, UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) said in her social media message