Mr. Chair,

1. I have the honor to deliver this statement on behalf of the Group of 77 and China on agenda item 154: Budget for the United Nations Logistics Base at Brindisi, (UNLB), Italy, for the period 1 July 2021 to 30 June 2022.

2. The Group would like to thank Mr. Chandru Ramanathan, the Assistant Secretary-General and Controller, and Mr. Abdallah Bachar Bong, the Chair of the Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions, for introducing their respective reports.

Mr. Chair,

3. The Group welcomes the report of the Secretary-General A/75/744 and that of the Advisory committee A/75/822/Add.10 on the financing of Peacekeeping operations: UNLB, and once again recalls that the United Nations Logistics Base at Brindisi, Italy, has been in operation since late 1994.

4. The Group further recalls that the United Nations Logistics Base operates as a unified entity, comprising the Global Service Centre, Brindisi, and the United Nations Information and Communications Technology Facility, Valencia, both of which provide global geospatial, information and telecommunications technologies, logistics and supply chain operational management, as well as enabling support services throughout the life cycle of field missions, from start-up planning and preparation to liquidation.

5. The Group recognizes the important role of the UNLB in supporting peacekeeping missions to deliver their mandates, and therefore continues to believe in improving its functioning, performance and efficiency. In this regard, we will take interest in obtaining more information about the Staffing changes proposed by the center in line with the mandate approved by the General Assembly.

Mr. Chair,

6. The Advisory Committee as well as the General Assembly over the years have expressed concern about the transparency of the receipt and use of income from non-secretariat entities by UNLB without satisfactory responses. The Group would like to seek further information on the income obtained from other entities that are outside the Peacekeeping entities as well as detailed and transparent breakdown on how this income is used.

7. The Group notes the remarks of the Advisory Committee in regard to the proposal to redeploy the Regional Aviation Safety Office from the Office of the Director to form a new UNLB tenant unit named Aviation Safety Assurance and Safety Promotion Unit. The Group highlights the importance of clear and consistent policy as well as criteria in establishing tenant units. We would like to seek further clarification in regard to the proposed Regional Aviation Safety Office.

8. The Group notes with appreciation the efforts made to establish a scalability model for UNLB based on the estimation of full-time equivalents. The Group reiterates that the scalability model applied in UNLB should be in line with the scalability model applied to other centers of the United Nations Secretariat. We would like to seek more information regarding the application of sacalability model in validating the number of posts at UNLB. We also look forward to future efforts in refining the scalability formula, including workload factors, efficiency gains, and a clearer linkage between workload factors and full-time equivalent requirements.

Mr. Chair,

9. The Strategic Air Operations Centre of UNLB, the Transportation and Movements Integrated Control Centre and the Global Procurement Support Section of RSCE are parts of an integrated supply chain management approach. We encourage the Secretary-General to continue his efforts in improving the overall supply chain management in order to provide rapid, effective, efficient and responsible services to peacekeeping missions.

10. The Group assures you our readiness to engage constructively in order to reach a successful conclusion on this agenda item.

I thank you, Mr. Chair.