The 2004 United Nations Namibia Common Country Assessment (CCA) is a tool for identifying the most critical development challenges facing Namibia. It will be used as the analytic basis for the formulation of the 2006 to 2010 UN Development Assistance Framework (UNDAF), which will guide integrated programming among the UN agencies working in Namibia. The method used is the human rights-based approach to programming, the starting point of which is an assessment of rights that are unfulfilled and their prioritisation on the basis of scope, scale and relevance to national and global development objectives.

The following issues were then given deeper analysis: the high prevalence of the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV); income poverty; environmental degradation; the heavy burden of preventable diseases and conditions; access to senior secondary education; and, the impact of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) on the education sector.

As a result, the following key areas most critical to national development emerged:

• Addressing the multiple impacts of HIV and AIDS through prevention, treatment and care with special attention on the most vulnerable households and communities; especially those caring for orphans;
• Ensuring household food security through economic growth and job promotion while ensuring environmental sustainability and addressing deep income poverty and disparities;
• Strengthening the capacities for governance, at the national, regional and local levels, encouraging the deepening of democracy and ensuring effective delivery of critical social services, especially to the most vulnerable groups.

In light of these broad areas of potential cooperation, the UNDAF will formulate two or three priority areas for more effective and integrated UN programming. Thus, the UN System in Namibia can better partner with others to focus on the issues most critical to Namibia’s development with the collective goals of contributing to the Government’s efforts to mitigate the impacts of HIV/AIDS, increasing household food security and enhancing institutional capacities.

Although there is a humanitarian crisis unfolding in Namibia and the surrounding region, this assessment concludes that there are still windows of opportunity available to the Government, the UN System in Namibia and their stakeholders through jointly embracing developmental and organisational opportunities that can combine to soften the impact of the Triple Threat and perhaps avoid it altogether.