Quality assurance policy

Abstract

The present document outlines the quality assurance management system and approach at the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), including policies, standards, tools and guidelines, and organizational arrangements. It serves as an update of the ECA operational quality policy and plan for the period 2014–2017 (December 2014), building on the gains from the implementation of that plan and using lessons learned from that experience to introduce the required changes for a more systematic and improved quality management system and approach at ECA. The policy document is informed by the recently completed reform process at ECA and the ongoing United Nations global reform efforts of the Secretary-General. The purpose of the present document is to define how ECA will verify that its knowledge products and services are sound, relevant, well-tailored, timely, accessible, and influential in order to ensure that they are indeed fit-for-purpose and of high quality. It also considers the extent to which ECA products and services comply with legislative mandates and with United Nations policies and procedures. In that context, the document describes the coordinated activities that are required to direct and control the quality of the Commission’s work. The document is divided into three sections. The first section, the introduction, explains the purpose of the policy document, provides the background to it, and recalls lessons learned from previous years. Section 2 describes the ECA quality management system, including its operational definitions, the tenets of the quality assurance policy, and the ECA quality management approach. Section 3 outlines the organizational arrangements and resources that are required to manage and control quality at ECA.