Follow-Up to the International Year of the Family

Invites Governments to continue their actions to build family-friendly societies, inter alia, by promoting the rights of individual family members, in particular gender equality and the rights of the child;

Urges Governments to continue to take sustained action at all levels concerning family issues, including studies and applied research, to promote the role of families in development and to develop concrete measures and approaches to address national priorities to deal with family issues;

Recommends that all relevant actors, including Governments, research and academic institutions and civil society, contribute to developing strategies and programmes aimed at strengthening the economic and sustainable livelihood of families;

Requests the Secretary-General to continue to play an active role in facilitating international cooperation within the framework of the follow-up to the International Year of the Family, to facilitate the exchange of experiences and information among Governments on effective policies and strategies, to facilitate technical assistance, with a focus on least developed and developing countries, and to encourage the organization of subregional and interregional meetings and relevant research;

Invites the Commission for Social Development, when adopting its next multi-year programme of work, to consider undertaking a review of the global situation of the family in 2004, bearing in mind that, in different cultural, political and social systems, various forms of the family exist;

Requests the Secretary-General to report to the General Assembly at its fifty-sixth session, through the Commission for Social Development and the Economic and Social Council, on the appropriate ways and means to observe the tenth anniversary of the International Year of the Family in 2004.