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Elder Lister
It’s moving season at the United Nations.
In the months since President Donald Trump unleashed his reign of foreign aid cuts, U.N. agencies have been looking to save money by accelerating the transfer of staff to more affordable cities in the global south, especially in Africa.
UNICEF, the U.N. Population Fund, and UN Women are transferring several hundred staffers from New York to Nairobi, Kenya, in part to save money, but also to station its workers closer to the beneficiaries of U.N. programs.
So how is it going?
“I’m not going to lie, like I was a little bit nervous,” said Yangsun Kim, a Korean junior professional officer with the U.N. population agency, on her August arrival in Nairobi, following a two-year stint at U.N. headquarters in New York City. But she said she had already fallen in love with the city during a previous visit, citing its vast greenery, national parks, and forests.
The posting, she said, has other benefits. Nairobi is centrally located, making it easier to reach her agency’s colleagues in country offices in Asia and Africa, and travel to other African countries is cheaper than transcontinental flights from New York, or to host African leaders in Nairobi. “In New York, it was really hard for us to call someone in Asia-Pacific areas, but here we are kind of in the middle,” she said. The World Summit for Social Development in Doha is in the same time zone. “We don’t have to worry about being jet lagged.”
African governments welcome the effort to bolster the U.N.’s presence in Africa at the same time that they have expressed concerns that a U.N. reform effort, known as UN80, combined with extensive U.N. layoffs, will ultimately reduce U.N. support for key African priorities, including development and peacekeeping.
“The reform must preserve and ideally enhance the ambition and quality of U.N. engagement in Africa,” Samba Sané, Guinea-Bissau’s U.N. ambassador, told the U.N. General Assembly in an Oct. 15 address on behalf of the Africa group. “Any realignment of programs or consolidation of entities should strengthen the U.N. presence of African countries and regions, rather than withdraw or centralize functions away from African duty stations.”
“Given what the continent offers in terms of geographical connectivity, reasonable cost of living, and other benefits, we believe it is very well placed to host many of the locations and the capacities proposed,” Sané added.
Some governments, including Rwanda, view the relocation push as an opportunity, and have openly lobbied to host U.N. offices. Rwanda’s former Prime Minister Édouard Ngirente wrote in a private May 15 letter to U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres that his government “is prepared to offer office facilities and essential services, while actively partnering on the development of a long-term U.N. Campus in the heart of the City of Kigali.” The Rwandan proposal, he said, “includes the full package of privileges, immunities, and tax exemptions in accordance with UN standards.”
But others suspect that while there may be some winners in Africa, there will be more losers. “Our concerns, however, are that these job cuts have significant negative effects, particularly on staff from developing countries,” a Nigerian diplomat told the U.N. General Assembly.
Still, there are some recent setbacks in Africa’s ability to play a larger role.
Opinion: Why the UN’s recent Africa relocation news matters
The announcement that key United Nations offices will be moved to Nairobi marks an encouraging step toward localizing the global body.
In 2023, Senegal’s former leader Macky Sall inaugurated a new compound, called United Nations House, in the city of Diamniadio, about 30 kilometers from the capital, Dakar.
The plan was to host dozens of U.N. agencies. But the U.N. is reportedly in a dispute with Senegal Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko, who has challenged the rental agreement. Botswana, meanwhile, had to cancel plans to host a U.N. conference for landlocked countries because it couldn’t afford it. But that is not an issue for the U.N.’s primary African hub, Nairobi, which has long hosted multiple U.N. agencies.
UNICEF is already in the process of shifting hundreds of positions to the Kenyan capital, though the move is not likely to begin till the beginning of next year. According to one UNICEF official, Nairobi would soon account for a larger portion of UNICEF’s global workforce than New York, but determining the number in absolute terms is difficult because it's all happening against the backdrop of global cuts.
Some staff have been asked to reapply for positions similar to their previous roles, but now based in Nairobi. While the transition has prompted uncertainty among employees about whether they will ultimately be relocated, staff sentiment appears largely pragmatic. “People are just happy to have a job,” one UNICEF worker said.
UN Women plans to relocate 160 workers by next year, according to a U.N. source. So far, about 20 people from UN Women have made the move, with more coming each week, according to the source. Though the bulk of transfers will take place next year.
UNFPA has already moved 120 staffers from Manhattan to the Kenyan capital, reducing its New York footprint by 25%. Even before the current crisis, in 2023, the U.N.’s Office of Project Services, or UNOPS, relocated 15 staff to its regional office for Africa from its headquarters in Copenhagen to Nairobi. That’s on top of Nairobi’s existing U.N. footprint, which already includes the headquarters of the U.N. Environment Programme and UN-Habitat.
The U.N.’s Nairobi offices were already in the midst of a major expansion before the latest round of cost-saving relocations began. Approved in 2023, the $340 million project includes new office blocks and upgraded conference facilities to accommodate the city’s growing role as a U.N. hub. Kenyan President William Ruto welcomed the move, saying his government was “glad that the UN has planned massive upgrading of the United Nations Office in Nairobi that will improve the work environment for staff and enhance its global operations.” The complex is still in the middle of that expansion, which could make it well placed to absorb the new wave of relocations.
The moves are part of broader efforts to cut costs, but they could have a very local impact. Real estate analysts say premium enclaves near the complex, such as Muthaiga, Kitisuru, and Lavington — where prices dipped earlier this year after USAID’s departure — may see renewed pressure. “One of the steps that is being considered is to put more of our operations into the field and into places where costs are lower,” Farhan Haq, deputy spokesperson for the secretary-general, told reporters, stressing that decisions still need board-level approval.
Still, the prospect of a bigger U.N. presence is proving popular among Kenyans. At least one survey from a local Kenyan publication suggests that most Kenyans — about 61% — are excited that more U.N. offices are moving to Kenya; with the next-largest share at about 30%, saying they felt neutral about it.
For Nairobi landlords, even the prospect has flipped the script. Global real estate firm Knight Frank is projecting upward price pressure, while local groups warn that government action — from boosting affordable housing to regulating property prices — will be needed to blunt the downside for Kenyans. How many people will ultimately move remains anyone’s guess, and it’s all happening as the U.N. trims jobs elsewhere.
“By moving posts from high-cost locations, we can reduce our commercial footprint in those cities and reduce our post and non-post costs,” the secretary-general told government representatives at U.N. headquarters. “We have already seen considerable savings in New York by terminating the lease of one building and moving staff into other existing premises, and we expect to close two more buildings when their leases expire in 2027.”
“We are taking bold and necessary steps to become leaner, more agile, and closer to the children we serve,” Catherine Russell, executive director of UNICEF, told her executive board back in September. “We are cutting core budgets at Headquarters and Regional Offices by 25 per cent. We are relocating about 70 per cent of Headquarters staff to lower-cost duty stations.”
For Alice Shackelford, who is leading the relocation effort for UN Women, Nairobi is a “very good duty station for families.” The expanding U.N. compound — which is set on 140 acres of gardens and woodland alongside the Karura Forest — offers a “great working environment,” she added.
“I mean, it's fantastic. It's got a vision. It's environmentally friendly. It is connected to nature,” she said. “The compound is growing and they are building more because more are coming.”
“If you think of the cost of life in New York, the amount of money that is spent on rent by UN staff in New York,” she added. “I mean I'm paying practically three times less for rent here.”
Still, Shackelford and others say the move to Nairobi is not only about money. In fact, most of the plans by U.N. agencies, including UN Women, to relocate were already in the works before Trump began slashing U.S. funding to the U.N.
“I would say most people are accepting the relocation,” Shackelford said.
The U.N. Population Fund, meanwhile, maintains that the move will require a one-time $10 million cost, but that the savings for staff rental and travel will amount to $3 million per year starting in 2026.
“Based on these estimates, it is anticipated that the payback period for the initial investment will be a little more than three years,” UNFPA estimates.
The 2022-2025 strategic plan called for the relocation of 120 employees from UNFPA’s policy, program, coordination, and civil society divisions in New York to Nairobi. However, the current financial crisis has raised the prospect that UNFPA and other U.N. agencies will be required to make additional moves.
Ian Richards, the head of the U.N. union in Geneva, Switzerland, and other insiders say a growing liquidity crisis, caused primarily by more than $1 billion in U.S. arrears, combined with the COVID-19 pandemic, demonstrated that the U.N. relief agencies didn’t need to be in New York. “I think they had a realization, especially during COVID, that actually it wasn’t so necessary to be in New York,” Richards told Devex in a phone call.
“The savings, I think, is not very much,” added Richards, who has weighed in on the virtues of staff relocation in two LinkedIn posts ( here and here) added. “Nairobi isn’t necessarily cheaper than some of the European places like Rome, Bonn, Vienna.”
In Washington, there are many who would like to see the U.N. pack its bags and leave the U.S. altogether, or be doomed to the same fate as the League of Nations. But Mike Walz, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., pushed back on that notion, underscoring the importance of competing with China for influence at the world body.
“Believe me, I understand [those] that say we should just shut the place down, turn out the lights on the embassy and walk away,” Waltz said at an Oct. 22 visit to the Richard Nixon Foundation. “I think there’s a much more nuanced calculation in response to that, because this is a space that our adversaries are competing on.”
“We still need one place in the world where everyone can talk, even if it’s the North Koreans, the Venezuelans, the Europeans, Russians, the Chinese. … We need one place in the world where everyone can talk, and I want it to be in the United States, not somewhere else.”
In the months since President Donald Trump unleashed his reign of foreign aid cuts, U.N. agencies have been looking to save money by accelerating the transfer of staff to more affordable cities in the global south, especially in Africa.
UNICEF, the U.N. Population Fund, and UN Women are transferring several hundred staffers from New York to Nairobi, Kenya, in part to save money, but also to station its workers closer to the beneficiaries of U.N. programs.
So how is it going?
“I’m not going to lie, like I was a little bit nervous,” said Yangsun Kim, a Korean junior professional officer with the U.N. population agency, on her August arrival in Nairobi, following a two-year stint at U.N. headquarters in New York City. But she said she had already fallen in love with the city during a previous visit, citing its vast greenery, national parks, and forests.
The posting, she said, has other benefits. Nairobi is centrally located, making it easier to reach her agency’s colleagues in country offices in Asia and Africa, and travel to other African countries is cheaper than transcontinental flights from New York, or to host African leaders in Nairobi. “In New York, it was really hard for us to call someone in Asia-Pacific areas, but here we are kind of in the middle,” she said. The World Summit for Social Development in Doha is in the same time zone. “We don’t have to worry about being jet lagged.”
African governments welcome the effort to bolster the U.N.’s presence in Africa at the same time that they have expressed concerns that a U.N. reform effort, known as UN80, combined with extensive U.N. layoffs, will ultimately reduce U.N. support for key African priorities, including development and peacekeeping.
“The reform must preserve and ideally enhance the ambition and quality of U.N. engagement in Africa,” Samba Sané, Guinea-Bissau’s U.N. ambassador, told the U.N. General Assembly in an Oct. 15 address on behalf of the Africa group. “Any realignment of programs or consolidation of entities should strengthen the U.N. presence of African countries and regions, rather than withdraw or centralize functions away from African duty stations.”
“Given what the continent offers in terms of geographical connectivity, reasonable cost of living, and other benefits, we believe it is very well placed to host many of the locations and the capacities proposed,” Sané added.
Some governments, including Rwanda, view the relocation push as an opportunity, and have openly lobbied to host U.N. offices. Rwanda’s former Prime Minister Édouard Ngirente wrote in a private May 15 letter to U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres that his government “is prepared to offer office facilities and essential services, while actively partnering on the development of a long-term U.N. Campus in the heart of the City of Kigali.” The Rwandan proposal, he said, “includes the full package of privileges, immunities, and tax exemptions in accordance with UN standards.”
But others suspect that while there may be some winners in Africa, there will be more losers. “Our concerns, however, are that these job cuts have significant negative effects, particularly on staff from developing countries,” a Nigerian diplomat told the U.N. General Assembly.
Still, there are some recent setbacks in Africa’s ability to play a larger role.
Opinion: Why the UN’s recent Africa relocation news matters
The announcement that key United Nations offices will be moved to Nairobi marks an encouraging step toward localizing the global body.
In 2023, Senegal’s former leader Macky Sall inaugurated a new compound, called United Nations House, in the city of Diamniadio, about 30 kilometers from the capital, Dakar.
The plan was to host dozens of U.N. agencies. But the U.N. is reportedly in a dispute with Senegal Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko, who has challenged the rental agreement. Botswana, meanwhile, had to cancel plans to host a U.N. conference for landlocked countries because it couldn’t afford it. But that is not an issue for the U.N.’s primary African hub, Nairobi, which has long hosted multiple U.N. agencies.
Rent’s too damn high
In Nairobi’s leafy suburbs, housing markets may soon get a jolt as U.N. agencies look to move people from high-cost centers to lower-cost hubs.UNICEF is already in the process of shifting hundreds of positions to the Kenyan capital, though the move is not likely to begin till the beginning of next year. According to one UNICEF official, Nairobi would soon account for a larger portion of UNICEF’s global workforce than New York, but determining the number in absolute terms is difficult because it's all happening against the backdrop of global cuts.
Some staff have been asked to reapply for positions similar to their previous roles, but now based in Nairobi. While the transition has prompted uncertainty among employees about whether they will ultimately be relocated, staff sentiment appears largely pragmatic. “People are just happy to have a job,” one UNICEF worker said.
UN Women plans to relocate 160 workers by next year, according to a U.N. source. So far, about 20 people from UN Women have made the move, with more coming each week, according to the source. Though the bulk of transfers will take place next year.
UNFPA has already moved 120 staffers from Manhattan to the Kenyan capital, reducing its New York footprint by 25%. Even before the current crisis, in 2023, the U.N.’s Office of Project Services, or UNOPS, relocated 15 staff to its regional office for Africa from its headquarters in Copenhagen to Nairobi. That’s on top of Nairobi’s existing U.N. footprint, which already includes the headquarters of the U.N. Environment Programme and UN-Habitat.
The U.N.’s Nairobi offices were already in the midst of a major expansion before the latest round of cost-saving relocations began. Approved in 2023, the $340 million project includes new office blocks and upgraded conference facilities to accommodate the city’s growing role as a U.N. hub. Kenyan President William Ruto welcomed the move, saying his government was “glad that the UN has planned massive upgrading of the United Nations Office in Nairobi that will improve the work environment for staff and enhance its global operations.” The complex is still in the middle of that expansion, which could make it well placed to absorb the new wave of relocations.
The moves are part of broader efforts to cut costs, but they could have a very local impact. Real estate analysts say premium enclaves near the complex, such as Muthaiga, Kitisuru, and Lavington — where prices dipped earlier this year after USAID’s departure — may see renewed pressure. “One of the steps that is being considered is to put more of our operations into the field and into places where costs are lower,” Farhan Haq, deputy spokesperson for the secretary-general, told reporters, stressing that decisions still need board-level approval.
Still, the prospect of a bigger U.N. presence is proving popular among Kenyans. At least one survey from a local Kenyan publication suggests that most Kenyans — about 61% — are excited that more U.N. offices are moving to Kenya; with the next-largest share at about 30%, saying they felt neutral about it.
For Nairobi landlords, even the prospect has flipped the script. Global real estate firm Knight Frank is projecting upward price pressure, while local groups warn that government action — from boosting affordable housing to regulating property prices — will be needed to blunt the downside for Kenyans. How many people will ultimately move remains anyone’s guess, and it’s all happening as the U.N. trims jobs elsewhere.
Money, money, money
Guterres says the move is saving the U.N. money.“By moving posts from high-cost locations, we can reduce our commercial footprint in those cities and reduce our post and non-post costs,” the secretary-general told government representatives at U.N. headquarters. “We have already seen considerable savings in New York by terminating the lease of one building and moving staff into other existing premises, and we expect to close two more buildings when their leases expire in 2027.”
“We are taking bold and necessary steps to become leaner, more agile, and closer to the children we serve,” Catherine Russell, executive director of UNICEF, told her executive board back in September. “We are cutting core budgets at Headquarters and Regional Offices by 25 per cent. We are relocating about 70 per cent of Headquarters staff to lower-cost duty stations.”
For Alice Shackelford, who is leading the relocation effort for UN Women, Nairobi is a “very good duty station for families.” The expanding U.N. compound — which is set on 140 acres of gardens and woodland alongside the Karura Forest — offers a “great working environment,” she added.
“I mean, it's fantastic. It's got a vision. It's environmentally friendly. It is connected to nature,” she said. “The compound is growing and they are building more because more are coming.”
“If you think of the cost of life in New York, the amount of money that is spent on rent by UN staff in New York,” she added. “I mean I'm paying practically three times less for rent here.”
Still, Shackelford and others say the move to Nairobi is not only about money. In fact, most of the plans by U.N. agencies, including UN Women, to relocate were already in the works before Trump began slashing U.S. funding to the U.N.
“I would say most people are accepting the relocation,” Shackelford said.
The U.N. Population Fund, meanwhile, maintains that the move will require a one-time $10 million cost, but that the savings for staff rental and travel will amount to $3 million per year starting in 2026.
“Based on these estimates, it is anticipated that the payback period for the initial investment will be a little more than three years,” UNFPA estimates.
The 2022-2025 strategic plan called for the relocation of 120 employees from UNFPA’s policy, program, coordination, and civil society divisions in New York to Nairobi. However, the current financial crisis has raised the prospect that UNFPA and other U.N. agencies will be required to make additional moves.
Ian Richards, the head of the U.N. union in Geneva, Switzerland, and other insiders say a growing liquidity crisis, caused primarily by more than $1 billion in U.S. arrears, combined with the COVID-19 pandemic, demonstrated that the U.N. relief agencies didn’t need to be in New York. “I think they had a realization, especially during COVID, that actually it wasn’t so necessary to be in New York,” Richards told Devex in a phone call.
“The savings, I think, is not very much,” added Richards, who has weighed in on the virtues of staff relocation in two LinkedIn posts ( here and here) added. “Nairobi isn’t necessarily cheaper than some of the European places like Rome, Bonn, Vienna.”
US to UN: Don’t leave us now
In New York, the U.S. has questioned whether the relocation of U.N. staff will put much of a dent in the U.N. finances. They would like to see cuts in U.N. benefits and composition, including education subsidies for U.N. employees.In Washington, there are many who would like to see the U.N. pack its bags and leave the U.S. altogether, or be doomed to the same fate as the League of Nations. But Mike Walz, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., pushed back on that notion, underscoring the importance of competing with China for influence at the world body.
“Believe me, I understand [those] that say we should just shut the place down, turn out the lights on the embassy and walk away,” Waltz said at an Oct. 22 visit to the Richard Nixon Foundation. “I think there’s a much more nuanced calculation in response to that, because this is a space that our adversaries are competing on.”
“We still need one place in the world where everyone can talk, even if it’s the North Koreans, the Venezuelans, the Europeans, Russians, the Chinese. … We need one place in the world where everyone can talk, and I want it to be in the United States, not somewhere else.”