User Driven Programmes
	UNITAR’s training programmes are user-driven programmes. The programmes are thus designed to serve the specific needs of the partner countries. UNITAR works very closely with the various government ministries to evaluate the needs of the partner countries before developing each training activity. Hence, the input of the partner countries is vital to the successful implementation of the programme. This approach ensures that UNITAR’s training programme remains faithful to the objective of providing training to partner countries in areas where there are definite training needs.
	Multidisciplinary Approach
	It is through a multidisciplinary approach that the Programme has addressed the main functions of debt management. UNITAR believes that debt and financial management necessarily involves input from a team of inter-disciplinary experts including accountants, economists, financial experts and lawyers. Hence, the training programmes include participants who hail from each of these disciplines and provide an atmosphere where they can understand and appreciate the contribution of various disciplines (i.e. accounting, finance, statistics, law, etc.) in the different aspects of debt and financial management. In the past, this has allowed non-lawyers to understand the crucial role of lawyers in the borrowing process as well as exposed lawyers to broader themes of debt management including financial issues.
	Local Counterpart Input
	Besides using national and international experts, UNITAR also calls upon a team of focal points or national correspondents to help in the organizing of the workshops. These focal points are usually based in the partner countries and hence, give advice on the debt and financial management situation in the country, the set-up and nature of institutions and in addition, play a valuable role in raising awareness of the Programme’s work through their links with government ministries and universities. UNITAR relies more and more on local experts to conduct training along with an international expert.
	Inter-Agency Cooperation
	UNITAR works with regional, national and international institutions which are involved in debt and financial management issues in designing training programmes for partner countries. This allows UNITAR to avoid overlapping or duplication of other training programmes. Since 1998, all UNITAR workshops in debt and financial management conducted in Africa involved collaboration and cost-sharing with partner training institutes like ESAMI (Arusha), ILI - Uganda (Kampala), MEFMI (Harare) and WAIFEM (Lagos). Similarly, "Best Practice" studies will help government departments gain a practical insight into issues relating to debt, financial management and negotiation.
	Sustainability
	UNITAR strives to make the partner countries sustainable in the long-term in running their own training programmes in the field of debt and financial management. It is with this in mind that it emphasizes the use of national experts and focal points in organizing training programmes. The programme also creates innovative training packages and materials with a view to integrating them into the university curricula in partner countries. Collaboration and joint work with partner training institutes also leads to sustainability.