The U.N.’s $3 Million Tent

I just came from U.N. headquarters, where, starting tomorrow, thousands of people from across government, civil society, and business will convene for a conference focused on implementing the organization’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals.

One of the venues in which they’ll meet is a tent that cost more than $3 million to construct.

I say “tent” because that’s what it effectively is — a building covered on the outside with white canvas — but this structure, called the SDG Pavilion, is so much more.

There are trees from the New York area planted on the inside; they will be replanted once the conference ends. There’s air-conditioning too, and a very sophisticated event space.

Surrounding the tent are small rooms containing exhibits for each of the 17 goals. They amount to an art installation that “assembles a cohort of cultural collaborators to bring each of the goals to life,” according to a sign that explains it.

So, who paid for this thing? The U.N. is perpetually cash-strapped, and funding from the U.S. ebbs and flows, depending on the presidential administration and congressional attention on the U.S. budget for international organizations.

A journalist who asked that question at a press conference today also pointed out that resources at the U.N. are stretched so thin that its agencies don’t have money for food rations in conflict-stricken countries such as Yemen and Syria.

U.N. deputy secretary general Amina Mohammed said that “the U.N. didn’t pay for it; its partners did.” When the journalist pressed again on the price tag, she said it cost “just over 3 million.”

“Some of this goes back to the community. Those doors that you see — the 17 — go back to the schools in the community in New York, and all these plants go back into the parks, and they are replanted.”