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I. BACKGROUND
TheMontevideo Consensus on Population and Development was the outcome of the first session of the
Regional Conference on Population and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean, held in
Montevideo from 12 to 15 August 2013. It represents the most significant intergovernmental agreement
signed in the region in the area of population and development, and has become a key piece of the process
of reviewing the Programme of Action from the International Conference on Population and
Development (PA-ICPD) and its follow-up since 2014. In this respect, Resolution 2014/1 of the United
Nations Commission on Population and Development takes note of the outcome documents from the
regional conferences on population and development, and recognizes that they provide region-specific
guidance onpopulation and development beyond 2014.
The broad support that theMontevideo Consensus on Population and Development has received
in the region has enabled the countries of LatinAmerica and theCaribbean to adopt common positions in
international forums, and has shown a possible path whereby the global accord to implement the
Programme of Action from the International Conference on Population and Development beyond 2014
can be reconciledwith region-specific circumstances.
Although the Montevideo Consensus on Population and Development covers all the major
population and development issues in Latin America and the Caribbean and forms the basis for a
comprehensive, up-to-date roadmap for the future of regional action in this area, it requires a number of
additional clarifications tomake it into an operational agenda. This point is recognized in the conceptual
note prepared by CELADE-PopulationDivision of the Economic Commission for LatinAmerica and the
Caribbean (ECLAC), as technical secretariat of the Regional Conference, for the first meeting of the
Presiding Officers, which was held at ECLAC headquarters in Santiago on 12 and 13 November 2014.
There it was agreed that the second session of the Regional Conference (Mexico City) would have for
examination and approval a set of operating guidelines for implementing the Montevideo Consensus on
Population andDevelopment. It was also decided to create an ad hocworking group to prepare a draft of
such an operational guide, and that draft is the substance of this document.
In particular, agreement 13 adopted at the meeting of the Presiding Officers requested the
secretariat to work in consultation with the coordinator of the working group and its member countries,
with the support and collaboration of the United Nations Population Fund and with the active
participation of civil society, on the preparation of a draft proposal, based on the conceptual note
mentioned above, for the development of the operating guidelines. As well, the chair of the Presiding
Officers suggested that the outcome of the second session of the Regional Conference should be an
instrument that would offer countries not only clear and specific guidance for implementing the
Montevideo Consensus but also the means for monitoring that implementation, i.e. an instrument to
ensure that theConsensus is put into effect.
At its meeting in Santiago on 14 November 2014, the working group defined the scope of the
exercise to be performed with the priority measures of the Consensus, indicating that its work would be
geared to finding the most effective way to support their implementation and follow-up, without
establishing rankings or priorities among the measures. That exercise presupposed the definition of
possible lines of action, targets and tentative indicators, which the guide would present in specific tables
for each prioritymeasure in theMontevideoConsensus onPopulation andDevelopment.
