Thord Palmlund

I am writing to share the sad news about Thord Palmlund. Thord passed away on December 14th, 2024, peacefully at home in New York. His wife Susy writes “he’s off to his next adventure. He was at ease, comfortable, at home and in his bed. He went quietly. And the full moon out tonight is very bright. All good.”

Thord joined UNDP in 1988 to head the Management Development Program in BDP, created by the then Administrator Bill Draper. He brought with him the wisdom and skills garnered through his long and distinguished career in Sweden where he had held many positions including the SIDA representative in Pakistan, State Secretary for bilateral aid in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Director General of the Immigration Board.

In UNDP he was highly respected for his ideas and known as a supportive colleague who always had a lot of common sense and could be trusted to be principled. He was highly committed to ethical principles in development and to the UN’s role in the world. He pioneered human rights as a relevant issue for UNDP, and through the UN development system. Even long into his retirement, he stayed engaged in public policy debates, writing letters the Financial Times, calling for more humane and global perspectives in migration policies.

For me he was both a supportive colleague and a friend. Together with our respective spouses, we shared the enjoyment of concerts, discussing ideas and books, and good food. We will miss his home-made gravlax on brown bread with wasabi mayonnaise.

Sakiko Fukuda-Parr