The Country Cooperation Strategy (CCS) is WHO’s strategic framework to guide the Organization’s work in and with a country. It responds to that country’s National Health and Development Agenda and identifies a set of agreed joint priorities for WHO collaboration, covering those areas where the Organization has a comparative advantage in order to assure public health impact. The CCS is WHO’s corporate framework strategy to implement GPW13 with a response to country needs and priorities and addresses the Sustainable Development Agenda in health-related Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

As the public expression of WHO’s results chain at the country level, the CCS sets out clearly defined impact targets for each of the agreed priorities. It also provides input to the process of formulating key elements of WHO’s operational instruments such as the Country Support Plan, which is linked to the Programme Budget. The CCS brings corporate value to WHO as both a process and an instrument. It is recommended that each CCS should be aligned with the GPW13 and United Nations Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework. Wherever applicable the CCS should serve as the starting point for WHO work in that country. This will allow WHO and the Member State to deliver priorities through the CCS strategic framework and measure impact at country level, and to track health-related SDGs.

The timeframe is flexible to align with national planning cycles. It is generally 4–6 years. The key principles guiding WHO’s cooperation in countries and upon which the CCS is based are:

1. Ownership by the country of the development process;
2. Alignment with national health priorities and strengthening national health systems in support of the NHPSP;
3. Harmonization with the work of other organizations of the UN system and other partners in the country towards effective development cooperation; and
4. Collaboration with Member States' in shaping the global health agenda.