Go Between 66, Oct.-Nov. 1997



UN NEWS

GENERAL ASSEMBLY WORKS ON UN REFORM

Virtually all heads of state and government,

and ministers who spoke in the opening debate

of the 52nd session of the General Assembly

paid considerable attention to the issue of UN

reform. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has

urged that this be the Assembly of reform,

based on his July report Renewing the United

Nations: A Programme for Reform to the General

Assembly (A/51/950, see also Go Between 65).

Some of the views expressed in the Plenary and

some of the issues addressed can be found on

pages 24-25.





UNITED NATIONS STILL ON  FINANCIAL BRINK 

Joseph Connor, UN Under-Secretary-General for

Management, said in October that lack of

payments by UN member states has put the

organization on a financial brink without

stability or liquidity. He said the financial

crisis has been caused by the late and

non-payment of member states, which have become

recurring practices on the part of many. This

has led to persistent intervals of regular

budget cash deficits, increased borrowing from

peacekeeping cash for regular budget purposes,

and debts accumulating to some member states

for troops and equipment. 



At the end of September unpaid assessments

totalled US$2.417 billion for the regular

budget, peacekeeping and international

tribunals. Mr. Connor said the major

contributor accounted for 60% of the total

amount owed to the UN, while the next 14

principal contributors accounted for 28%, with

most of that portion owed by just two member

states. Outstanding contributions to the

regular budget (not including peacekeeping and

international tribunal contributions) amounted

to US$649 million at the end of September, and

the largest contributor owed 77% of that

amount. So far this year the UN has received

US$972 million against regular budget

assessments, but this included payment of prior

years  assessments.



Mr. Connor said the regular budget is forecast

to end 1997 with a deficit of US$272 million.

He added that peacekeeping cash is dwindling;

usable cash at the end of September amounted to

US$745 million and is forecasted to end the

year with US$670 million. Disbursements

exceeded receipts from May through August 1997

and would likely do the same in November and

December.





UN SECURITY COUNCIL MEETS ON AFRICA

Concerned by the number and intensity of armed

conflicts on the African continent and their

effects on sustainable economic and social

development, the UN Security Council held a

ministerial meeting on 25 September to consider

the need for concerted international efforts to

promote peace and security in Africa. The open

meeting was attended by foreign ministers of

Security Council member states and

representatives of observer governments,

interested agencies and organizations.



UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan noted the  new

consensus that the primary responsibility for

the solution of Africa s problems rests with

Africans themselves.  But this consensus brings

with it a realization of the role and

responsibilities of the international community

in support of Africa s goals.  In place of

interventionism, it promises a mature

relationship based on mutual support and

trust,  he explained.



The current chair of the Organization of

African Unity (OAU), Robert Mugabe, President

of Zimbabwe, emphasized that peace and security

cannot be attained  in conditions of abject

poverty as prevalent as in Africa today.  Mr.

Salim Ahmed Salim, Secretary-General of the

OAU, emphasized the importance of close

cooperation between the OAU and the United

Nations, while other African government

representatives noted the importance of paying

heed to African positions when deciding matters

related to the continent s well-being.



Keizo Obuchi, Japan s Minister for Foreign

Affairs, noted that success in resolving

African problems will be a test of the

effectiveness of the Security Council as the

principal UN organ primarily responsible for

maintaining international peace and security.

He announced Japan s intention to convene an

International Conference on Preventive Strategy

in Tokyo in January 1998, which will focus on

Africa. 



Oxfam International said it welcomes the

council s initiative and called on the UN,

World Bank, International Monetary Fund (IMF)

and other international institutions and

governments to adopt a more comprehensive

approach to tackling conflict. It said greater

coherence across all political, economic,

military and humanitarian policies would ensure

that they reinforce rather than undermine one

another. Oxfam also recommended undertaking a

 conflict impact assessment  to be applied to

all international economic, trade, aid and

investment policies when a region is subject to

conflict or instability.



The council has asked the UN Secretary-General

to produce a report containing concrete

recommendations regarding the sources of

conflict in Africa, ways to prevent and address

these conflicts, and how to lay the foundation

for durable peace and economic growth. The

report is to be submitted to the council by

February 1998 and to the General Assembly and

other relevant UN bodies for appropriate

action. 



Contact: NGLS, Room FF-346, 304 East 45th

Street, New York NY 10017, United States,

telephone +1-212/963 3125, fax +1-212/963 8712,

e-mail <ngls@undp.org>. The press release

(S/6420) containing the presidential statement

of the meeting is available on the UN web site

(http://www.un.org).





UNCTAD TRADE AND DEVELOPMENT BOARD MEETS

The Trade and Development Board of the UN

Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD),

which held its 44th session from 13-24 October

in Geneva, discussed inter alia issues related

to globalization; interdependence; income

distribution and growth; special problems of

least developed countries and Africa,

particularly agricultural reform; and

 economies in regress.  Discussions were based

primarily on reviews of the two annual reports

recently published by UNCTAD: Trade and

Development Report 1997 and The Least Developed

Countries 1997 Report. 



The high level segment of the board discussed

these issues in relation to the theme

 Globalization, Competition, Competitiveness

and Development.  A later session, jointly held

with the Second Committee of the General

Assembly in New York via video conference,

focused on the prospects for electronic

commerce. The segment closed by launching a

Partners for Development meeting between

UNCTAD, the private sector and NGOs, to be held

in Lyon (France) from 9-13 November 1998. 



The board s Commission on Investment,

Technology and Related Financial Matters

previously reviewed UNCTAD s World Investment

Report 1997 at its second session, held from 29

September-3 October in Geneva. At that time the

commission discussed the issue of

liberalization and competition policy, and

criteria for assessing the

 development-friendliness  of investment

treaties. (For more detailed coverage see NGLS

Roundup, November 1997.)



Contact: Jo Butler, External Relations, UNCTAD,

Palais des Nations, CH-1211 Geneva, telephone

+41-22/907 5048, fax +41-22/907 0043, e-mail

<jo.butler@unctad.org>. 





51ST GENERAL ASSEMBLY CONCLUDES

The 51st session of the UN General Assembly was

a time of  discarding the syndrome of business

as usual,  according to the session s outgoing

President Razali Ismail (Malaysia), when

bringing it to a close on 15 September.  The

United Nations has not yet found a formula to

become a universal house which can defuse the

debilitating aspects of power politics, nor to

overcome bilateral and subregional hostilities

which stand in the way of effectualizing the

universal values of the Charter,  he said.  At

the end of the day, the unfinished business and

the inertia that accompanies it is because of

entrenched national positions and their

attendant politics. 



The GA President said the  financial crippling

of the United Nations continues to obstruct the

momentum for reform, preventing constructive

negotiations for genuine reform of the

organization. Arguments about complicated

legislative procedures, attaching arbitrary

conditions to payments and using the media to

cast a different version do not reduce what is

simply a solemn treaty obligation. Blind

unilateralism will be the undoing of the United

Nations.  Mr. Razali said the UN will not be

strengthened if reform concentrates only on

cost-effectiveness, efficiency and better

coordination; instead such objectives alone

would divert attention from the United Nations 

real functions and Charter responsibilities.

 If the United Nations is to survive,  he

added,  it has to transform itself from an

organization serving only the interests of

states to one serving the interests of peoples

living in an interdependent and global

society.  He also cited as discouraging the as

yet unfulfilled comprehensive package to reform

the UN Security Council.



Mr. Razali said that the issue of NGO

participation in the work of the UN remains

unresolved, despite extensive efforts to

clarify and move it forward in the General

Assembly subgroup on NGOs (see Go Between 64).

 While some are concerned about the logistical

aspects of dealing with NGOs claiming that

there are not enough seats nor enough meeting

time to cater for them,  he said,  some in fact

fear the prospects of greater transparency,

accountability and public participation in the

intergovernmental decision-making process,

using any manner of legal arguments to prevent

this from happening.  He noted that this

approach exemplifies how governments treat the

UN  as a creature of national self-interest

where national sovereignty is supreme, however

and by whomever that is defined, and not

equipped with conditions to reflect universal

rights and growing transnational concerns.  He

added that a mix of governmental,

intergovernmental and non-governmental voices

in the organization can reflect reality more

closely than a nation-state dominated United

Nations.



For a copy of Mr. Razali s speech contact:

NGLS, Room FF-346, 304 East 45th Street, New

York NY 10017, United States, telephone

+1-212/963 3125, fax +1-212/963 8712, e-mail

<ngls@undp.org>.





MONTREAL PROTOCOL ON OZONE MEETINGS

Some 110 governments attending the ninth

Meeting of the Parties (MOP-9) to the Montreal

Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone

Layer have agreed to tighten restrictions on

several destructive chemicals. Participants in

the meeting, held from 15-17 September in

Montreal (Canada), agreed on a phase-out

schedule for methyl bromide, a fumigant. They

also set up a licensing system to help

governments track international trade in

chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and other controlled

substances and discourage illegal sales.



Under the methyl bromide agreement, phase-out

by developed countries (previously set at 2010)

has been moved up to 2005 with exemptions for

 critical uses  and interim reductions of 25%

by 1999, 50% by 2001 and 70% by 2003.

Developing countries (previously committed only

to a freeze by 2002) have agreed to a 20%

four-year average of 1995-1998 as the base year

for calculating the phase-out; the interim

reduction schedule will be reviewed in 2003.



In addition to the US$10 million agreed last

year for funding demonstration projects testing

the feasibility of methyl bromide alternatives,

the Multilateral Fund will make US$25 million

per year available in both 1998 and 1999 for

activities to phase out methyl bromide in

developing countries. Starting one year after

the agreement enters into force, Parties will

ban trade in methyl bromide with non-Parties.

The new licensing system for controlling trade

will be based on licences issued by Parties for

each import and export and on regular

information exchange between Parties. This will

enable customs and police officials to track

trade in CFCs and to detect unlicensed trade.

The system will become effective at the start

of 2000.

  

Contact: Michael Williams, Information Unit for

Conventions, UN Environment Programme (UNEP),

Geneva Executive Centre, 15 chemin des

AnÇmones, CH-1219 ChÉtelaine, Switzerland,

telephone +41-22/979 9242 or 979 9244, fax

+41-22/797 3464, e-mail <mwilliams@unep.ch> or  

K. Madhava Sarma, Coordinator, Ozone

Secretariat, PO Box 30552, Nairobi, Kenya,

telephone +254-2/623851, fax +254-2/226886,

e-mail <sarmam@unep.org>.





A Montreal Protocol Tenth Anniversary

Colloquium, held on 13 September in Montreal,

brought together over 300 participants,

including natural and social scientists, policy

makers, business people, NGOs and delegates to

MOP-9 held afterwards. Participants in the

colloquium, which was sponsored by Environment

Canada, 3M and Nortel, reviewed progress made

since the signing of the protocol in 1987 and

highlighted the lessons this process holds for

continued implementation of the protocol and

for addressing other global environmental

issues. 



Based on the outcomes of the colloquium, a

statement on lessons learned from the Montreal

protocol highlighted what it described as the

vital role of scientific contributions in

establishing the reality of the ozone threat;

the importance of realistic measures and

cooperative elements in implementing the

protocol; the necessity for technological

innovation in providing solutions; and the

value of objective assessment of scientific,

environmental, technological and economic

factors in fostering consensus.



Contact: John D. Reid, Director, Policy and

International Affairs, AES/Environment Canada,

Tour Nord, 5äme Çtage, Les Terrasses de la

Chaudiäre, 10 rue Wellington, Hull, Quebec K1A

0H3, Canada, telephone +1-819/997 3832, fax

+1-819/994 8841, e-mail <john.reid@ec.gc.ca>,

web site

(http://www.ec.gc.ca/ozone/tenthann/coll_e.htm)

.





UNDP/UNFPA EXECUTIVE BOARD MEETS

The third session of the UN Development

Programme (UNDP) and UN Population Fund (UNFPA)

Executive Board in 1997 concluded its week-long

meeting on 19 September.



With regard to UNDP, the board approved the

regional framework for the Arab States region,

the global cooperation framework and 83 country

cooperation frameworks, most of them on a

 non-objection  basis. However, UNDP

Administrator James Gustave Speth said the

organization would have difficulty bringing

about internal changes required by the UN

reform process without adequate funding.  I am

committed to lead an organization which can and

does make a real difference in the lives of the

poor. We have such an organization today, but

it is being placed increasingly in jeopardy, 

he said. The board debated ways to address the

current stagnation in voluntary contributions

to the UNDP core budget. Management of the

sharp rise in non-core or earmarked

contributions, now accounting for some

two-thirds of UNDP income, will be examined at

the 1998 January session. An estimated budget

appropriation of US$518 million was approved

for the 1998-1999 biennium.



The board also considered six items related to

UNFPA: 

n    budget estimates for 1998-1999; 

n    an annual financial review for 1996; 

n    evaluation of the fund s staff training

activities; 

n    the technical support services system; 

n    a report on the consequences of resource

shortfalls on the achievement of the 1994

International Conference on Population and

Development (ICPD) goals; and 

n    draft terms of reference for the

Coordinating Committee on Health, which is an

intergovernmental body composed of

representatives of the Executive Boards of the

World Health Organization (WHO), UN Children s

Fund (UNICEF) and UNFPA. 



The board adopted a 1998-1999 biennium support

budget for UNFPA of roughly US$143.2 million in

gross appropriations.



Monique Essed-Fernandes of the Suriname-based

Women and Development Organization and a

representative of the NGO Advisory Committee to

UNFPA, called on the board to strengthen

partnerships with NGOs and increase resources

channelled to them in line with recommendations

contained in the ICPD Programme of Action and

the revised resource allocation system. She

also emphasized the need for NGO representation

at the board and cited structures recommended

for the institutionalization of such

participation in the advisory committee s June

meeting. Although there was no discussion of

this item, the Executive Board took note of the

recommendations of the NGO Advisory Committee

as contained in the report of its third

session, which represented the first formal

acknowledgement of that committee s work. The

bureau of the board has asked UNFPA and UNDP to

prepare brief papers containing proposals on

how to accommodate more structured NGO

participation in the work of the Executive

Board. The papers are expected to be presented

to the bureau at a meeting in October.

Subsequently, bureau members will share the

papers with regional groups for reaction and

comment.



The UNDP/UNFPA Executive Board is scheduled to

meet during 1998 on 19-23 January, 20-24 April,

8-19 June and 14-18 September. A one-day joint

meeting with UNICEF will be added to the

January session to enable an exchange of views

on the impact of overall reform on UN funds and

programmes.



Contact: UNDP, 1 UN Plaza, New York NY 10017,

United States, telephone +1-212/906 5000 or

UNFPA, 220 E. 42nd Street, New York NY 10017,

United States, telephone +1-212/ 297 5011, fax

+1-212/557 6416.





UNHCR EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE SESSION HELD

Sadako Ogata, UN High Commissioner for Refugees

(UNHCR), said during the 48th annual UNHCR

Executive Committee Session that the world is

experiencing a crisis in the application of

humanitarian principles, not a failure of the

principles themselves. There were 82 observer

delegations at the session (compared to 75 last

year), with 27 represented at ministerial

level.



Ms. Ogata told the committee, meeting from

13-17 October in Geneva, that if states had

fulfilled their responsibilities as stipulated

by the committee and supported UNHCR s actions

more firmly and decisively, some of the

problems it encountered could have been

avoided.  Many of you said [during the session]

that UNHCR cannot be left alone to face

intractable dilemmas and security risks. I hope

that your sympathy can be translated into the

political and financial support required to

carry out our mandate.  She thanked delegations

that have pledged additional resources, and

said she is counting on what one of the

delegates defined as  a shared determination to

tackle the root causes of political, social and

economic instability that generate population

movements.  Ms. Ogata said it is important that

donor governments take note of the need

expressed by many delegations from the South,

especially Africa, for more resources to be

allocated to communities hosting refugees or

receiving returnees.  States must not only be

reminded of principles,  she added,  but must

also be given the means to apply them.  



On the role of UNHCR in post-conflict

rehabilitation Ms. Ogata said,  We do not wish

to enlarge the scope of UNHCR s humanitarian

work into development activities. We have no

mandate, no expertise, and no capacity for

development work. Voluntary return in safety

and dignity remains the fundamental aim of all

our repatriation operations, and as a

consequence, obliges us to be involved in the

post-conflict rehabilitation and reconciliation

process.  



Prior to the session UNHCR held its traditional

meeting with NGOs. Participants in the meeting

on 8-10 October discussed UNHCR activities in

Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa, with

special attention on the Great Lakes region.

Ms. Ogata told participants that UNHCR, whose

primary mandate is protection, is unable to

fulfil this mandate on its own and needs the

support of the NGO community. She stressed the

importance of striving for the best

communication and coordination when working

with NGOs and concluded by highlighting the

importance of establishing a sense of community

as an integral part of peace building.



Contact: Maureen Connelly, NGO Coordinator,

UNHCR, Case postale 2500, CH-1211 Geneva 2

DÇpìt, Switzerland, telephone +41-22/739 8985,

fax +41-22/733 7309.





UNESCO EXECUTIVE BOARD CONCLUDES SESSION

The Executive Board of the UN Educational,

Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)

ended its 152nd session on 17 October after

adopting a series of decisions and

recommendations, notably a draft Declaration on

the Human Genome. UNESCO Director-General

Federico Mayor, who described the declaration

as the first universal standard setting text in

the field of biology, said it is of

 fundamental moral and technical importance. 

The board, which began its work on 6 October,

also adopted a draft Declaration on the

Responsibilities of the Present Generations

Towards Future Generations.



In preparation for the 50th Anniversary of the

Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1998,

the board approved UNESCO s plans to celebrate

the event with a view to disseminate the

declaration text. It also requested the UNESCO

Director-General  to assign priority to poverty

eradication activities in all the fields of

UNESCO s competence  and called for continued

intersectoral and inter-agency collaboration

for the development of effective strategies for

the eradication of poverty.





UNICEF EXECUTIVE BOARD MEETS

The third regular session of the UN Children s

Fund (UNICEF) Executive Board, held at UN

headquarters from 9-12 September, considered 24

country programme recommendations, a management

excellence process, supply operations, a new

strategy outline for the 1998-1999 budget and a

medium-term financial plan for 1997-2000. The

session also discussed terms of reference for a

Joint Coordinating Committee on Health

involving UNICEF, the World Health Organization

(WHO) and UN Population Fund (UNFPA).



UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy

reaffirmed the organization s support for the

UN Secretary-General s recommendations for UN

reform. She said UNICEF s active involvement in

implementing the reforms, through participation

in drafting and implementation of the

guidelines for the UN Development Assistance

Framework and the working group on reform of

humanitarian assistance operations, would help

 enlarge and sharpen focus on children

throughout the UN system. 

  

However, she highlighted what she described as

the  shameful evaporation  of official

development assistance. (ODA flows in 1996

represented only 0.25% of the combined GNP of

members of the Development Assistance Committee

of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation

and Development.) She said the decline,

combined with the foreign-exchange impact of a

strong US dollar, has led to a projected

shortfall of some US$35 million in UNICEF

income for 1997 and a likely total drop of

US$100 million in the past two years. For this

reason hundreds of UNICEF posts around the

world have been cut or frozen. 



Among other things, the board discussed

decentralizing supply operations and improving

access to basic supplies such as essential

drugs, staple foods, school materials, clean

water and sanitation facilities. Under this

approach closer attention will be given to the

most disadvantaged children. In terms of the

allocation of general resources for programmes,

the board agreed to give higher priority to the

needs of children in least developed countries

and sub-Saharan Africa. Regarding the Joint

Coordinating Committee on Health, UNICEF, WHO

and UNFPA will continue to collaborate in

increasing community involvement, providing

greater access to health services to the

poorest and ensuring sustainability of health

actions. 



Contact: Janet Nelson, Chief, NGO Liaison

Section, UNICEF, 3 UN Plaza, New York NY 10017,

United States, telephone +1-212/824 6380, fax

+1-212/888 7465, e-mail <jnelson@unicef.org>,

web site (http://www.unicef.org).





TELEFOOD LINKS UP THE WORLD

On 19 October the first global TeleFood

telecast, organized by the UN Food and

Agriculture Organization (FAO) with the aim of

raising awareness of the world s 800 million

chronically hungry and malnourished, linked an

estimated 100 million viewers in 60-70

countries. 



The Italian national television company RAI

presented over eight hours of TeleFood

transmission in Italy with relays by satellite

links to the rest of the world. Satellite

operators Intelsat and Radio France Outremers

provided free downlinks for developing

countries to connect to the RAI transmission.

Many countries also broadcast programmes of

their own on the TeleFood theme.

The TeleFood transmission by RAI included

reports from developing countries, discussion

of food security issues and live entertainment

by international artists. It culminated with a

star-studded concert at the Vatican. 



In several countries TeleFood programmes

included appeals for donations. In Italy these

reached over two billion lire (US$1.2 million)

by the time the programme ended, and in Spain

about US$250,000 was pledged. FAO says every

dollar raised by the TeleFood appeal will go to

providing practical support to rural people in

developing countries both through FAO s Special

Programme for Food Security or similar

grassroots projects.



Contact: Christine Graves, FAO, Viale delle

Terme di Caracalla, I-00100 Rome, Italy,

telephone +39-6/5705 2515, fax +39-6/5705 6167,

e-mail <christine.graves@fao.org>. Details of

television programming in individual countries

can be found on the web site

(http://www.fao.org/food).





INTERNATIONAL DAY TO ERADICATE POVERTY

UN Development Programme (UNDP) events to

commemorate the International Day for the

Eradication of Poverty on 17 October included a

programme on  A World Without Poverty  at UN

headquarters in New York. During the programme,

held in the Economic and Social Council

Chamber, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and

UNDP Administrator James Gustave Speth

recognized project representatives from Viet

Nam, South Africa, El Salvador and the United

States. The representatives recounted their own

stories about the impact of anti-poverty

projects on their lives and on those around

them. 



In connection with the events, about 40

journalists are participating in trips covering

anti-poverty activities in Angola, Guatemala,

Viet Nam and the Siberian area of Russia. UNDP

resident representatives around the world also

organized a variety of activities to

commemorate the day, including seminars, TV

debates and project visits, school contests and

sport and cultural activities.



At the end of the 20th century, 1.3 billion

people live on incomes of less that US$1 a day.

Nearly one billion people are illiterate, over

a billion lack access to safe drinking water, 

and some 840 million go hungry or face food

insecurity. Nearly a third of the people in the

least developed countries most of which are in

sub-Saharan Africa are not expected to survive

to age 40.





WORLD HABITAT DAY 1997 FOCUSES ON FUTURE CITIES

Governments, community organizations and

individuals around the world marked this year s

World Habitat Day on 6 October with a variety

of national and community level events focusing

on the theme  Future Cities. 



The actual job of creating sustainable healthy

urban centres requires the involvement of a

wide range of actors, said      Dr. Wally

N Dow, United Nations Assistant

Secretary-General and Executive Director of the

UN Centre for Human Settlements (Habitat).

These include governments, local authorities,

and just as importantly representatives of

civil society. He said this year s theme

highlights the special importance of the

Habitat Agenda, which was approved by the

world s governments at the 1996 UN Conference

on Human Settlements (Habitat II) in Istanbul

(Turkey). 



 The Habitat Agenda is a global call to action

which offers a positive vision of  Future

Cities:  sustainable human settlements where

all have adequate shelter, a healthy and safe

environment, basic services and productive

freely-chosen employment,  said Dr. N Dow.



In New York, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan

urged all member states, local authorities and

grassroots organizations to deepen the

partnerships formed in Istanbul toward

implementing the Habitat Agenda. On World

Habitat Day at UN headquarters, two panels of

representatives from academia, the private

sector, public administration, NGOs and

professional associations discussed issues

related to the themes  Healthy Future Cities 

and  Sustaining Communities. 



Contact: Susan Francis, Communication Manager,

UNCHS (Habitat), PO Box 30030, Nairobi, Kenya,

telephone +254-2/623239, fax +254-2/624333,

e-mail <susan.francis@unchs.org>.





MAINSTREAMING GENDER EQUALITY

Over 60 participants from UN agencies and

bilateral donor agencies met in Geneva from

15-17 September to consider how to take forward

commitments to mainstreaming gender equality

made in the Platform for Action of the 1995

Fourth World Conference on Women, and further

endorsed at the 1997 session of the UN Economic

and Social Council (see NGLS Roundup, September

1997).



 Gender mainstreaming is a comprehensive

strategy,  said Angela E.V. King, UN Special

Adviser on Gender Issues and the Advancement of

Women.  It involves policies and operations,

and the processes of their development. It also

involves individuals, structures and

institutions. But most of all, it involves

change. Change from the tried and true way of

policy formulation and decision-making, from

the comfortable habits of designing development

projects and service delivery. Gender

mainstreaming means a change from functioning

in well-established structures and hierarchies,

from dealing with ever-familiar interlocutors,

and from following orthodox approaches and

using traditional sources of

information....Decisive leadership, cogent

arguments, striking examples, and convincing

strategies will help the majority to embrace

change. Its advocates have to reach beyond

their own familiar collaborators and foster new

partnerships and alliances. Clear models of

responsibility and accountability are needed so

that well-defined outcomes can be achieved. 



Carolyn Hannan-Andersson, Policy Adviser on

Equality Between Women and Men at the Swedish

International Development Agency (SIDA), said

there is growing consensus on the basic

principles of mainstreaming: it is more than

integration, more than making gender equality

aspects an integral part of routines, processes

and documents (even if this is a precondition

for real mainstreaming), and more than ensuring

equitable involvement of women and men.

 Mainstreaming,  she said,  necessarily

involves ensuring that the perceptions, values,

knowledge, experience, priorities, needs and

potentials of both women and men are given

equal weight and utilized in developing the

visions, goals, policies and strategies

necessary to achieve effective, sustainable

people-centred development. Mainstreaming is

thus about improving development; it is about

transforming development. 



During panel presentations and working groups,

participants discussed and pooled ideas on

strategies, institutional development, and

collaboration and partnership for mainstreaming

gender equality. They agreed that achieving

gender equality is not only a goal in itself

but also a means to make poverty reduction and

promotion of human rights and democratization

more effective by addressing the needs of both

women and men. They also recognized that

despite innovative efforts by multilateral and

bilateral development agencies, greater

commitment of human, technical and financial

resources is required to ensure the

transformation of organizations and the full

institutionalization of the gender equality

perspective. Building strategic partnerships

with women s organizations and other

stakeholders in civil society was also agreed

to be vital for achieving success.



A statement adopted at the meeting identifies

some key challenges for achieving mainstreaming

of gender equality, including increased

commitments and political will, the development

and institutionalization of higher levels of

gender competence, and the establishment of

tools for monitoring and mechanisms of

accountability.



The meeting, organized by the UN Division for

the Advancement of Women, brought together

members of the UN Inter-Agency Committee on

Women and Gender Equality and the Expert Group

on Women and Development of the Development

Assistance Committee of the Organisation for

Economic Co-operation and Development

(DAC/OECD). Participants agreed that there

should be a continued professional exchange on

mainstreaming gender equality.



Contact: Kristen Timothy, Deputy Director,

Division for the Advancement of Women,

Department for Economic and Social Affairs,

United Nations, New York NY 10017, United

States, telephone +1-212/963 3104, fax

+1-212/963 3463.





RIGHT TO DEVELOPMENT GROUP MEETS

The Intergovernmental Group of Experts on the

Right to Development, which held its second

session from 29 September-10 October in Geneva,

emphasized the urgency of implementing this

right in the context of globalization, which it

said has increased risks of marginalizing

countries, groups and individuals. The group

reaffirmed the need to interpret the right to

development in its  integrated and

multidimensional aspects.  This means taking a

 balanced  approach between different

categories of rights (civil and political

rights and economic, social and cultural

rights) and between national and international

scales of responsibility. 



The group s report highlights the

responsibilities in this regard of

international development and financial

institutions, states and civil society

organizations and calls for a coalition of

these different actors to  implement a clear

campaigning and mobilization platform.  The

report, while insisting on the responsibilities

of states to fulfill their obligations under

all categories of rights, stresses action at

the international level to address the

transboundary impact of policies and practices

on all human rights. It suggests civil society

take a leading role on this:  In view of the

expanding influence of financial and market

forces at international and national levels,

civil society organizations should be supported

by States and international organizations to

fulfil their countervailing role in

representing the public interest and minimizing

possible adverse social effects of the market. 





The report also says  civil society groups

should address the implications of

transnational corporations and financial

institutions especially in terms of the ethics

of their behaviour, economic, environmental,

health and cultural effects, effects on local

firms and sectors, and on the right to

development.  It adds that civil society

organizations should be encouraged to influence

states and international agencies to pay

serious attention and take concrete measures to

implement the right to development.



After years of controversy and debate among

member states, the right to development was

recognized as an integral part of fundamental

human rights in consensus language of the

Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action,

adopted by the 1993 World Conference on Human

Rights. As it is not subject to a treaty,

however, the right to development does not have

any legal status. Moreover, member states still

disagree on interpretation, particularly as to

whether the right to development is exclusively

an individual right or can also be treated as a

collective right. 



At its next session the Commission on Human

Rights will consider recommendations of the

working group to set up a follow-up mechanism

whose functions would be decided in the context

of broader UN reforms. In 1996 the commission

mandated the working group to elaborate a

strategy and practical measures for the

implementation and promotion of the right to

development, as set forth in the Declaration of

the Right to Development (UN General Assembly

resolution 41/128).



Contact: John Pace, Research and Right to

Development Branch, Office of the High

Commissioner for Human Rights, Palais des

Nations, CH-1211 Geneva 10, Switzerland,

telephone +41-22/907 1039, fax 41-22/917 0212,

e-mail <jpace.hchr@unog.ch>, web site

(http://www.unhchr.ch).





WORLD BANK CONFERENCE ON ENVIRONMENT

While many countries have signed environmental

treaties to preserve everything from the air we

breathe to wildlife habitats, few signatories

have carried them out. One of the aims of the

Environmentally and Socially Sustainable

Development Conference, held from 6-11 October

in Washington DC, was to bring together many of

the world s leading authorities on the

environment to come to grips with issues that

prevent governments from living up to their

existing legal obligations.



The conference, organized by the World Bank,

included sessions on the mounting evidence of

climate change, the steady destruction of the

world s coral reefs, and the threats posed to

forests and farmland by poor environmental

practices.



 For environmental agreements to work, you have

to get sound scientific, technical and economic

information,  said Robert Watson, Director of

the Bank s Environment Department.  You have to

make comprehensive international assessments of

the problem you re trying to correct. Then you

want the full participation by everyone

involved in the debate: civil society,

governments, industry, environmental groups,

and all the scientific and technical experts. 

He said other prerequisites include

knowledgeable local communities, informed by a

responsible media; recognition of equity within

and among nations; financing for developing

countries to help them comply with

environmental restrictions; and political will

by governments, individual and corporate

leaders.



Contact: Clare Fleming, World Bank, 1818 H

Street NW, Washington DC 20433, United States,

telephone +1-202/473 2874, e-mail

<cfleming@worldbank.org>.





IMF ADOPTS GUIDELINES ON GOVERNANCE

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) Executive

Board, which met on 4 August, has adopted

guidelines covering the IMF s role in issues of

governance.  Increasingly, we find that a much

broader range of institutional reforms is

needed if countries are to establish and

maintain private sector confidence, and thereby

lay the basis for sustained economic growth, 

said IMF Managing Director Michel Camdessus.

 Every country that hopes to maintain market

confidence must come to terms with the issues

associated with good governance.  

  

The guidelines advocate attention to governance

issues falling within the mandate and expertise

of the IMF in the context of both IMF-supported

lending programmes and Article IV

consultations. Article IV consultations of the

IMF s Articles of Agreement are bilateral

discussions held with all IMF members, usually

every year, where a staff team visits the

country, collects economic and financial

information and discusses with officials the

country s economic development and policies. 

  

They also call for a more proactive approach in

advocating policies, and the development of

institutions and administrative systems that

aim to eliminate the opportunity for rent

seeking, corruption and fraudulent activity.

The guidelines stress an evenhanded treatment

of governance issues in all member countries

and call for enhanced collaboration with other

multilateral institutions, particularly the

World Bank, to make better use of complementary

areas of expertise.

  

The guidelines say that the IMF can contribute

to good governance through its policy advice

and (where relevant) technical assistance by

improving management of public resources

through reforms covering public sector

institutions; and by supporting development and

maintenance of a transparent and stable

economic and regulatory environment conducive

to efficient private sector activities. 



They also state that the use of IMF

conditionality related to governance issues

 emanates from the IMF s concern with

macro-economic policy design and implementation

as the main means to safeguard the use of IMF

resources. Thus, conditionality, in the form of

prior actions, performance criteria,

benchmarks, and conditions for completion of a

review, should be attached to policy measures,

including those relating to economic aspects of

governance that are required to meet the

objectives of the programme. 

  

Contact: IMF, 700 19th Street NW, Washington DC

20431, United States, telephone +1-202/623

7000, web site (http://www.imf.org). The

Guidance Note is published in full in the IMF

Survey, Vol. 26 No. 15, 5 August 1997. 





INTERNATIONAL MONETARY SYSTEM REVIEW URGED

In an economy characterized by globalization

and liberalization of financial markets,

private capital now dominates the total net

long-term financial flows to the developing

world, with 95% going to only 26 countries; at

the same time official development assistance

is stagnating, according to Professor Gerald

Helleiner of the University of Toronto

(Canada). Prof. Helleiner was one of the

several speakers who briefed the Second

(Economic and Financial) Committee of the 52nd

UN General Assembly on  What Kind of Finance

Conference Does the World Need?  He also said

private capital has proven  highly fickle and

volatile  and cited the current turmoil in

South East Asian currency markets. 



 Effective global macroeconomic and financial

management is far more important to overall

output, employment and development than any

individual national-level actions or, for that

matter, any changes in the trade regime,  he

said, which puts a premium on sound and

effective management of the global economy. 



Prof. Helleiner, who also acts as advisor to

the Intergovernmental Group of 24 (developing

countries), said the International Monetary

Fund (IMF) and the World Bank group have done

much of their work extremely well. However, he

described as  severely flawed  the process

through which these and other institutions

managing the international monetary and

financial system are attempting to adapt to

global financial market forces.  It is

tortuously slow,  he said,  insufficiently

participatory, overly influenced by powerful

lobbies from the financial sector and

constrained by jurisdictional ambiguities and

turf battles.  



The process also fails to take adequately into

account the rapidly growing importance of

governments that are not members of the Group

of Eight in the world economy. Using examples

from recent major initiatives in the

international financial arena, he argued that

the priorities of developing countries are not

adequately reflected, and that the views and

interests of a few major industrialized

countries characterize decisions reached. Under

these conditions, international economic

governance cannot be carried out with the full

involvement and input of ever-more central

economic powers. 



Prof. Helleiner urged the Second Committee to

take up the question of financing for

development and to avoid a narrow approach.  It

would be nonsensical,  he said,  to attempt to

address the issues surrounding the future of

the financing of development in isolation from

the many influences upon the now dominant

private flows of capital.  The issues he said

would benefit from the UN General Assembly s

attention include macroeconomic policies of the

major industrial countries, particularly as

they affect interest rates; provision of

adequate liquidity and appropriate responses to

periodic crises; and the backstopping and

supervisory roles of the major financial

institutions not only the IMF and the World

Bank group but also the regional development

banks, the Bank for International Settlements

(BIS) and related institutions.

 

A useful conference, he added, would address

the workings of the entire international

monetary and financial system as it impacts

development. He also cautioned members against

seeing such a conference as an end in itself.

The point, he said, is not to hold a conference

but to start a process. 



For a copy of Prof. Helleiner s statement

contact: NGLS, Room FF-346, 304 East 45th

Street, New York NY 10017, United States,

telephone +1-212/963 3125, fax +1-212/963 8712,

e-mail <ngls@undp.org> .





TELECOM POLICY FORUM ON ACCESS INEQUALITY

In response to rapid changes in the

telecommunications marketplace, the

International Telecommunications Union (ITU)

organized a forum and exhibition entitled

Telecom Interactive  97. The forum, held on

8-14 September in Geneva, opened with a

discussion on the universal right to

communicate and policies that could make the

market for telecommunications more affordable,

accessible and responsive to consumer needs. 



Dr. Pekka Tarjanne, ITU Secretary-General, said

97% of Internet connections, which are

concentrated among only 16% of the world s

population, are used mostly for business

purposes in the United States. Although the

growth rate of new connections is higher in the

developing world than in Europe, there are

still major challenges to putting in place

affordable and widespread telecommunication

infrastructures, particularly in Africa.

Martin Bangemann of the Commission of the

European Communities said that in view of

growing inequalities between economies and the

dangers of a  clash of civilizations,  it is

imperative to develop an international charter

that would harmonize national and international

telecommunications laws and reverse the process

of marginalization. He said that the charter

should be limited to broad principles and in

general avoid detailed rules. Since the pace of

technological innovation is five to ten times

faster than the time required to develop (let

alone implement) a new regulation, Dr.

Bangemann stressed that it would be impossible

to develop detailed laws without hindering

competitive innovation, which drives down

costs. He acknowledged a tension between market

competition and the public interest, but he

said this could be reconciled through the

proposed charter.



Most speakers, who were senior government and

private sector representatives, concurred that

liberalization on a global scale is the most

appropriate policy option, although some argued

for safeguards against possible cultural

homogenization. They also raised the problem of

the reliability of information found on the

Internet. In response to questions by African

delegates concerning the high initial costs of

setting up telecommunications infrastructure,

meeting chair Bruno Lanvin of the UN Conference

on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) said the

costs of such investments should not be seen in

isolation since they bring down transaction

costs and help improve trade efficiency at

national and international levels. However,

questions remain on the demand side. Craig

McCaw, chairman of the US-based Teledisc

Corporation, said the  final element remains

the purchasing power of the local inhabitants. 



ITU will organize Africa Telecom  98 on 4-10

May 1998 in Johannesburg (South Africa). The

event will focus on, inter alia, possibilities

and ways of increasing access to basic

telecommunications in Africa.



Contact: ITU, Place des Nations, CH-1211 Geneva

20, Switzerland, telephone +41-22/730 6161, fax

+41-22/730 6444, e-mail <telecominf@itu.int>,

web site (http://www.itu.int/TELECOM).





WORKING GROUP ON BIOSAFETY MEETS

Delegates in the Open-Ended Ad Hoc Working

Group on Biosafety, which met from 13-17

October in Montreal (Canada), have produced a

consolidated draft text for negotiations on a

biosafety protocol at the group s next session.

Among other things, they created a contact

group on final clauses and institutional

matters; extended the existing contact group s

mandate on definitions established at the prior

session on address annexes; and identified

elements to be included in draft articles on

outstanding issues, including socio-economic

considerations, liability and compensation,

illegal traffic, non-discrimination, trade with

non-Parties, and objectives, general

obligations, title and preamble of the

protocol. Two parallel open-ended sub-working

groups, established to address the core

substantive articles of the protocol, achieved

their objectives of developing a consolidated

draft negotiating legal text, which will form

the basis for the forthcoming negotiations.



The working group strongly recommended to the

fourth Conference of the Parties (to be held in

Bratislava in May 1998) the need for an

additional three days for each of the two

already approved meetings in 1998, and a

further third meeting of the working group in

1998 in order to complete its work. In addition

the working group recommended that a special

session of the Conference of the Parties be

held following the last meeting of the working

group, at which the Protocol on Biosafety would

be considered for adoption. The working group s

next meeting will be held in February 1998 in

Montreal.



The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD),

negotiated under the auspices of the UN

Environment Programme, was adopted in May 1992

and opened for signature at the June 1992 Earth

Summit. The treaty entered into force on 29

December 1993; there are currently 169 Parties

to the convention.



Contact: Thomas Yongo, Associate Legal

Officer Biosafety,  CBD, 393 St. Jacques

Street, Office 300, Montreal, Quebec H2Y 1N9,

Canada, telephone +1-514/287 7028, fax

+1-514/288 6588, e-mail

<thomas.yongo@biodiv.org>.





A workshop on Policy Reform to Implement the

Convention on Biological Diversity: Meeting the

Challenge with Policy Research took place at

the Eighth Global Biodiversity Forum in

Montreal from 29-31 August. The forum was held

immediately prior to the third meeting of the

Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and

Technological Advice (SBSTTA-3) to the

Convention on Biological Diversity. The

workshop on policy reform to implement the

convention, attended by 53 participants from 18

countries, including members of SBSTTA

delegations, government agencies, NGOs,

intergovernmental organizations and

universities, was organized by the African

Centre for Technology Studies (Kenya), Land and

Agriculture Policy Centre (South Africa),

Sociedad Peruana de Derecho Ambiental (Peru)

and the World Resources Institute (United

States).



Workshop participants formulated a set of

recommendations that they presented to SBSTTA-3

the following week. They urged Parties to the

convention to identify gaps in policy

development; include in their national reports

to COP-4 and in sector-specific discussions

information on available national capacity to

analyze policy alternatives for implementing

the CBD; ensure future documentation prepared

for use by the Parties provides delegations

with options for policy choice and evaluates

the implications of each; and urge the

financial mechanism of the CBD, as well as

other financial sources, to support the

development, strengthening and sharing of

policy research capacity at the national and

regional levels. They also recommended that

national decision-making processes for

convention implementation should be supported

by policy research capacity that is

inter-disciplinary, multi-sectoral, utilizes

in-country, local and non-governmental

capacity, ensures participation of relevant

stakeholders and provides for on-going

monitoring and evaluation. 

Contact: Christine Elias, World Resources

Institute, 1709 New York Avenue NW, Washington

DC 20006, United States, telephone +1-202/638

6300, fax +1-202/638 0036,e-mail

<christin@wri.org>.





INTERNATIONAL OCEANOGRAPHIC COMMISSION

The Assembly of the Intergovernmental

Oceanographic Commission (IOC) of the UN

Educational, Scientific and Cultural

Organization (UNESCO) met from 2-18 July in

Paris to discuss current programmes in ocean

sciences, activities of the Global Ocean

Observing System (GOOS), and national and

international plans for the 1998 International

Year of the Ocean, among other issues.



Delegates from the 125 member states of the

commission reviewed its activities undertaken

in the last two years and noted that while

global interest in the ocean and ocean sciences

is increasing worldwide, financial resources

available at the international level remain

limited. They called on the commission to

redefine priorities and focus on four main

areas of activity in coming years: 

n    development of operational oceanography

through the GOOS mechanism, which is a global

framework of collection, analysis and

distribution of marine data used to forecast

weather and monitor ocean health; 

n    provision of scientific input for coastal

area management and sustainable development; 

n    transfer of knowledge and

capacity-building; and 

n    ocean observations as early warning

systems for climate variability and change.



The IOC, founded by UNESCO in 1960, works in

four major areas: research on oceanic and

coastal phenomenon and their relation to marine

resources; ocean monitoring; education,

training and technical assistance; and the

exchange and distribution of data.



Contact: Nicole Guillemain-Goupi,

Documentalist, International Oceanographic

Commission, UNESCO, 7 place de Fontenoy,

F-75700 Paris, France, telephone +33-1/45 68 39

82, fax +33-1/45 68 58 12, e-mail

<n.guillemain@unesco.org>.





INTERGOVERNMENTAL FORUM ON FORESTS

The Intergovernmental Forum on Forests (IFF) of

the Commission on Sustainable Development held

its first organizational session from 1-3

October 1997 at UN headquarters in New York.

The forum was established during the June 1997

special session of the General Assembly to

review and appraise implementation of Agenda 21

(UNGASS). 



The forum encouraged inputs from Major Groups

in all the activities of its programme of work

and welcomed proposals made by governments to

organize expert group meetings or to conduct

studies in support of its work. Austria, Costa

Rica and Indonesia have offered to host

intersessional meetings in support of IFF

deliberations.



The second session of the IFF will meet in

June-August of 1998 in New York or Geneva. The

third session will meet in February-March 1999

in Geneva. The IFF will report to the

Commission on Sustainable Development at its

eighth session in the 1999. 



Contact: Zehra Aydin, Department for Economic

and Social Affairs, Room DC2-2252, United

Nations, New York NY 10017, United States,

telephone +1-212/963 8811, fax +1-212/963 1267,

e-mail <aydin@un.org>, web site

(http://www.un.org/dpcsd). 





COMMITTEE ON THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD

The Committee on the Rights of the Child, a

monitoring body to the Convention on the Rights

of the Child, held its 16th session from 22

September-10 October. Governments presenting

their reports at the session were Laos,

Australia, Uganda, the Czech Republic, Trinidad

and Tobago, and Togo. States Parties were asked

to answer questions by the committee, make

statements on country reports, and submit

further information.



The committee reviewed methods of work,

developments, cooperation, dialogue and

interaction with United Nations bodies and

specialized agencies. A representative of the

International Labour Organization (ILO) said

the committee s concluding observations were

instrumental in the ratification by a number of

states of the ILO convention concerning minimum

age for admission to employment. He also spoke

about a new instrument to abolish the most

intolerable forms of child labour under three

main categories: situations of slavery and

servitude; illicit activities such as the use

of children in drug trafficking, pornography

and sexual exploitation; and jobs harmful to

the health and development of children.



The committee, considering issues on the

question of the rights of children with

disabilities, said that provisions in the

convention are intended to assure disabled

children the maximum fulfilment of all their

rights, not only those applying to disabled

children. A working group on the rights of

children with disabilities will be constituted

to elaborate a plan of action for

implementation of various proposals and to

follow up on recommendations. The question of

mandate, composition and activities of the

working group will be pursued at the

committee s next session in January 1998. The

NGO Group for the Rights of the Child will also

convene an informal meeting on its ongoing

cooperation with the committee at that time.



Contact: S. Raadi-Azarakhchi, Office of the

High Commissioner for Human Rights, Palais des

Nations, CH-1211 Geneva 10, Switzerland,

telephone +41-22/917 3359, e-mail

<sraadi-azarakhchi.hchr@unog> or Laura

Theytaz-Bergman, NGO Group for the Rights of

the Child, 1 rue VarembÇ, CH-1211 Geneva,

Switzerland, telephone +41-22/734 0558.





BUILDING THE FUTURE OF BURUNDI

During a meeting on Building the Future of

Burundi, held from 26-28 September in Paris,

participants from Burundi stressed the need to

end violence and restore peace in the country

through dialogue and negotiation. They asked UN

Educational, Scientific and Cultural

Organization (UNESCO) Director-General Federico

Mayor to pursue this dialogue on themes within

UNESCO s field of competence to assist the

building of a better future for Burundi with

its national, regional and international

partners.



At the meeting, organized by UNESCO, some 50

representatives of different sections of

Burundi society began a dialogue focusing on

three themes: origins and nature of the

conflict; education, culture, science and

communication at the service of dialogue; and

building the future for peace and development,

democratic principles and human rights. About

30 observers of the meeting represented

different countries, NGOs, and international

and inter-governmental organizations. 



Participants stressed that ideas, cultures and

ethnic groups must be allowed to express

themselves within a democratic constitutional

and institutional framework to ensure the

security and participation of every citizen in

the management of public affairs. To this end,

participants agreed on the importance of

guaranteeing freedom of information, security

and the rights and freedoms of all. They also

said the preservation of a united Burundi

nation will be possible only if all citizens

take part in the construction of a democratic

system, taking into account the conditions of

the country and the political, social, economic

and cultural aspirations of the entire society.



Contact: Daniel Janicot, Assistant

Director-General, Directorate, Operational

Unit, UNESCO, 7 place de Fontenoy, F-75700

Paris, France, telephone +33-1/45 68 16 52, fax

+33-1/45 68 55 53.





COMPANIES MOBILIZE AGAINST HIV/AIDS

In the first internationally coordinated

response by the business sector to the HIV/AIDS

epidemic, a core group of companies launched on

23 October the Global Business Council on

HIV/AIDS. The council, whose honourary

president is South African President Nelson

Mandela, includes Cargill, The Financial Times,

GlaxoWellcome, Levi Strauss and MTV. The Joint

UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) played a key

role in creating the council and will work

closely with it.



Member companies that join the council agree to

take visible, positive action to help their

customers, employees and communities where they

work face the challenges posed by the epidemic;

cooperate with each other on projects involving

national and local response to HIV/AIDS; and

advise UNAIDS on business interests and policy

concerns.



Contact: Anne Winter, Manager, Communications

and Public Information, UNAIDS, 20 avenue

Appia, CH-1211 Geneva 27, Switzerland,

telephone +41-22/791 4577 or +41-79/213 4312

(mobile), fax +41-22/691 4187,   e-mail

<wintera@unaids.org>, web site

(http://www.unaids.org).





UNICEF AND WORLD BANK SIGN AGREEMENT

The UN Children s Fund (UNICEF) and the World

Bank have agreed to work together to support

sub-Saharan African countries in their efforts

to promote access to safe water, environmental

sanitation, and hygiene education for the poor

in rural and urban areas.



The two agencies, which signed a memorandum of

understanding on 9 October, will collaborate to

develop and implement water, environmental

sanitation and hygiene education programmes in

villages, small towns and poor urban

neighbourhoods and to extend sustainable

services to the poor.



Over 250 million people half of Africa s

population are without access to safe drinking

water, and almost 300 million do not have

adequate sanitation. With the current rate of

population growth and extension of water and

sanitation services, a  business as usual

approach  would result in over 500 million

without water and sanitation by the year 2020,

according to UNICEF and the World Bank. Much of

sub-Saharan Africa is threatened by growing

water scarcity and deteriorating water quality,

increasing water costs, and conflicts among

users. The human impact especially on the poor

and women and children will be unprecedented,

as will the environmental impacts in cities

where almost half the population lives.



The two agencies said their complementary

nature, the scale of the challenge ahead and

the need for innovative national programmes

make collaboration an imperative if there is

going to be a serious effort to significantly

improve the availability of water, sanitation

and hygiene education to those that will not be

reached by conventional services in the near

future.



Contact: Anna Wright, UNICEF, 3 UN Plaza, New

York NY 10017, United States, telephone

+1-212/326 7566 or David Theis, World Bank,

1818 H Street NW, Washington DC 20433, United

States, telephone +1-202/477 1955. 





NEW UNIFEM TRUST FUND LAUNCHED

The United Nations Development Fund for Women

(UNIFEM) has launched a US$1.2 million trust

fund dedicated to eliminating violence against

women.



 Violence obliterates women s self-esteem,

destroys their health, denies their human

rights and undermines their full involvement in

society,  said Noeleen Heyzer, UNIFEM Director.

 More than one-third of women in the developing

world are victims of domestic violence. UNIFEM

is working to break the silence of violence in

women s lives. We are bringing it out into the

open and demanding accountability and action. 



Twenty-three projects aimed at eradicating

gender-specific violence have been selected for

funding in the initial grant cycle. They will

be implemented in 18 countries in Africa, East

and South Asia, the Middle East, Latin America

and the Caribbean. 

n    In Latin America a regional Campaign for

Action to Eliminate Violence Against Girls and

Women will press governments to approve

effective legislation and promote adequate

sanctions to gender-specific crimes.

n    In South Africa an educational programme

targeting highschool students will seek to

educate youth as well as parents and teachers

about these issues using theatre, games,

youth-led counseling services and other

participatory methods. 

n    In the Philippines women migrant workers

who were victims of abuse will write and

produce a video on their experiences, which

will serve as an educational tool to teach

other migrant workers about their rights and

how to exercise them.

n    In India health workers will be sensitized

to the issues through specialized training

designed to improve the treatment of women

victims of violence.



The criteria for funding projects include areas

of awareness raising and advocacy, capacity

building, literacy, training, action-related

research, and prevention and deterrence of

violence. The next cycle of grants will be

considered in November.



The new trust fund was created by the United

Nations General Assembly in response to an

urgent call for action at the 1995 Fourth World

Conference on Women. Initial contributors to

the Trust Fund are the governments of

Australia, Denmark, Italy, Japan, Malta,

Mauritius and the Republic of Korea.



Contact: Melanie Roth, Media Officer, UNIFEM,

304 E. 45th Street, 6th Floor, New York NY

10017, United States, telephone +1-212/906

6897, fax +1-212/906 6705, e-mail

<melanie.roth@undp.org>, web site

(http://www.unifem.undp.org).





NEW PESTICIDES ADDED TO WATCH LIST

Five extremely hazardous pesticides are being

added to an existing watch list so that their

trade can be better monitored and managed. The

UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and

the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) announced

in September that highly concentrated

formulations of five pesticides known as

organophosphates  methamidophos, methyl

parathion, monocrotophos, parathion and

phosphamidon will join 17 harmful pesticides

and five industrial chemicals that are already

part of the Prior Informed Consent procedure

(PIC).



According to this voluntary system, dangerous

substances should not be exported without prior

agreement of the government of the importing

country. Currently, 154 countries are

participating in the PIC procedure, which is

jointly administered by FAO and UNEP.



 These pesticide formulations pose a

considerable risk to the health of many small

farmers and agricultural workers because they

cannot be handled safely,  said Niek Van der

Graaff, Chief of the FAO Plant Protection

Service.  In developing countries, protective

gear is often too expensive, or if available,

cannot be used due to the climate.  Studies on

the application of organophosphates have

demonstrated that during normal spraying,

farmers are exposed to contamination by

absorption through the skin of residues on

clothing. 



The global market for pesticides, which was

estimated at US$30 billion in 1996, continues

to grow. The fastest growing markets are in the

developing world, particularly Latin America

and Asia. In China the production of

organophosphorus insecticides totalled 177,900

tons in 1995, an increase of 28% over the

previous year. Thailand, one of Asia s most

rapidly expanding agrochemical markets, uses

monocrotophos, methamidophos and methyl

parathion as its main insecticides. Dramatic

shifts to intensive pesticide use on export

crops is also occurring in Africa.



Contact: Erwin Northoff, FAO, Viale delle Terme

di Caracalla, I-00100 Rome, Italy, telephone

+39-6/570 53105, e-mail

<erwin.northoff@fao.org> or Jim Willis, UNEP,

Geneva Executive Centre, 15 chemin des

AnÇmones, CH-1219 ChÉtelaine, Switzerland,

telephone +41-22/979 9183, e-mail

<jim.willis@unep.ch>.





ENVIRONMENT, URBAN DEVELOPMENT CONFERENCE

About 60% of the world s population will be

living in cities by the year of 2020. Promoting

collective endeavours among all stakeholders

living in cities to address urban environment

problems in the coming decades will be one of

the objectives of an international conference

to be held in 1998 in Tokyo (Japan). The

conference, to be organized by the Tokyo

Metropolitan Government and the UN Department

of Economic and Social Affairs, will focus on

the theme  How to Cultivate an  Eco-Society 

Worldwide. 



The conference organizing committee, which will

meet from 26-29 May 1998, held its second

meeting in Tokyo on 13 October. The meeting

finalized the themes, format and likely

outcomes of the World Conference on

International Cooperation of Cities and

Citizens for Cultivating Eco-Society, or

 Eco-Partnership Tokyo.  



Other issues to be highlighted at the

conference will include:

n    creation of regional recycling systems

with cooperative work by citizens, NGOs,

enterprises and urban administrations;

n    international cooperation toward

realization of an  ecosociety;  and

n    promotion of a wide popular culture for an

 eco-society  that will foster sustainable

development and respect for the earth s rich

natural resources.



About 500 delegates from around the world are

expected to attend, including heads of cities,

experts, municipal administrators, government

officials, private citizens and representatives

of NGOs, commercial enterprises, the United

Nations and other intergovernmental bodies.



Contact: Akira Kawada, Secretariat to the World

Conference on International Cooperation of

Cities and Citizens, Tokyo Metropolitan

Government, 8-1 Nishi-Shinjuku 2-chome,

Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 163-01 Japan, telephone

+81-3/5388 3097, fax +81-3/5388 1329.





IMF: BOLIVIA ELIGIBLE FOR HIPC INITIATIVE

On 10 September the IMF Executive Board decided

that Bolivia has completed the first stage of

strong adjustment and reform under the HIPC

initiative and is eligible for exceptional

assistance to reduce its debt burden to a

sustainable level. The IMF, which will provide

US$29 million, said this will reduce Bolivia s

external debt by US$448 million in net present

value (NPV) terms. The board agreed that

Bolivia could reach its completion point (after

the second stage of adjustment and reform) in

September 1998. It decided that the target NPV

of external public and publicly-guaranteed debt

at the completion point should be set at 225%

of exports, compared with a projected ratio of

259% before assistance.



In view of the heavy debt-service burden facing

Bolivia over the next few years, the IMF and

the World Bank will deliver their assistance in

a front-loaded fashion. The total nominal

debt-service relief is estimated at US$0.6

billion. All assistance is conditional on

Bolivia s continued adherence to an IMF and

World Bank-supported programme including the

observance of social development targets as

well as satisfactory assurances of action under

the initiative by all other creditors. The

IMF s exceptional assistance of US$29 million

will be provided at the completion point in the

form of a grant into an escrow account to be

used exclusively to pay debt service to the

IMF.





FORUM ON PROMOTING FDI

The Economic Commission for Europe (ECE) and

the World Bank/Foreign Investment Advisory

Service held a forum on the Prospects for

Promoting Foreign Direct Investment in the

Transition Economies to discuss foreign direct

investment (FDI) in East-Central Europe and the

newly independent states of the former Soviet

Union.



Participants in the forum, held on 29-30

September in Geneva, included representatives

of the private sector of the regions,

governments and international legal

institutions. Many private sector

representatives stressed the necessity for

regional trade fairs, an improvement of local

infrastructure and more financing from their

governments. Some members said the private

sector believes that because governments

finance some of their activities, these

governments want a say in how the activities

are run. Representatives of the private sector

in transition economies argued that this

thinking needs to be changed if the sector is

to grow and unnecessary bureaucracy needs to be

reduced. Working groups at the forum suggested

that organizations such as the UN and the ECE

encourage governments of East-Central Europe

and the former Soviet Union through dialogue

and information to give greater flexibility to

private sector activities. The working groups

called on international organizations to play a

larger role in training members of the private

sector, especially those working abroad, and

they said international organizations should

give Investment Promotion Agencies (IPAs) a

higher domestic status and weight. A

representative of the NGO Transparency

International stressed the importance of

reducing private sector and government

corruption, which was described as widespread

in the region.



Contact: Geoffrey Hamilton, Economic Commission

for Europe, Palais des Nations, CH-1211 Geneva

10, Switzerland, telephone +41-22/917 2838, fax

+41-22/917 0037.





WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION AT EXPO 2000

The World Health Organization (WHO) has

concluded an agreement to advise organizers of

the World Exhibition EXPO 2000 on the

conceptualization and development of a health

exhibition. EXPO 2000, which is estimated to

attract more than 40 million visitors, will be

held in Hanover (Germany) from 1 June-31

October 2000. EXPO 2000 is designed to follow

up on and promote Agenda 21, the programme of

action for sustainable development agreed five

years ago at the 1992 Earth Summit.



The exhibition will thus present sustainable

options to meet the health challenges of the

next century in the following areas: youth and

older people, non-communicable and new and

re-emerging infectious diseases, and healthy

cities. Visitors will explore how healthy

lifestyles, supportive environments and

technology can address health futures and

improve the health of the world s people in the

21st century.



The exhibition will be a mixture of theatre

stage productions, science centre and high-tech

multi-media to take visitors on a journey of

discovery of health. It will be multiplied by

modern media technologies to also reach

 virtual visitors,  who are not physically at

EXPO 2000.



The exhibition will be developed in cooperation

with NGOs, scientists, academic institutions

and public and private sector organizations

from around the world.



Contact: Monika Gehner, Division of Health

Promotion, Education and Communication, WHO,

CH-1211 Geneva 27, Switzerland, telephone

+41-22/791 2929, fax +41-22/791 4178, e-mail

<gehnerm@who.ch>.





UN NGO NEWS



ANNUAL DPI/NGO CONFERENCE

 Building Partnerships  was the theme of the

50th annual UN Department of Public Information

(DPI) NGO Conference held from 10-12 September

at UN headquarters in New York. The conference,

organized by the DPI NGO section in cooperation

with the Committee of NGOs associated with it,

focused on growing collaboration between the UN

and NGOs working to promote peace and security,

economic and social well-being, human rights,

and the rule of law. The meeting, attended by

over 600 civil society organizations, provided

an opportunity for representatives of

government, international and national NGOs and

UN officials to share ideas on how to make a

difference in their own communities through

their work and through networking with other

organizations.

   

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan told

participants that NGOs have become

 indispensable partners  of the UN,

particularly in preventive diplomacy,

humanitarian work, development and in human

rights. Razali Ismail (Malaysia), President of

the 51st UN General Assembly, said NGO

participation in the UN s work is a healthy

development that should be enhanced:  Not only

do NGOs deliver more development assistance

than the entire UN system (excluding the World

Bank and the International Monetary Fund), but

they also provide development, education and

health care services in areas that government

and the private sector fail or neglect to

reach. 



UN High Commissioner for Refugees Sadako Ogata

said NGOs are among UNHCR s most important

partners, with some 400 NGOs implementing 1200

projects in more than 120 countries at a cost

this year of US$264 million. She also called

for enhanced and continued dialogue with NGOs. 

 

With regard to how much access NGOs should be

given to the UN, Ambassador Ahmad Kamal

(Pakistan), who chaired the Subgroup on NGOs of

the High Level Working Group on the

Strengthening of the UN System, said  debate on

the role of NGOs is in truth about

power-sharing, and the United Nations has so

far declined to share power.  Mr. Razali

pointed out that while there is merit in

keeping the boundaries of the relationship

porous in the case of non-profit NGOs, he said

the ramifications of association with

profit-making or commercial NGOs and

foundations are potentially serious.   



Formal sessions during the three-day conference

were conducted on topics including milestones

in the UN-NGO relationship; UN-NGO partnerships

and current trends; communications aspects of

human rights; cooperating for development;

partnering in cyberspace; global information

flows; models for new partnerships; working for

peace; and new trends in NGOs and civil

society.



Contact: NGO Section, DPI, Room S-1060, United

Nations, New York NY 10017, United States, fax

+1-212/963 6914.





HUMAN RIGHTS HIGH COMMISSIONER MEETS NGOS

During her first meeting with NGOs, who gave

her a notably warm welcome, the new UN High

Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson

said the high expectations generated by her

appointment place tremendous responsibility on

her, in particular to act independently and

impartially as a  moral voice for victims of

abuse and those that are excluded.  At the

meeting, held on 18 September in Geneva, and

followed by a similar meeting with NGOs in New

York, she said she intends to adopt a

 bottom-up  approach in her work that will

depend greatly on the field-level monitoring

role of NGOs and their inputs. She said she

will  reach down to support the structures of

civil society at the local level  as much as

possible.



Ms. Robinson s appointment as head of the new

Geneva-based Office of the High Commissioner

for Human Rights, which encompasses the former

Centre for Human Rights, coincides with

preparations for the commemoration of the 50th

Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of

Human Rights and the 1998 Five Year

Implementation Review of the 1993 Vienna

Declaration and Programme of Action adopted at

the World Conference on Human Rights. She said

this should be a cause for  stock-taking 

rather than celebration, even if the exercise

is not very comfortable.



The momentum around these two events should

facilitate her efforts to initiate one of the

main features of the UN Secretary General s

reform package, which is to mainstream the

human rights agenda across the entire UN

system. Ms. Robinson, who said she will

increasingly highlight the human rights

dimension in the work of other UN agencies,

will be represented at all four Executive

Committees (peace and security; economic and

social affairs; humanitarian affairs; and

development cooperation) that form part of the

new leadership structure set up by UN

Secretary-General (see Go Between 65). She

stressed that the mainstreaming of human rights

goes hand in hand with gender mainstreaming and

said she will give strong impetus to the

implementation of the Beijing Platform of

Action.  Women s rights are human rights,  she

added.



Ms. Robinson said one of her major roles will

be to bridge the different perceptions of human

rights between the North and South. She said

that while civil and political rights cannot be

compromised, greater weight must be placed on

economic, social and cultural rights and the

right to development. And she stressed that

problems related to food, health, education and

shelter must be seen in terms of  rights, not

needs,  adding that she intends to be  very

vocal on this. 



She expressed concern at the financial

situation of her office, which she described as

critically under-resourced since its creation

in 1994. Ms. Robinson hopes to increase

voluntary financial contributions and widen the

circle of contributors.



Ms. Robinson, who is the former President of

Ireland, replaces JosÇ Ayala-Lasso (Ecuador),

the first High Commissioner for Human Rights.

The post was set up after the World Conference

on Human Rights in Vienna.



Contact: BÇatrice Murebwayire, Office of the

High Commissioner for Human Rights, Palais des

Nations, CH-1211 Geneva 10, Switzerland,

telephone +41-22/917 1143, fax +41-22/917 0212,

e-mail <bmurebwayire.hchr@unog.ch>.





IFAD/NGO ANNUAL CONSULTATION

Participants in the International Fund for

Agricultural Development (IFAD) NGO Annual

Consultation, held on 13-15 October in Rome

(Italy), addressed the theme  Local Action

Development for Sustainable Resource

Management.  Participants, who included 13

representatives of Northern NGOs, 20 of

Southern NGOs and seven observers, discussed

case studies on the impact of desertification

on local economies; combating desertification

and capacity of local institutions to respond

to challenges; the role and potential of local

financial institutions; and improving

micro-finance capacity building. Policy

recommendations to IFAD included the following:

n    Knowledge Network devise ways to extend

the linkages between IFAD s Knowledge Network

and the global NGO community by appointing a

number of NGOs as focal points.

n    IFAD/NGO financing instruments lead other

multilateral financial institutions in creating

innovative mechanisms for assuring NGO

participation in the design, implementation and

evaluation of the loans. At the same time, the

Extended Cooperation Programme (ECP) grants, a

useful instrument that permits direct grants to

NGOs, should be increased in size and overall

budget.

n    NGO capacity building IFAD should support

training programmes for NGOs to build their

professional capacities in project design so

that they can be better partners. Such training

should include the planning of projects,

monitoring and evaluation, impact assessment,

and integration of specific issues such as

health, environment, gender and social aspects

in project design.

n    North-South interface IFAD, selected as

the agency that will host the Global Mechanism

of the Convention to Combat Desertification

(CCD), should facilitate a new and creative

interface between Northern and Southern NGOs

(see page 28).

n    Development of Local Programmes in order

to improve the quality and quantity of local

area development programmes, IFAD should

conduct a critical analysis of best practices.

Moreover IFAD should provide financing to pilot

projects for promoting local community

development in countries that support the CCD.

n    CCD implementation IFAD should set up

strategies and criteria for involving NGOs at

different levels of policy making in IFAD-NGO

partnership arrangements for implementing the

CCD. Indeed, IFAD should promote stronger and

more flexible institutional frameworks for its

implementation at local, national, regional and

international levels.



Contact: Maria Teresa Rubin de Cervin,

Programme Development Officer for NGOs and

Civil Society, IFAD, via del Serafico 107,

I-00142 Rome, Italy, telephone +39-6/5459 2394,

fax +39-6/504 3463, e-mail <m.rubin@ifad.org>.





AMNESTY ADDRESSES UN SECURITY COUNCIL

On 15 September Pierre Sane, Secretary-General

of Amnesty International, briefed an ad hoc

meeting of the Security Council on human rights

considerations in the prevention and management

of conflicts and in ensuring the rebuilding of

societies. During the meeting, also attended by

UN agency and Secretariat personnel, he told

the council that respect for human rights

should be central to how it monitors and

manages conflicts.  We tend to think that when

a conflict erupts human rights have to be

suspended because it is war,  Mr. Sane said.

Instead, he stressed the importance of reports

on human rights violations as the first step in

establishing accountability, which he said

changes the behaviour of the belligerents. Mr.

Sane said analysis of human rights reports for

patterns of violations allows early

identification of signs of impending conflicts.





Mr. Sane said his briefing to the council

reflects the growing importance that council

members attach to considering the human rights

dimension, particularly when designing their

responses to crises and planning operations

aimed at producing long-lasting solutions in

the field. He noted that if post-conflict

peace-building efforts are to have a lasting

impact, the building of human rights

institutions has to be taken seriously. In this

regard, he highlighted the creation of national

human rights commissions, the retraining of

police and military, and the importance of

establishing an international criminal court

that is truly independent.

   

Other issues identified as crucial include

monitoring of arms transfers, especially light

weapons. Mr. Sane suggested that the council

follow up on its initiative to investigate the

flow of arms to the former Rwandan army, and he

recommended examining arms flows into the

entire Great Lakes region, including illicit

transfers and  certain government-authorized

arms transfers,  which he said have fuelled the

crisis and led to gross human rights

violations. Children need to be protected in

armed conflict, and women with appropriate

qualifications should be included in human

rights investigative teams so that violations

committed against women, such as rape and

sexual slavery, can be properly documented and

the perpetrators brought to justice. He advised

the council to consider this issue in its

peacekeeping and demobilization plans;

otherwise he warned those children would be

used in attempts to refuel conflicts.



Contact: Amnesty International, 1 Easton

Street, London WC1X 8DJ, United Kingdom,

telephone +44-171/413 5500, fax +44-171/956

1157. 



UN INTERNATIONAL NGO MEETING ON PALESTINE

NGOs participating in the UN International NGO

Meeting/European Symposium on the Question of

Palestine expressed serious concern over the

current stalemate in peace negotiations.

Participants at the meeting, held from 25-28

August in Geneva, committed themselves to

undertake campaigns against Israeli settlements

and pledged to work to make East Jerusalem

capital of the future Palestinian state.

Participants, who called for coordinated

international campaigns in support of the

rights of Palestinian people, also discussed

refugee rights, family reunification and

economic and social issues.



The meeting, convened under the auspices of the

Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable

Rights of the Palestinian People, was chaired

by Ibra Deguene Ka (Senegal). He said the NGO

community has played an important role in

fostering international action to bring

occupation of the Palestinian territories to an

end; endeavouring to influence their respective

governments; engendering positive public

opinion on the subject; and contributing moral

and material assistance to the Palestinian

people to better their living conditions and

assist their efforts in resisting occupation. 



Contact: Thierry Potvin, Press Officer,

Information Service, United Nations, CH-1211

Geneva 10, Switzerland, telephone +41-22/917

2311, fax +41-22/917 0300, e-mail

<tpotvin@unog.ch>.





CONFERENCE ON TOBACCO AND HEALTH

Each year tobacco causes about 3.5 million

deaths throughout the world this will increase

to ten million annual deaths during the 2020s,

with seven million of these deaths in

developing countries, according to the Tenth

World Conference on Tobacco or Health, held

from 24-28 August in Beijing (China). 



Fifty percent of the unnecessary deaths are

taking place in middle age (35-69) and robbing

those killed of around 22 years of normal life

expectancy.  Nicotine is addictive and tobacco

products have and are being aggressively

marketed by a powerful industry promoting to

the young the images of independence,

emancipation and sex appeal for products that

in reality only kill and disable,  said Dr.

Hiroshi Nakajima, Director-General of the World

Health Organization (WHO). 



WHO says the situation is especially worrisome

in less developed countries the home of 80% of

the world s population where public awareness

of the health consequences of smoking is low,

while funds to counteract marketing practices

of international tobacco companies are

negligible. And the absence of an international

agreement protecting less developed countries

from the  marketing assault  of the tobacco

giants makes these countries even more

vulnerable.



For example, according to the largest study

ever conducted on smoking deaths in China,

tobacco will kill a third of all young men in

China if current rates of new smokers persist.

Of the 300 million males now aged up to 29

years, about 200 million will become smokers.

If they continue to smoke throughout their

lives, 100 million will eventually be killed by

tobacco; half of these deaths will occur before

age 70. 



In many countries, tobacco consumption is

increasing among women.  More than half a

million smoking deaths occur in women,  said

Dr. Judith Mackay of the WHO Expert Advisory

Panel on Tobacco and Health.  Globally,

approximately 12% of women smoke as compared to

47% of men. But there can be no complacency

about the lower level of tobacco consumption

among women.  She said studies in different

countries show that smoking among women

presents a special problem for public health:

not only do female smokers suffer from all the

negative health consequences that male smokers

endure, but they also experience other

consequences that are gender specific.

 Indications are that smoking is increasing

among girls in both developed and developing

countries,  said Dr. Mackay.  



The conference was organized under the auspices

of WHO by the Chinese Medical Association and

the Chinese Association on Smoking and Health.



Contact: Igor Rozov, Health Communications and

Public Relations, World Health Organization

(WHO), 20 avenue Appia, CH-1211 Geneva 27,

Switzerland, telephone +41-22/791 2532, fax

+41-22/791 4858, e-mail <rozovi@who.ch>.





FIRST MAYAN WOMEN S CONGRESS

Eighty women representing 33 Mayan women s

groups assembled at the First Mayan Women s

Congress, held from 10-11 October in Merida

(Mexico). The event, which brought together

more than 200 participants including

representatives of governments, donors and UN

organizations, was described by its sponsor,

the UN Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), as

an unprecedented opportunity for Mayan women to

present their experiences and indigenous

knowledge to policy makers and donors as part

of an ongoing effort to enable the economic

empowerment of Mayan women by bringing them

into mainstream development. 



Mayan women urged financial support for

projects aimed at transforming women s

traditional activities into profitable

microenterprises, and they emphasized the need

for workspaces to increase efficiency and

quality control; training to improve businesses

and administration skills; new markets;

elimination of intermediaries so that profits

go directly to women; and gender sensitivity

training for men and women. 



Roundtables, which allowed for in-depth

discussion of ways to make Mayan women s

activities more economically viable, focused on

embroidery, crafts, aquaculture, beekeeping,

livestock, agriculture and environmental

education. Plans are underway to hold similar

congresses in Belize, Guatemala and other

states of Mexico. 

Contact: Melanie Roth, UNIFEM, 304 E. 45th

Street, 6th Floor, New York NY 10017, United

States, telephone +1-212/906 6897, fax

+1-212/906 6705, e-mail <unifem@undp.org>, web

site (www.undp.org/unifem).





DECLARATION ON PRESS FREEDOM ADOPTED

Media professionals from 40 European countries

have adopted a declaration urging the release

of imprisoned journalists, the prosecution of

crimes committed against journalists, media

self-regulation, journalistic ethics and

unbiased reporting on ethnic minorities. The

declaration was adopted by acclamation at the

close of the European Seminar on Promoting

Independent and Pluralistic Media with a focus

on Central and Eastern Europe, held in Sofia

(Bulgaria) from 10-13 September. More than 300

journalists and representatives of professional

media organizations took part in the seminar,

the last of five major regional meetings on

this theme organized by the UN Educational,

Cultural and Scientific Organization (UNESCO)

and the United Nations since the fall of the

Berlin Wall.



 Eastern and Central European journalists today

face serious problems like their colleagues in

other regions of the world,  said Henrikas

Yushkiavitshus, UNESCO Assistant

Director-General for Communication, Information

and Informatics.  The historical struggle for

freedom of expression experienced in Western

democracies in the past is today s reality for

many journalists in Eastern Europe. 



The Sofia Declaration highlights Article 19 of

the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights,

which enshrines the  freedom to hold opinions

without interference and to seek, receive and

impart information and ideas through any media,

and regardless of frontiers.  The declaration

urges the UN General Assembly to reinforce the

practical application of Article 19 as an

important contribution to the 50th Anniversary

of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.



It also  strongly deplore[s] that nearly all

assassinations and other crimes against

journalists and other media professionals in

Europe, as in other parts of the world, go

unpunished.  It calls on governments to free

immediately journalists jailed for their

professional activities, urges access to

governmental and intergovernmental information,

and asserts the right not to reveal sources of

information.

 The Sofia Declaration is important,  said

Aidan White, General-Secretary of the

International Federation of Journalists (FIJ).

 It puts pressure on governments to set the

media free and warns the private sector that

action needs to be taken against media

concentration and activities which undermine

standards of journalism. 



The Sofia seminar was organized in cooperation

with, among others, FIJ, the World Association

of Newspaper Publishers (FIEJ), the

International Organization of Journalists (IOJ)

and Reporters sans Frontiäres (RSF). 



Contact: Rosa Gonzalez, Communications

Division, UNESCO, 7 place de Fontenoy, F-75700

Paris, France, telephone +33-1/45 68 42 11, fax

+33-1/45 68 55 84, web site

(http://www.unesco.org).





CLEAN UP THE WORLD CAMPAIGN

An estimated forty million people around the

world participated in the fifth annual Clean Up

the World Campaign, which took place from 19-21

September in more than 110 countries.



The campaign, organized in partnership with the

United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP),

focuses on initiatives to produce both short

and long-term solutions to environmental

problems. The campaign s organizing committees

help establish recycling centres, carry out

environmental education campaigns, create

reforestation programmes and establish compost

centres.

   

Clean Up the World emphasizes the importance of

establishing long term sustainability and

implementing strategies to recycle and reuse

waste materials, as well as to reduce waste at

its source.  The Clean Up the World Campaign

has proven to be one of the simplest and most

effective ways of tackling these issues and at

the same time help raise environmental

awareness,  said UNEP Executive Director

Elizabeth Dowdeswell.

 

Contact: Clean Up the World, 117 Harris Street,

Pyrmont, Sydney, Australia, telephone

+61-2/9692 0700, fax +61-2/9692 0761, e-mail

<cuw94@peg.apc.org> or Patricia Jacobs,

Information Officer, UNEP, PO Box 30552,

Nairobi, Kenya, telephone +254-2/623088, fax

+254-2/623692, e-mail

<patricia.jacobs@unep.org>.





NGO NEWS



CIVICUS SECOND WORLD ASSEMBLY

While the globalization of markets,

communication and democracy creates new

opportunities for millions, it may also lead to

the destruction of cultures and communities. Is

civil society the answer to the perils of

globalization? This was one of the questions

discussed by participants at the 2nd World

Assembly of CIVICUS the World Alliance for

Citizen Participation. The assembly on Engaging

Our Partners was held from 23-26 September in

Budapest (Hungary).



At the opening ceremony Dr. Benjamin Barber of

the Walt Whitman Center for the Culture of

Politics of Democracy noted that the greatest

challenge facing civil society is the onset of

globalization.  Civil society and the forces of

globalization are in a contest for the soul of

democracy,  he said.  The institutions of

democracy must be rooted in civil ideals...[of]

plurality, diversity and difference. 



Over 500 civil society activists from 70

countries participated, including NGO leaders,

business people, government leaders,

researchers, grassroots activists, scholars,

donors and artists. 



Participants focused on strengthening the

building blocks essential to a strong civil

society, particularly in those countries

without a long history of nonprofit-sector

activity. They introduced proposals for

increasing visibility and understanding of the

sector, promoting supportive laws and

regulations, and developing new approaches to

mobilizing financial resources for civil

society initiatives.



Contact: CIVICUS Secretariat, 919 18th Street,

3rd Floor, Washington DC 20006, United States,

telephone +1-202/331 3518, fax +1-202/331 8774,

e-mail <info@civicus.org>, web site

(http://www.civicus.org).





NGOS LAUNCH HUMAN RIGHTS DECLARATION

Over 180 human rights and women s organizations

are preparing a Declaration of Human Rights

from a Gender Perspective, which is intended to

strengthen and enrich the Universal Declaration

of Human Rights on its 50th anniversary in

1998. The consortium preparing the declaration

with a gender perspective said,  There is no

better way to celebrate this anniversary than

to launch a major campaign for human rights

education with, for, and by the communities who

stand to gain most from the declaration s

proclamations.  The consortium includes the

ComitÇ de AmÇrica Latina y el Caribe para la

defensa de los derechos de la mujer (CLADEM),

which initiated the declaration; the US-based

People s Decade for Human Rights Education

(PDHRE), which serves as the secretariat for

the campaign; and some 20 other human rights

organizations from around the world.



A related campaign aims to implement the UN

Decade for Human Rights Education (1995-2004)

to the fullest extent possible. The consortium

said many non-governmental and community groups

engaged in struggles for economic and social

justice are not familiar with the powerful

content of the declaration and its relevance to

their daily lives or the Platform of Action for

the UN Decade. Indeed, they said many of the

communities have not defined their efforts

within a human rights perspective.  That s why

the 50th anniversary of humanity s most

critical and empowering document should not

pass in silence,  NGO representatives said. 



Contact: Susana Chiarotti, CLADEM, Juan JosÇ

Paso 652, Rosario, Argentina, telephone

+54-41/370874, fax +54-41/370874, e-mail

<insgenar@tau.wamani.apc.org>, web site

(http://www.pdhre.org). 





MEETING ON REPRESENTATION OF WOMEN IN MEDIA

Women media producers from around the world met

in Zurich (Switzerland) from 6-12 September to

discuss electronic media, representation of

women from the South in local and Northern

television productions, and cultural expression

and self-representation, among other things.

The meeting, sponsored by Shedhalle, an NGO

working on international art and cultural

projects, included audio-visual presentations

by women from independent media, community

television and video units from Latin America,

Africa, Asia and the Middle East. Participants

discussed media production, distribution and

representation in a post-colonial context;

exclusionary social practices that are produced

and fostered by the media, such as those

affecting gypsies; struggles against the

effects of globalization by taking a grassroots

approach to the question of identity and

representational politics; and the challenges

marginalized women face. Speakers highlighted

the ways in which communication can be used to

mobilize for political change within national

contexts or for emerging  alternative

globalizations,  such as global fax alarms used

by women at the 1995 Fourth World Conference on

Women in Beijing.



Contact: Shedhalle Zurich, Seestrasse 395,

CH-8038 Zurich, Switzerland, telephone

+41-1/481 5950, fax +41-1/481 5951, e-mail

<uleshedhalle@access.ch> web site

(http://www.access.ch/justwatch).





NGOS MOBILIZE AGAINST EU PATENT DIRECTIVE

Southern NGOs, people s organizations and

scientists have joined NGOs in Europe in

mobilizing to block legislation approved on 16

July by the European Union Parliament. The

legislation allows 17-20 year patents to be

taken out within the EU on living material

including plants, animals and human parts. If

implemented, the Directive on the Legal

Protection of Biotechnological Inventions would

prove a major victory for transnational

corporations that have been lobbying to impose

monopoly rights over life forms through

patents, and it would jeopardize the

livelihoods of millions of people in the South,

according to some activists. The next stage in

the legislative procedure takes place in the

European Council of Ministers in November 1997.





A Memorandum from Concerned Citizens of the

South, delivered to EU development ministers in

September, outlines concerns about the

legislation and calls for the directive to be

delayed until wide public consultation has

taken place. The NGOs cite concerns including

legalization of biopiracy, and undermining of

food security and the South s bargaining power

in the World Trade Organization (WTO). By

corrupting common-sense definitions of what

constitutes an invention (in practice, equating

it with a discovery), NGOs note the directive

would not only encourage continuing biopiracy

of genetic resources from the South but would

also criminalize Southern farmers, herbalists,

traditional healers and indigenous communities.





In terms of food security, some activists say

the directive would dramatically increase the

powers and influence of corporate plant

breeders, transnational agribusiness companies

and transnational pharmaceutical corporations.

Southern NGOs signing the memo reject the

argument that biotechnology is necessary if the

world s people are to be fed. Instead, they say

it will exacerbate hunger and malnutrition by

further undermining community control over food

production and access to land and food.

Activists also believe the directive threatens

to preempt a democratic outcome to the 1999 WTO

review of the Trade Related Intellectual

Property (TRIPs) agreement by intensifying the

already substantial pressure on Southern

nations to adopt US-style patent legislation

and undermining their bargaining power within

the negotiations. 



Contact: The Corner House, PO Box 3137, Station

Road, Sturminster Newton, Dorset DDT10 1YJ,

United Kingdom, telephone +44-1258/473795, fax

+44-1258/473748, e-mail

<cornerhouse@gn.apc.org>.





CONFERENCE ON HIGHLY INDEBTED POOR COUNTRIES

The second Latin American Conference of the

Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPCs), held

from 2-4 July in Tegucigalpa (Honduras), aimed

to educate the public, including leaders of

Honduran grassroots organizations, about the

World Bank s HIPC initiative and to examine

whether Honduras, whose debt burden is

currently classified as  sustainable  by the

Bank, might qualify for debt relief. The

conference was organized by NGOs and the

Netherlands Organization for International

Development Cooperation (NOVIB).



Technical experts from central banks and NGOs

from around the world discussed the reasons

debt is contracted; the extent of the debt

problem beyond the 41 HIPC countries; and how

the debt burden inhibits the  space of human

development.  Participants also discussed some

of the shortcomings of the HIPC initiative and

proposed alternative methods of calculating the

debt burden including giving a more prominent

place to the ratio of debt-to-budget

expenditures and debt-to-GDP. Representatives

from a number of HIPC countries, including the

four Latin American highly-indebted poor

countries of Bolivia, Guyana, Honduras and

Nicaragua, stressed the importance of direct

action, international labour solidarity, and

initiatives to promote civil society/government

consultations on debt.



Participants decided to form a Latin American

network for sharing information and strategies

on external debt, to be called the Red

Latinoamericana en Deuda y Desarrollo (Latin

American Network on Debt and Development).



Contact: Associaci¢n de Organismos No

Gubernamentales, Apd Postal 2239, Tegucigalpa,

Honduras, telephone +504/303546 or 307622, fax

+504/303546, e-mail

<pachecor@asonog.sdnhon.org.hn>.





JUBILEE CAMPAIGN 2000

The Jubilee Campaign 2000 is collecting

signatures for a petition to be submitted to

the 1999 Summit of the Eight (formerly the

Group of Seven), to be held in Germany. The

campaign has also set up a millennium clock in

London to draw attention to what it calls the

urgent need for slashing developing country

debt by the year 2000. 



Jubilee 2000 (see Go Between 63), an

educational charity based in the UK, is

campaigning to achieve a one-off cancellation

of the backlog of unpayable debt for the

world s poorest countries, which it describes

as one that either cannot be paid, or can be

paid only with enormous human suffering.



The campaign, which focuses on relieving the

debt burden of governments to other

governments, international financial

institutions or to commercial banks by the year

2000, is designed to promote social justice,

fundamental human rights and sustainable

development.



During 1997 Jubilee 2000 campaigns are being

launched in Australia, Austria, Canada,

Denmark, France, Germany, Ghana, Honduras, Hong

Kong, India, Ireland, Italy, Kenya, New

Zealand, Norway, Philippines, Spain, Sweden,

Switzerland, Tanzania, the United States,

Zambia and Zimbabwe. The campaign, which has

established strong links with refugee and

anti-racist groups, is also working with many

other national, women s and community

organizations, as well as trade unions such as

the International Confederation of Free Trade

Unions (ICFTU). 



Contact: Jubilee 2000, PO Box 100, London SE1

7RT, United Kingdom, telephone +44-171/620

4444, fax +44-171/620 0719, e-mail

<j2000@gn.apc.org>, web site

(http://www.oneworld.org/jubilee2000/campaign.h

tml).





YOUTH FOR HABITAT INTERNATIONAL NETWORK

Youth organizations from 41 countries gathered

in Eskisehir (Turkey) from 14-21 September to

discuss the role of youth in implementing the

agendas agreed at the 1996 Habitat II

conference and the 1992 Earth Summit. This

event was the first follow-up meeting of Youth

for Habitat, an open-ended network of youth

groups formed during the build-up to Habitat

II.



The 400 participants in the meeting decided to

consolidate their partnership under an umbrella

structure called Youth for Habitat

International Network. The network, whose

secretariat will be based in Turkey, will focus

on the following objectives: 

n    raise awareness and distribute information

on the Habitat Agenda and Agenda 21, as well as

promote youth perspectives on their

implementation; 

n    encourage local work on the documents 

objectives, particularly in areas where no

action has been taken and where global aspects

are not integrated into existing local

initiatives; 

n    exchange information within the network in

the fields of training, fundraising,

communication and networking;

n    encourage other international events that

could promote youth perspectives on the Habitat

Agenda and Agenda 21; 

n    monitor youth actions at all levels

through comparable human settlement and shelter

indicators and documented best practices; and 

n    establish contact with relevant UN

agencies, NGOs/grassroots organizations and

other partners to achieve these objectives.

 

Contact: Youth for Habitat International

Secretariat, c/o Mehmetcan Tarhan-Sezai Hazir,

Youth Association for the Implementation of the

Decisions of Habitat II and Agenda 21, Sisli

Belediyesi 12, Kat Istanbul, Turkey, telephone

+90-212/272 1212, fax +90-212/272 4596, e-mail

<youthforhab@turk.net>.





REGIONAL CONSULTATION ON REFUGEE WOMEN

Major problems confronting refugee women are

violence, insecurity, lack of basic needs and

disrupted lives, according to participants at

the Regional Consultation on Refugee Women and

Women in Situations of Armed Conflict, held on

12-16 October in Chiangmai (Thailand). The

consultation, organized by the Asian Pacific

Development Centre, is part of the centre s

support for implementation of the 1995 Fourth

World Conference on Women Platform for Action. 



Participants said filling information gaps and

improved dissemination on conditions of refugee

women and women in armed conflict, among other

things, are essential to lobbying and advocacy

on their behalf. As a result of the conference,

a regional situation analysis report will be

produced for distribution among women s

networks and for the UN Commission on the

Status of Women session in March 1998.



Contact: Vanessa Griffen, Coordinator, Gender

and Development Programme, Asian and Pacific

Development Centre, Pesiaran Duta, PO Box

12224, 50770 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, telephone

+60-3/6511088, fax +60-3/6510316, e-mail

<apdc@po.jaring.my>.  





WORLD BREAST CANCER CONFERENCE

More than 1000 delegates from 54 countries

attended the first World Conference on Breast

Cancer to discuss, among other things, research

and medical treatment; environmental pollution

and its links to health; and economic links to

health such as poverty and globalization.

Nearly half of the participants were women

living with cancer. The theme of the

conference, held from 13-17 July in Kingston

(Canada), was  Break the Silence, Stop the

Epidemic: Opening the Doors to Dialogue Around

the World.  Delegates, who began work on a

Global Action Plan to Eradicate Breast Cancer,

included scientists, environmentalists,

political leaders and health and human rights

activists.



The conference ended in an International Public

Hearing chaired by Bella Abzug, President of

the Women s Environment and Development

Organization (WEDO) and a cancer survivor. Ms.

Abzug said 70% of breast cancer cases are due

to unknown causes although connections can be

shown between increases in chemical use and

rising rates of cancer worldwide. She called

the breast cancer epidemic an international

public health crisis, with a death toll

expected to exceed half a million globally in

the year 2000.  This is every woman s nightmare

and one in eight women s grim reality in

industrialized regions of the world,  she

stated.  As regions of the South become more

industrialized, cancer incidence increases. Our

question is: Why?  



Scientists, researchers and activists presented

testimony to a panel of government

representatives from legislative bodies and

ministries of health or environment from

Brazil, Egypt, Guyana, Japan and the United

States. A survey was distributed to conference

delegates to gather suggestions for the global

action plan, which will be developed over the

coming months. The next conference, scheduled

to take place from 25-31 July 1999 in Ottawa

(Canada), will assess progress in implementing

the plan. 



Contact: WEDO, 355 Lexington Avenue, 3rd Floor,

New York NY 10017, United States, telephone

+1-212/973 0325, fax +1-212/973 0335, e-mail

<wedo@igc.apc.org.>.





REGIONAL NEWS



COUNCIL OF EUROPE SUMMIT

The Council of Europe Summit, held in

Strasbourg (France) on 10-11 October, has

adopted an action plan to strengthen democratic

stability of the council s 40 member states. 



The action plan defines four main areas where

the council says there is scope for immediate

advances and practical measures. They are:

n    democracy and human rights a Single Court

of Human Rights will be established, as well as

an office of Commissioner of Human Rights;

n    social cohesion social standards as

embodied in the Social Charter and in other

council instruments will be promoted, and a new

strategy for social cohesion will be defined;

n    security of citizens the council called

for the adoption of further measures to prevent

terrorism and strengthen international

cooperation in combating terrorism, and it

instructed the Committee of Ministers to adopt

before the end of the year guiding principles

to be applied in the development of domestic

legislation and practice to combat corruption

and organized crime; and

n    democratic values and cultural

diversity the council decided to launch an

initiative for education for democratic

citizenship.



To carry out structural reforms, the council

instructed the Committee of Ministers to adapt

the organization to its new tasks and its

enlarged membership and to improve its

decision-making process. (Over the past five

years over 15 states of Eastern Europe and the

former Soviet Union have joined the council.)

It also instructed the committee to take steps

to ensure that the action plan is speedily

implemented by the various Council of Europe

bodies, in cooperation with European and other

international organizations.



Contact: Information Point, Publishing and

Documentation Service, Council of Europe,

F-67075 Strasbourg Cedex, France, telephone

+33-3/88 41 20 33, fax +33-3/88 41 27 45.





MULTILATERAL ENVIRONMENTAL AGREEMENTS

An International Conference on Implementation

of Multilateral Environmental Agreements

(MEAs): Ways and Means, held 15-16 September in

The Hague (Netherlands), was attended by 110

experts of 29 countries, relevant MEA

secretariats, international organizations,

NGOs, research institutes and universities. 



Presentations were made on implementation of

MEAs through trade and non-trade measures,

historical analysis and expectations for the

future. A comparison was made of dispute

settlement regimes in MEAs and in the World

Trade Organization (WTO). Participants were

also updated on the use of consensus building

as a way to handle disputes between environment

and trade interests, and on negotiations of a

Biosafety Protocol under the Convention on

Biological Diversity as they relate to the

trade and environment debate. 



Three parallel sessions focused on

implementation of multilateral environmental

agreements on climate change, forests and waste

exports. Participants also discussed legal

implications of WTO law on environmental

policies and bridges between trade, environment

and development to improve effectiveness of

global environmental policies. The conference

concluded with a panel on the future of debate

on trade and environment.



The conference was organized by the Netherlands

Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the

Environment and TMC Asser Instituut.



Contact: TMC Asser Instituut, PO Box 30461,

2500 GL Den Haag, Netherlands, telephone

+31-70/342 0329, fax +31-70/342 0316, e-mail

<huisman@mail.asser.nl>, web site

(http://www.asser.nl).





UNHCR WARNS AGAINST DEPORTATIONS

In September the United Nations High

Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) warned

against the  hasty deportation  of rejected

Algerian asylum-seekers in the midst of an

upsurge of violence in the country. UNHCR said

it is concerned about the forcible return of

rejected Algerian asylum-seekers from European

countries in recent months.



 We recognize that not all asylum-seekers from

Algeria have legitimate claims to asylum,  said

Dennis McNamara, UNHCR s Director of

International Protection.  However, we consider

that a significant number of those currently

fleeing Algeria are in genuine need of

international protection.  UNHCR said there has

been a low level of acknowledgement paid by

some European countries to the protection needs

of these Algerians: last year, of the 5950

Algerian asylum applicants in Canada, the

United States and 14 European countries, only

670 were approved.



Violence and terrorism in Algeria have been on

the rise since the end of 1996. Political

assassinations and car bomb attacks have

claimed many lives, particularly in recent

months.



Under the current situation, UNHCR says it

believes certain groups of asylum seekers could

face serious security problems if returned to

Algeria now.  Algerians who have close links

with the government, members of the country s

security forces and the judiciary,

intellectuals, artists and journalists seen as

supporting a secular government need special

consideration in the asylum countries. Also at

risk are women viewed as transgressing moral or

religious values and members or perceived

members of Islamic groups. 



UNHCR said these people should benefit from

international protection, and it strongly

appealed to governments not to deport Algerian

asylum seekers without due consideration of the

security risk they may face if they return to

their country.



In October, UNHCR also denounced the expulsion

of hundreds of Rwandan refugees from the

Democratic Republic of Congo. The DRC

government said it had  repatriated  more than

4000 Rwandans from its frontier in Goma. Most

were reported to have fled the recent upsurge

of violence in Rwanda. At the same time Rwandan

authorities told UNHCR staff in the border town

of Gisenyi that DRC soldiers trucked to the

area 830 Rwandan refugees, including 753 women

and children.  The DRC government is a

signatory to international conventions on

refugees. Its actions against refugees in

recent days constitute a violation of their

commitments,  said UN High Commissioner for

Refugees Sadako Ogata.



 We are particularly alarmed at the situation

in the DRC. We were forced to suspend our

operations for Rwandan refugees there after our

efforts to help these people had been

frustrated at every turn,  she added.  This is

just another stage in the deteriorating

condition of refugees in the DRC. 





DUBROVNIK CONFERENCE ON TRANSITION ECONOMIES

Experts from governments of transition

economies, academia and the International

Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank, Bank for

International Settlements, and the European

Bank for Reconstruction and Development

gathered in Dubrovnik in late June for the

third Dubrovnik Conference on Transition

Economies. 



Participants discussed balance of payment

trends, exchange rates and competitiveness in

transition economies. Two previous conferences

dealt with macroeconomic stabilization and

banking sector reforms, respectively. The

conferences are designed to facilitate

systematic analyses and a free exchange of

ideas on the problems of transition economies. 



The June 1997 Dubrovnik conference focused on

approaches to balance of payments, exchange

rates and trade issues in transition economies.

It was suggested that certain indicators such

as the ability to mobilize domestic savings,

attract foreign savings and use the proceeds

productively to advance reforms and

growth determine the sustainability of current

account deficits and should be monitored

carefully. Many favoured fixing exchange rates

in the early stage of stabilization. Others

advocated flexible rates to avoid currency

appreciation, among other things. 



On trade policy, all agreed that transition

economies should remain open, but views

differed on whether countries should

simultaneously pursue complementary reforms.



Contact: Dorothy Thibodeau, International

Monetary Fund (IMF), 700 19th Street NW,

Washington DC 20431, United States, telephone

+1-202/623 7300. 





UNDCP: OPIUM PRODUCTION IN AFGHANISTAN UP

Opium poppy production in Afghanistan rose to

2800 metric tons in 1997 an estimated 25%

increase over the preceding year, according to

the 1997 Afghanistan Opium Poppy Survey. Over

95% of Afghanistan s total opium production

originates in provinces currently under Taliban

control.



The survey results  reaffirm the importance and

urgency for the international community and the

local authorities to take coordinated action at

the source to deal with this very grave

problem,  according to the UN International

Drug Control Programme (UNDCP). It said some

58,400 hectares of Afghanistan are under opium

cultivation, with a marginal increase of about

2.8% over 1996. 



The significant increase in production is

probably due to a higher yield per hectare

resulting from favourable weather conditions

and improved methods of cultivation. The new

estimate puts dry opium production in

Afghanistan above the combined estimated

production in the so-called Golden Triangle of

Lao People s Democratic Republic, Myanmar and

Thailand.



According to UNDCP, few countries today are

faced with a more daunting array of problems

than Afghanistan it is poverty-stricken, the

infrastructure is in ruins, and it has

experienced 19 years of war. In addition,

legitimate agricultural production has been

halved, with a per capita income below US$100

per year.



Contact: UN Information Service, Vienna

International Centre, PO Box 500, A-1400

Vienna, Austria, telephone +43-1/21345 4666,

fax +43-1/21345 5899, e-mail

<vpetzoldt@unvienna.un.or.at>.





DUBROVNIK CONFERENCE ON TRANSITION ECONOMIES

The World Food Programme (WFP) has warned that

nutritional data collected under government

auspices shows an average 17% of young children

surveyed in North Korea are seriously

undernourished.



 Without adequate assistance we can expect

massive mortality in the coming winter,  WFP

Executive Director Catherine Bertini said in

September.  Nutritionally, North Koreans are

already pressed to the limit.  In the first

collection of nutritional data obtained by a

foreign aid agency in North Korea, a team of

five WFP-recruited nutritionists measured the

weight-for-height ratio of more than 4000

children in nurseries and kindergartens in four

North Korean provinces selected by the

government. 



 This is not the random sample we had hoped to

carry out countrywide, and we cannot vouch for

its scientific accuracy, but it does confirm

anecdotal evidence about the North Korean s

poor nutritional status and the strong

impressions of WFP staff and other visitors to

the country,  Ms. Bertini said.



According to WFP, 17% of the young children it

measured were seriously malnourished. The

standard weight for a young girl 70 centimetres

tall is 8.4 kilograms, but the malnourished

children measured with this height were all

below 6.8 kg and some were below 6.0 kg, which

are respectively the cut-off points for

moderate and severe malnutrition. The situation

is dangerous because winter will set in soon:

temperatures fall to below 20 degrees

centigrade, and the country lacks adequate

heating and medicine. People will need

additional food to combat the cold and medicine

to fight off disease. 



WFP has been distributing supplementary food

rations to 2.6 million children aged six or

younger since May. However, malnutrition

persists in children who cannot absorb the

nourishment because they suffer from diarrhoea,

respiratory ailments and other diseases left

untreated for lack of medicines and medical

care. Food aid has also gone to some 250,000

farmers and workers taking part in flood

rehabilitation projects and their 850,000

dependents, and up to one million hospital

patients.



The team of nutritionists included

representatives of Save the Children Fund UK,

the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)

and the UN Children s Fund (UNICEF). 



Contact: Trevor Rowe, Spokesman, WFP, Via

Cristoforo Colombo 426, I-00145 Rome, Italy,

telephone +39-6/6513 2602, fax +39-6/6513 2866.





FOCUS



REALITY OF AID 1997-1998: BLEAK FUTURE FOR THE

POOR



The Reality of Aid 1997/1998, published by

Eurostep, the International Council for

Volunteer Agencies and ActionAid, reports that

total aid from member states of the

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and

Development (OECD) has been cut to 0.25% of

total OECD gross national product, the lowest

level since 1950. The report says this

indicates a total lack of commitment by the

richest governments to reach the target of 0.7%

of GNP.





Total aid from OECD countries fell by US$3.8

billion in 1996, a decline of 4.2% in real

terms from 1995. The deepest cut was made by

Japan, the world s largest bilateral donor,

which reduced its aid disbursements by 15% in

net terms. The report says there is little

indication in OECD countries that this decline

will be reversed.



Cuts Made Despite Need 

and Public Support

An insufficient amount of aid is being

channeled to where it is most needed, according

to the report. While the poorest countries

received a smaller share of a smaller aid pot,

wealthier countries in Central and Eastern

Europe received a 10% increase in aid. In 1995

only one-fourth or 25.1% of total OECD aid

reached the 48 least developed countries, and

17 out of 21 OECD donors cut their aid to

sub-Saharan Africa. 



 We were encouraged when governments committed

themselves to OECD targets to halve abject

poverty by 2015,  said Sabina Siniscalchi,

chair of Eurostep.  But we now fear that these

were empty promises. 



These cuts have been made despite strong public

support for aid and poverty eradication. For

example, a recent poll of the European Union

(EU) found that an average 67% of people

support development cooperation and 87% think

it is important. In Japan, 80% of the

population thinks aid should remain steady or

be increased. And in Spain there have been

public demonstrations calling for increased aid

levels. 



Governments say that these cuts are necessary

as they must deal with domestic budget

deficits. Several European countries have cited

pressures to cut their budgets in order to meet

targets to join the European Monetary Union.

However, in countries that have successfully

eliminated their domestic deficits, there are

no signs that aid budgets will be restored to

previous levels.



The report says there is some good news

regarding individual government efforts to

improve their aid programm