SUNS 4347 Thursday 17 December 1998



UNITED NATIONS: RESURGENCE OF INTEREST IN HARD-CORE ECONOMIC ISSUES

Geneva, 15 Dec (Chakravarthi Raghavan) -- There has been a perceptible shift at the United Nations General Assembly towards "hard-core" economic issues, attributable in large part to the constructive approach of major groups and delegations from all regions, according to UNCTAD Secretary-General Rubens Ricupero.

In a statement at the Executive Session of the Trade and Development Board, the UNCTAD head said that the just concluded Second Committee of the UN Assembly had ended on a "successful note" from UNCTAD's point of view, with delegations showing trust and confidence in UNCTAD's
willingness to provide sound balanced support and policy advice, and promoting consensus on the resolutions.

There is a perceptible shift towards "hard core" economic issues - such as globalization and finance - while relegating issues related to the UN reform to a secondary level, Ricupero reported.

The shift to consideration of serious economic issues, already visible at the 1997 General Assembly after the outbreak of the Asian crisis, it has been accentuated this year as the financial crisis has deepened and widened.

The General discussions in the Second Committee were dominated by issues and concerns such as effects of globalization implications of the financial crisis, ODA and debt, trade and related matters, and the governance of the international monetary, financial and trade systems.

And the resurgence of interest in these 'hard-core' issues had led to the formulation of new resolutions in some critical areas - such as globalization and financial crisis - and to a considerable qualitative improvement in some other resolutions in terms of their substantive content and role of the UN in the areas of finance, trade, investment and sustainable development.

There had been remarkable cooperation among delegations, developed and developing, which made compromises on critical and new issues possible, he added.

The cosponsoring by a broad and heterogenous group of countries (the G77 and China, the EU, the USA, Australia Canada, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, South Korea and Russia) augured well for the preparations for UNCTAD-X.