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CWMUN NEW YORK 2020

United Nations Conference on Trade and Development

UNCTAD

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Dear Delegates,

Welcome to the 2020 UN Conference and to the United Nations Conference on

Trade and Development (UNCTAD).

This background guide (BGG) is a brief summary on what is the UNCTAD, its

history, objectives, its achievements, and state members. This will help you gain

the main information about this committee.

Delegates will be divided into groups and each group will be assigned with a

country in which they will represent in the conference. During the conference,

each group will be representing a country that must reflect the past

achievements and failures as well as pursue future progress.

We look forward to meeting all of you at the conference and hope that all topics

that will be discussed will inspire debate and cooperation. Please do not

hesitate to email us if you have any questions.

Ms Sandra Magdy: sandra_magdy123@outlook.com

Ms Nour Kareem: Nour151437@bue.edu.eg

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Introduction of the Committee

United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) is the part

of the United Nations Secretariat that deals with trade, investment, and

development concerns. It was founded in 196 and its Headquarters is in Geneva,

Switzerland.

The main goals of the organization are to: "maximize the trade, investment and

development opportunities of developing countries and assist them in their

efforts to integrate into the world economy on an equitable basis".

UNCTAD was established by the United Nations General Assembly in 1964

and it reports to the UN General Assembly and United Nations Economic and

Social Council. The main objective of UNCTAD is to formulate policies

relating to all parts of development including trade, aid, transport, finance and

technology.

The Trade and Development Board oversees the activities of the organization

and deals with policy issues, management and institutional matters. The

conference ordinarily meets once in four years; the permanent secretariat is in

Geneva. The conference is a subsidiary organ of the United Nations General

Assembly. The conferences serve an important political function: they allow

intergovernmental consensus building regarding the state of the world economy

and development policies, and they play a key role in identifying the role of the

United Nations and UNCTAD in addressing economic development problems.

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One of the principal achievements of UNCTAD (1964) has been to conceive

and implement the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP). It was argued in

UNCTAD that to promote exports of manufactured goods from developing

countries, it would be necessary to offer special tariff concessions to such

exports. Accepting this argument, the developed countries formulated the GSP

scheme under which manufacturers' exports and import of some agricultural

goods from the developing countries enter duty-free or at reduced rates in the

developed countries. Since imports of such items from other developed

countries are subject to the normal rates of duties, imports of the same items

from developing countries would enjoy a competitive advantage.

The creation of UNCTAD in 1964 was based on concerns of developing

countries over the international market, multi-national corporations, and great

disparity between developed nations and developing nations. The United

Nations Conference on Trade and Development was established to provide a

forum where the developing countries could discuss the problems relating to

their economic development. The organization grew from the view that existing

institutions like GATT (now replaced by the World Trade Organization, WTO),

the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and World Bank were not properly

organized to handle the particular problems of developing countries. Later, in

the 1970s and 1980s, UNCTAD was closely associated with the idea of a New

International Economic Order (NIEO).

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UNCTAD conferences

The first UNCTAD conference took place in Geneva in 1964, the second in

New Delhi in 1968, the third in Santiago in 1972, fourth in Nairobi in 1976, the

fifth in Manila in 1979, the sixth in Belgrade in 1983, the seventh in Geneva in

1987, the eighth in Cartagena in 1992, the ninth at Johannesburg (South Africa)

in 1996, the tenth in Bangkok (Thailand) in 2000, the eleventh in São Paulo

(Brazil) in 2004, the twelfth in Accra in 2008, the thirteenth in Doha (Qatar) in

2012 and the fourteenth in Nairobi (Kenya) in 2016.

Based on UNCTAD reports, UNCTAD has 195 member states and is

headquartered in Geneva. UNCTAD has 400 staff members and a bi-annual

(2010–2011) regular budget of $138 million in core expenditures and $72

million in extra-budgetary technical assistance funds. It is a member of the

United Nations Development Group. UNCTAD can deliver better results and

achieve greater impact when efforts are coordinated with other partners.

Therefore, UNCTAD has deepened cooperation with other international

organizations, governments, businesses, civil society, youth and academia to

enhance our policies and practices at the national, regional, and global levels.

Sustainable development requires a comprehensive and coherent approach that

draws on the expertise and contributions of many different actors.

Fourteenth session of the United Nations Conference on Trade and

Development was on the 17th

till the 22nd

of July, 2016 in Nairobi, Kenya.

The upcoming conference, the fifteenth session of the United Nations

Conference on Trade and Development will be on the 18th

till the 23rd

of

October 2020 in Bridgetown, Barbados.

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Membership

195 states are UNCTAD members, all UN members plus UN observer states Palestine and

the Holy See. UNCTAD members are divided into four lists, the division being based

on United Nations Regional Groups with six members unassigned: Armenia, Kiribati, Nauru,

South Sudan, Tajikistan, Tuvalu.

List A consists mostly of countries in the African and Asia-Pacific Groups of the UN.

List B consists of countries of the Western European and Others Group.

List C consists of countries of the Group of Latin American and Caribbean States

(GRULAC).

List D consists of countries of the Eastern European Group.

The lists, originally defined in 19th General Assembly resolution 1995 serve to balance

geographical distribution of member states' representation on the Trade Development Board

and other UNCTAD structures. The lists are similar to those of UNIDO, an UN specialized

agency. The most recent member are the Palestinians.

List A (100 members): Afghanistan, Algeria, Angola, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Benin, Bhutan, Bosnia and

Herzegovina, Botswana, Brunei Darussalam, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cambodia, Cameroon, Cape Verde,

Central African Republic, Chad, China, Comoros, Côte d'Ivoire, Republic of Congo, Democratic Republic

of Congo, Djibouti, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea,

Eswatini, Ethiopia, Fiji, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana,

Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, India, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq,

Israel, Jordan, Kenya, Kuwait, Laos, Lebanon,

Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Malawi,

Malaysia, Maldives, Mali, Marshall Islands,

Mauritania, Mauritius, Micronesia, Mongolia,

Morocco, Mozambique, Myanmar, Namibia, Nepal,

Niger, Nigeria, North Korea, Oman, Pakistan,

Palestine, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Philippines,

Qatar, South Korea, Rwanda, Samoa, Sao Tome and

Principe, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra

Leone, Singapore, Solomon Islands, Somalia, South

Africa, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Syria, Thailand, Timor-

Leste, Togo, Tonga, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Uganda,

United Arab Emirates, Tanzania, Vanuatu, Viet Nam,

Yemen, Zambia, Zimbabwe.

List B (31 members): Andorra, Australia, Austria,

Belgium, Canada, Cyprus, Denmark, Finland, France,

Germany, Greece, Holy See, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan,

Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, Netherlands,

New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, San Marino, Spain,

Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States.

List C (33 members): Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile,

Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Grenada, Guatemala,

Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Saint Kitts and Nevis,

Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay, Venezuela.

List D (24 members): Albania, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Georgia,

Hungary, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Montenegro, Poland, Moldova, Romania, Russia,

Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Macedonia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan.

Not assigned countries (6 members): Armenia, Kiribati, Nauru, South Sudan, Tajikistan, Tuvalu.

Members, List B Members, List C Members, List D Members, to be assigned

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Committee Mission Statement

The Committee main aim is to strengthen national capabilities to design and

implement complementary trade and agricultural policies. The Committee aims

to attain higher integration of the developing countries and LDCs that are

mainly dependent on agriculture into the global value chains. As this integration

will be able to create new prospects and opportunities. However, the main

objectives are to create knowledge on the social and environmental effects of

trade-led structural transformation in agriculture.

Also, to join trade for inclusive and sustainable development in rural areas. The

Strategy of the UNCTAD is to build analysis on both existing and emerging

development problems. It creates consensus around efforts to encourage

national and international policies and strategies beneficial to development and

supports countries in fulfilling their development strategies.

Topic A: Strengthening national capacities to design and implement complementary

trade and agricultural policies.

1. Statement of the Problem:

For most of the developing countries, the agricultural area remains mainly

underdeveloped regarding production for the domestic market and for export.

Simultaneously, in most of these countries the agricultural part lies at the center

of their markets. As it accounts for a large share of GDP, engage a huge

percentage of the labor force, embodies the main source of foreign exchange

incomes, supplies the majority of basic food needed by the population and

offers maintenance and other earnings for large rural populations. Therefore,

major advancement in encouraging economic growth, reducing poverty and

improving food security cannot be attained in most of these countries without

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recognizing more fully the productive potential of the agricultural area and its

impact to overall economic development.

2. History/ Past UNCTAD Actions:

The foundation of UNCTAD in 1964 was founded on concerns of developing

countries over the international market, multi-national corporations, and great

inequality between developed nations and developing nations. The United

Nations Conference on Trade and Development was grounded on providing a

forum where the developing countries can discuss the difficulties relating to

their economic development.

However, the interests and development strategies of developing countries

might be different, but these countries are united together by the common aim

of accelerating their development. The Committee has discussed international

goods agreements to guarantee fair prices for developing countries, enhanced

the productivity of their trade structure and assisted them to expand their

production and to take part of the global economy.

The UNCTAD has provided leadership in several areas, emphasizing and

analyzing problems that often became noticeable in international policy-making.

The UNCTAD had several achievements and actions. The Committee

established the idea of the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP). It

pioneered the matter of trade in services, which later became a central feature of

GATT discussions and negotiations. The Committee concentrated on the

problem of tariff escalation, a phenomenon that still continues. UNCTAD

pioneered as early as the 1960s the focus on South-South trade, yet another

main element in trade discussions today. It also pioneered the analysis of skilled

migration and structured discussions of suggestions to deal with the issue

through such measures as the taxation of migrants for purposes of. UNCTAD

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provided significant input to goods agreements as a way of addressing the

persistent difficulties of incomes instability by countries reliant on one or just a

few primary products.

Latest Developments

Globalized markets and the implementation of trade agreements would bring

profits for LDC exporters if they can be supported in overcoming their supply

and competitiveness constraints. The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable

Development offers a critical examination of the Sustainable Development

Goals (SDG) indicators from a statistical perspective. It shapes several key

measurement challenges and some unanticipated consequences.

The Report of the Secretary-General of UNCTAD to UNCTAD XIV:

underscores four action lines needed to fulfil the ambitions of the 2030

Sustainable Development Agenda: 1 Building productive capacity to transform

economies, more effective States and more efficient markets, tackling

vulnerabilities, building resilience and strengthening multilateralism, finding

common solutions.

Problems a Resolution should address

Furthermore, LDCs today face more challenges such as adjusting to

technological change as most LDCs are at an early stage of agricultural

technology. Also, LDCs today have to compete in a more fiercely competitive

world market. The continuing removal of trade barriers, increasing demand for

1 https://unctad.org/en/Pages/About%20UNCTAD/UNCTAD-and-the-Global-Goals.aspx

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higher quality goods and higher standards are specific issues that obstruct the

competitiveness of producers in LDCs in both world and domestic markets.

There are also some risks and challenged when dealing with overseas trade such

as unstable global prices affecting export incomes and profits, shifts in demands

and might cause rising structural unemployment in some industries.

Some questions to consider:

What are the losses from agricultural trade policies?

What are the impacts of agricultural trade on employment?

What are the issues that require UNCTAD's engagement?

How can the LDCs and developing countries cope with the technological change?

How can the Committee best address the importance of agricultural trade?

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References

Enhancing the Development Role and Impact of UNCTAD. (2006). Retrieved from:

https://unctad.org/en/PublicationsLibrary/osg20061_en.pdf

UNCTAD delivers on the Sustainable Development Goals. Retrieved from:

https://unctad.org/en/Pages/About%20UNCTAD/UNCTAD-and-the-Global-Goals.aspx

United Nations Conference On Trade And Development.

https://unctad.org/en/Pages/aboutus.aspx

UNCADSTAT. Retrieved from https://unctadstat.unctad.org/EN/About.html

Trade and Development Report. (2019). Retrieved from:

https://unctad.org/en/PublicationsLibrary/tdr2019_en.pdf