Special high-level meeting of the ECOSOC with the BWIs and WTO
The Economic and Social Council held a special high-level meeting with the Bretton Woods Institutions, the World Trade Organization and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development on Monday 18 April 2005 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York.
Following Monterrey, the spring meetings of ECOSOC have gained greater importance in the multilateral efforts to pursue development goals. In this important and challenging year, the spring meeting had special significance as a first of a series of key events aimed to contribute to an effective outcome of the September Summit, which will review the implementation of the Millennium Declaration.
The Monterrey Consensus has mandated these meetings to address issues of coherence, coordination and cooperation as a follow up to the . General Assembly resolution 58/230 requests the President of the Economic and Social Council, in consultation with all major institutional stakeholders, to focus the meeting on specific issues, within the holistic approach of the . Following these consultations, the President of the Council proposed the following focus for this year’s dialogue, within the overall framework of “Coherence, coordination and cooperation in the context of the implementation of the Monterrey Consensus: Achieving the internationally agreed development goals, including those contained in the Millennium Declaration“. Within this broad theme, the following three issues were addressed in the roundtables: (i) Policies and strategies; (ii) Trade, investment, and private flows; and (iii) ODA, innovative sources of financing and debt.
The meeting was held on the day following the meetings of the and the. The intention was to create a free-flowing dialogue between a panel of finance ministers and senior officials who have participated in the spring meeting of the Bretton Woods institutions or in intergovernmental work on trade, and the high-level participants (ministers and senior officials) of the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations.
The panel of speakers included the Chairperson of the , the representative of the  and the President of the . Panelists participated in their personal capacity. The Secretary-General of the United Nations, the Senior Management of the IMF, World Bank, WTO and UNCTAD also participated in the meeting.
For further information please contact Mr. Sarbuland Khan, Director, Office for ECOSOC Support and Coordination at ecosocinfo@un.org.
Programme
- Roundtables:
- : Policies and strategies;
- : Policies and strategies;
- : Trade, investment, and private flows;
- : Trade, investment, and private flows;
- : ODA, innovative sources of financing and debt;
- : ODA, innovative sources of financing and debt.
Statements
- , Secretary-General of the United Nations
- , Permanent Representative of Pakistant to the United Nations and President of the Economic and Social Council
- , Finance Minister, South Africa
- , Designated Representative of the Chair of the International Monetary and Finance Committee
- , Ambassador, President of the Trade and Development Board, UNCTAD
- , Minister of Privatization and Investment, Pakistan
- , Minister of State, Ministry of Finance and Planning of Jamaica, on behalf of the Group of 77 and China
- , Ambassador, Permanent Representative of Luxembourg, on behalf of the European Union
- , Chair of the New Rules for Global Finance Coalition, on behalf of the NGO
- , Secretary-General, International Chamber of Commerce, on behalf of the private sector
- , Head of the Department of Studies and Research, Directorate General of the International Economics, Ministry of Foreign Affair, Chile
- , Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Permanent Representative, Tunisia
- , Minister, Nigeria
- , Executive Secretary, UNECE
- , U.S. Representative to the Ãå±±½ûµØEconomic and Social Council, U.S.A.
- , Director-General, Department for Humanitarian and Social Affairs, Ministry of External Relations, Brazil
Documentation
- Note by the Secretary-GeneralÌý–Ìý
- ´¡²ÔÌýÂ drawn from the Report of the Secretary General “In Larger Freedom”, Global Monitoring and Millennium Project Report.
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- Photo gallery
Background
Since 1998, the United Nations Economic and Social Council has held a special high-level meeting with the Bretton Woods institutions immediately after the Spring meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The origin for these meetings can be found in the context of Ãå±±½ûµØreform measures adopted at the fiftieth session of the General Assembly, specifically in Assembly resolution 50/227. The meetings are meant to facilitate a free-flowing dialogue among ministers of finance returning from the Washington meetings, on the one hand, and ministers of development cooperation as well as ministers and high-level officials of foreign affairs, on the other. Civil society and private sector representative have also participated in these meetings.
The first meeting, in 1998, was held against the backdrop of the Asian financial crisis, and ministers discussed how to maintain the focus on long-term development amidst economic and financial upheavals. The meeting in 1999 addressed the functioning of international financial markets and stability in financing for development, in the broader context of issues related to promoting recovery, ensuring cross-sectoral coherence and mobilizing the cooperation of all actors in the development process. In 2000, the meeting discussed the theme of strengthening international financial arrangements and eradicating poverty. In 2001, the meeting addressed two themes: (a) development financing, in particular poverty eradication, official development assistance, and debt; and (b) a development-friendly international financial system: public and private responsibility in the prevention of financial crises. The topic of the 2002 meeting was “Dialogue on the outcome of the International Conference on Financing for Development and of the meetings of the Development Committee and International Monetary and Financial Committee.” The meeting, just one month after the , which adopted, in March 2002, the , was the first opportunity to lay down the foundation for “staying engaged” as called for in the Consensus. In 2003 the meeting undertook “an overall assessment of progress in implementation of the Monterrey Consensus at all levels”. In 2004 the meeting addressed the impact of private investment and trade related issues on financing for development, the role of multilateral institutions in reaching the MDGs and debt sustainability in six roundtables under the overall theme of “Coherence, coordination and cooperation in the context of the implementation of the Monterrey Consensus”. Participation and full engagement of an unprecedented number of Executive Directors in both the meeting itself and the preparatory process enriched the event.
These ECOSOC meetings have been considered important for deepening the dialogue between the United Nations and the Bretton Woods institutions, the World Trade Organization and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, and for strengthening their partnership for achieving the development goals agreed at the global conferences of the nineties. In the Millennium Declaration, Heads of State and Government declared their resolve to strengthen further the Economic and Social Council, building on its recent achievements, to help it fulfill the role ascribed to it in the Ãå±±½ûµØCharter. The Assembly subsequently encouraged the deepening of the dialogue between the Council and the Bretton Woods Institutions in the special high-level meetings.