unctad - united nations conference on trade and development - objectives - functions - activities

1. United Nations Conference on Trade and
Development
By Shreyan Dutta
Roll No. 103

2. Introduction
• UNCTAD is the principal organ of the United Nations General
Assembly dealing with trade, investment, and development
issues.
• The creation of UNCTAD was based on concerns of developing
countries over the international market and great disparity
between developed nations and developing nations.
• The UNCTAD was established to provide a forum where the
developing countries could discuss the problems relating to
their economic development.
• The organisation grew from the view that existing institutions
like GATT (replaced by WTO), the IMF, and the World
Bank were not properly organized to handle the particular
problems of developing countries.
• Currently, UNCTAD has 194 member states and is
headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland.
• The conference ordinarily meets once in four years.

3. Objectives
To accelerate the rate of economic growth of
the developing world.
To reduce and eventually eliminate the trade
gap between the developed and developing
Countries.

4. Functions
To promote international trade between
developed and developing countries.
To formulate principles and policies on
international trade and related problems of
economic development.
To make proposals for putting its principles and
policies into effect.
To review and facilitate the coordination of
activities of the other U.N. institutions in the
field of international trade.

5. Activities
Technical elaboration of new trade schemes
Various promotional activities designed to help
developing countries in the areas of trade and
capital flows

6. Thank you!