There are two types available: a "Print Plus deposit" and a "Regular deposit".

A "Print Plus deposit" includes printed Official Records of main organs of the United Nations, most sales publications regardless of place of issuance, all periodicals normally available by subscription, masthead documents (i.e., working documents) of the regional commission located in the area of the library, as well as all masthead documents and publications placed in general distribution, records of plenary meetings of the Security Council.

A "Regular deposit" includes Official Records of main organs of the United Nations, most sales publications regardless of place of issuance, all periodicals normally available by subscription and masthead documents (i.e., working documents of the regional commission located in the area of the library.

The deposit entitlement commences with the date of designation, is not retroactive and is limited to one copy, normally in one official language.

1) Publications under Sales Number Categories 0, all of III and XX;

2) Publications by the International Court of Justice (ICJ);

3) Publications by the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM);

4) Publications by the United Nations Centre for Regional Development (UNCRD);

5) Publications by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR);

6) Publications by the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD);

7) Publications by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR);

8) Publications issued in only one (e.g. English) or two (e.g. French and Spanish) of the official languages, if the depository does not receive materials in those languages and no specific request has been made for such materials to be included in the deposit;

9) Material not claimed before the lapse of two years after the date of publication;

10) Documents issued under the LIMITED, RESTRICTED or PARTICIPANTS ONLY categories of distribution;

11) Publications marked "Sales only" at time of issuance;

12) Sales publications issued and distributed by a trade publisher;

13) Press releases;

14) Online, CD-ROM, and microfiche products; and

15) Documents and publications by specialized agencies of the United Nations.

Deposit is available in the six official languages of the United Nations, namely Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish. Normally, the entitlement is limited to material in one official language. Not all of publications appear in Arabic, Chinese or Russian. Depositories where the national language is Arabic, Chinese or Russian may therefore choose either English, French or Spanish as a language of deposit, but they will also receive one copy of each publication available in their national language.

The United Nations has introduced to the global community free access to UN documents, treaties and statistical data via the Internet.

The Official Document System (ODS), a full-text storage and retrieval system for UN documents in electronic format in all official languages started in 1992. An active process of digitizing older documents is presently taking place. ODS offers a more economical, timely and secure means of distributing and storing parliamentary documents worldwide. It has a multilingual interface and good search capability.
Effective 1 January 2005, the Official Document System (ODS) is free of charge.

Access to the United Nations Treaty Series Database is provided via the internet; This databases includes the international instruments published in the United Nations Treaty Series. The League of Nations Treaty Series are also a part of the the online version of the printed publication, entitled, "Multilateral Treaties Deposited with the Secretary-General". These databases are free of charge to the general public since November 2007.

In 2008, the Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) launched the United Nations Data Retrieval System (UNdata), a service based on UN statistical sources. More than 60 million records from 24 UN databases on employment, education, energy, environment, health, population, refugees, etc., are available to the general public free of charge.

No, but they are available for purchase. Please visit United Nations Publications or consult United Nations Publications Catalogue, which is included in the deposit.

Arrangement
A depository library may choose any system it prefers, as long as the collection is kept in good order and under adequate control. The below serve as suggestions only:

A partial depository may choose to arrange the collection of sales publications by sales code, thus achieving a broad subject classification. The arrangement may be:

(1) by year, and within year by subject category, then by individual publication code, in order to bring together all sales publications issued during the year; or

(2) by subject category, and within category by year, then by individual sales publication code, in order to group all publications by broad subjects.

The Official Records should be arranged by organ and session/year.

A full depository may prefer to arrange the collection alphabetically by series symbol, then numerically by the individual document number. As many sales publications also carry a symbol, the depository may choose to disregard the sales code and file sales publications by symbol. If a combination of arrangement by sales code and by symbol is chosen, a cross reference needs to be placed.

For information on United Nations documents, categories of distribution, meaning of symbols assigned to documents and research tools (printed and on the Internet), consult United Nations Documentation : Research Guide.

Discarding/Weeding
While judicious weeding is permitted, the essence of the collection as a record of United Nations activities from the date of designation to the present must be preserved. The following material can be discarded:

1) Masthead versions of documents that are reproduced in the Official Records or in printed proceedings;

2) The basic document and its addenda, corrigenda, amendments and excerpts once a revision is issued;

3) Duplicate copies of documents bearing more than one symbol (only one copy needs to be kept if a cross reference is placed under the other symbols);

4) Masthead documents of conferences, meetings, symposia, etc., if subsequently reissued as sales publications;

5) Weekly, monthly, quarterly, etc., issues of publications for which a yearly cumulation has been issued;

6) Masthead documents that are subsequently reproduced, such as documents of the International Law Commission later appearing in the Yearbook of the International Law Commission.