Sixty-fourth General Assembly

Second Committee

1^st Meeting (AM)

Poverty Eradication, Climate Change, International Financial System among Key

Agenda Items as Second Committee Approves Organization of Work

Poverty eradication, climate change, the international financial system and development were among key topics approved for consideration by the Second Committee (Economic and Financial) this morning as it approved its organization of work for the sixty-fourth session of the General Assembly.

The Committee also adopted its programme of work (document A/C.2/64/L.1) as Chair Park In-kook ( Republic of Korea) welcomed other members of its new Bureau: Vice-Chairpersons Mohamed Cherif Diallo ( Guinea), Carlos Enrique García González ( El Salvador), Dragan Mićić ( Serbia) and Rapporteur Denise McQuade ( Ireland).

Issues slated for review included macroeconomic policy questions, including international trade and development, the international financial system, external debt and commodities; operational activities for development, including United Nations activities and South-South cooperation; and follow-up to, and implementation of, the outcome of the 2002 International Conference on Financing for Development and the 2008 Review Conference.

Other topics to be considered were:  groups of countries in special situations, including the Third United Nations Conference on the Least Developed Countries, and the outcome of the International Ministerial Conference of Landlocked and Transit Developing Countries; globalization and interdependence, including the role of the United Nations in promoting development in that context, preventing and combating corrupt practices, and science and technology; poverty eradication, including implementation of the Second United Nations Decade for the Eradication of Poverty (2008-2017), women in development, and human resources development; and agriculture development and food security.

The Committee was also expected to take up permanent sovereignty of the Palestinian people in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and of the Arab population in the occupied Syrian Golan over their natural resources; information and communications technology for development; sustainable development, including implementation of Agenda 21, the Programme for the Further implementation of Agenda 21 and the outcomes of the World Summit on Sustainable Development, and follow-up to, and implementation of, the Mauritius Strategy for the Further Implementation of the Programme of Action for the Sustainable Development of small island developing States.

Also under sustainable development, the Committee was expected to consider the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction, protection of global climate for present and future generations, implementation of the United Nations to Combat Desertification, the Convention on Biological Diversity, the report on the twenty-fifth session of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Governing Council, sustainable mountain development, and the promotion of new and renewable sources of energy.

Others items on the Committee’s agenda were implementation of the outcome of the United Nations Conference on Human Settlements (Habitat II) and strengthening of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), global partnerships, and programme planning.

The Second Committee will meet again at 10 a.m. on Monday, 5 October, to begin its general debate.

* *** *

For information media • not an official record