UNREPORTED: News on the United Nations System at Work.

"PIC" in Effect

A late 1998 incident, in which toxic chemicals unwittingly imported from Taiwan Province of China brought fear, death and anger to the Cambodian port city of Sihanoukville, will be much easier to prevent in future under a new international convention. Called the Rotterdam Convention on Prior Informed Consent (PIC), it introduces voluntary limitations to international trade in pesticides and other hazardous chemicals. The 22 pesticides and 5 industrial chemicals that are banned or severely restricted in at least two countries may, under the Convention, no longer be exported unless the receiving country, for reasons of its own, agrees to import them.

An initiative of the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations and the United Nations Environment Programme, PIC will help Governments make informed decisions on whether, or under what circumstances, to import known harmful substances. The arrangement formalizes and gives legal status to an international exchange of information that has been going on for years.

The Convention was adopted in September 1998 in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, by 62 Governments after two years of negotiations that have involved more than 150 countries. Four Asian-Pacific countries Indonesia, Mongolia, New Zealand and the Philippines were among the immediate signatories, and most other countries in the region are expected to sign up in 1999. PIC will come into effect three months after 50 sovereign States ratify it.

UN Volunteers in East Timor

The first of some 400 polling officers recruited by the United Nations Volunteers (UNV) programme were fielded in mid-June to help prepare East Timor's "popular consultation", a ballot scheduled for this summer which is to decide on the territory's special autonomy or separation from Indonesia.

The rest of the short-term UNVs, representing some 50 nationalities, are set to arrive in East Timor by the end of June after completing five days of electoral training at an airforce base in Darwin, Australia. Ten UNV physicians and 10 laboratory technicians will accompany the polling officers.

UN volunteers are being sent for a two-month term of service in compliance with United Nations Security Council Resolution 1246 of 11 June, which established the United Nations Mission in East Timor (UNAMET) to organize and conduct the popular consultation.

Organizing and observing elections has been a key area of work for UN volunteers since the early 1990s. More than 5,000 professional electoral observers have been recruited by the Bonn-based UNV programme to provide electoral assistance in Cambodia, Mozambique, South Africa, Haiti, Liberia, the Central African Republic, Bosnia, Nigeria, Nepal and most recently in Indonesia. They have represented the United Nations, the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe and the European Union.

Increased Internet Interest

Businesses are responding to a growing use of the Internet by Governments to disseminate procurement opportunities and receive quotations from interested providers. International organizations are also using the Internet for purchasing activities. The United Nations, for example, recently launched the UN Development Business Online (http://www.devbusiness.com), a site providing procurement opportunities from multilateral development banks such as the World Bank and other international agencies. Over the next five years, major development banks will pay over $190 billion to companies worldwide.

IMF Access to Archives

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is further expanding public access to documentary materials in the IMF's archives, including Executive Board documents that are more than five years old and other materials that are more than 20 years old. IMF had moved in 1996 to declassify all materials in its archives that are more than 30 years old, except for some documents that contain highly confidential information. The decision to open die archives further to public review is part of an ongoing initiative by the Fund toward greater openness with respect to its operations and activities.

Egypt Promotes Health Advocacy

The Government of Egypt and the United Nations Population Fund signed a health advocacy cooperation agreement in January by which the United Nations fund will allot some $4 million for programmes recommended by the Cairo Conference on Population and Development. Under the agreement, Egypt's Ministry of Health and Population will use the sum to strengthen grass-roots nongovernmental organizations that work to improve the status of women, reduce female genital mutilation (FGM), influence youth attitudes on gender issues and increase male involvement in reproductive health.