United Nations Economic Commission for Europe

File:UNECE member states.svg

Map showing the member states of the commission

The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (ECE or UNECE) is an intergovernmental organization or a specialized body of the United Nations. The UNECE is one of five regional commissions under the jurisdiction of the United Nations Economic and Social Council. It was established in 1947 in order to promote economic cooperation and integration among its member states.

The commission is composed of 56 member states, most of which are based in Europe, as well as a few outside Europe. Its transcontinental Eurasian or non-European member states include: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Canada, Cyprus, Georgia, Israel, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, the Russian Federation, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, the United States and Uzbekistan.

History

The commission was first proposed in London in the summer of 1946 by the Temporary Subcommission on the Reconstruction of Devastated Areas.

The commission was established by the Economic and Social Council on 28 March 1947 in order to "Initiate and participate in measures for facilitating concerted action for the economic reconstruction of Europe," as well as to "maintain and strengthen the economic relations of the European countries, both among themselves and with other countries of the world."

It was established at the request of the United Nations General Assembly who called on the Economic and Social Council to create the commission, as well as the Commission for Asia and the Far East, in order to "give effective aid to countries devastated by war."

EE absorbed the function and resources of the European Central Inland Transport Organization upon its founding.

As the commission was established towards the beginning of the Cold War, it faced difficulties in achieving its mandate of economic reconstruction of Europe due to the Iron Curtain: separately the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation was established in 1948 in the west and the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance in 1949 in the east. The work of the commission had to concern itself only with questions that were of common interest to East and West, as to not cause confrontation. However, since the fall of the Soviet Union, the economic commissions of the United Nations have been expanding their activities in the former Soviet republics.

Member states

The following are the member states of the commission, along with their date of admission:

Committees and programmes

Committee on Environmental Policy

The concern of UNECE with problems of the environment dates back at least to 1971, when the group of Senior Advisors to the UNECE governments on environmental issues was created which led to the establishment of the Committee on Environmental Policy, which now meets annually. The Committee provides collective policy direction in the area of environment and sustainable development, prepares ministerial meetings, develops international environmental law and supports international initiatives in the region. CEP works to support countries to enhance their environmental governance and transboundary cooperation as well as strengthen implementation of the UNECE regional environmental commitments and advance sustainable development in the region.

Its main aim is to assess countries' efforts to reduce their overall pollution burden and manage their natural resources, to integrate environmental and socioeconomic policies, to strengthen cooperation with the international community, to harmonize environmental conditions and policies throughout the region and to stimulate greater involvement of the public and environmental discussions and decision-making.

CEP is the overall governing body of UNECE environmental activities. The committee's work is based on several strategic pillars:

• Providing the secretariat to the "Environment for Europe" process and participating in the regional promotion of Agenda 21;
• Developing and carrying-out of UNECE Environmental Performance Reviews in the UNECE countries non-members of OECD;
• Overseeing UNECE activities on environmental monitoring, assessment and reporting;
• Increasing the overall effectiveness of UNECE multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs) and facilitating the exchange of experience on MEAs' implementation. See UNECE Espoo Convention, Aarhus Convention, Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution, Convention on the Protection and Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes and Convention on the Transboundary Effects of Industrial Accidents.
• Participating and/or facilitating the exchange of experience in a number of cross-sectoral activities undertaken under the leadership of UNECE (e.g. education for sustainable development, transport, health and environment, green building), or in partnership with other organizations (e.g. environment and security initiative, European environment and health process).

Committee on Forests and the Forest Industry

The first task of UNECE after the Second World War was to coordinate reconstruction effort in Europe. Timber was crucial for construction, and energy, but the forests had been heavily overcut and production and trade were at a standstill. The ECE Timber Committee emerged from the International Timber Conference held in 1947 in Mariánské Lázně in the former Czechoslovakia.

The main pillars of the committee's activities have been: the collection and publication of the best available statistics on forests, wood production and trade; the exchange of information on forest working techniques and training of forest workers; periodic surveys of the long-term outlook on forests; technical work on the rational use of wood; reviewing forest product markets; and share experiences on forest and forest sector policy.

Committee on Urban Development, Housing and Land Management

In 1947, UNECE set up a Panel on Housing Problems, which later evolved into the Committee on Human Settlements and after the reform in 2005/2006 into the Committee on Housing and Land Management. The committee is an intergovernmental body of all UNECE member States. It provides a forum for the compilation, dissemination and exchange of information and experience on housing, urban development, and land administration policies; and in areas such as Birmingham, a more fiscal issue-UK.

In 2020, the CUDHLM created the Forum of Mayors at the Palais des Nations, an event allowing mayors from the UNECE region to exchange their best practices on urban development, housing and land management. UNECE is the first UN Regional Economic Commission to implement such an initiative that facilitates the cooperation between the UN, Member States and cities.

Inland Transport Committee

The UNECE Transport Division has been providing secretariat services to the World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulations (WP.29). In addition to acting as secretariat to the World Forum, the Vehicle Regulations and Transport Innovations section serves as the secretariat of the Administrative Committee for the coordination of work, and of the administrative/executives committees of the three agreements on vehicles administered by the World Forum.

Among other things, ITC has produced:

• 59 United Nations conventions concerning inland transport,
• Trans-European North-South Motorways, Trans-European Railways and the Euro-Asia Transport Links projects
• the TIR system (Transports Internationaux Routiers), a global customs transit facilitation solution
• transport statistics methods.

The World Forum services three UN Agreements:

• the 1958 Agreement on the approval/certification of Vehicles and its annexed UN Regulations,
• the 1997 Agreement on Periodic Technical Inspections (PTI) and its annexed UN Rules,
• and the 1998 Agreement on Global Technical Regulations and its annexed UN GTRs.

Statistical Division

The UNECE Statistical Division provides the secretariat for the Conference and its expert groups, and implements the statistical work programme of UNECE. The Conference brings together chief statisticians from national and international statistical organizations around the world, meaning that the word "European" in its name is no longer an accurate description of its geographical coverage. The Statistical Division helps member countries to strengthen their statistical systems, and coordinates international statistical activities in the UNECE region and beyond through the Conference and its Bureau, and the Database of International Statistical Activities. The Statistical Division develops guidelines and training materials on statistical methodology and practices, in response to demands from member countries. It works with different groups of specialists from national and international statistical organizations, and organizes meetings and online forums for statistical experts to exchange experiences on a wide range of topics. The UNECE Statistical Division also provides technical assistance to South-East European, East European, Caucasus and Central Asian countries.

The division also provides:

1. On-line data on the 56 UNECE member countries in Europe, Central Asia and North America in both English and Russian, on economic, gender, forestry and transport statistics.
2. A biennial overview of key statistics for member countries.
3. A set of wikis to support collaboration activities and disseminate information about good practices.

UNECE conducted the Template:Visible anchor in the 1990s in 23 member States, with over 150,000 participants, with hundreds of resulting scientific publications. This activity has hence continued in the form of the Generations and Gender Programme.

United Smart Cities (USC)

The United Smart Cities programme is a joint effort between UNECE and the Organization for International Economic Relations (OiER).

Numerous private business entities and other international and European agencies support the programme, including Environment Agency Austria (EAA), the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS), UN-Habitat, and the International Society of City and Regional Planners (ISOCARP). The programme promotes areas of strategic smart city policy and development. The key focus areas as detailed by the programme are:

1. Urban mobility
2. Sustainable housing
3. Clean energy
4. Waste management
5. Information and Communications Technology (ICT)

Implementing Sustainable Development Goals

The UNECE has presented a set of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) priorities, which resulted from a mapping and prioritization of its existing activities against the goals. These consist of most SDGs except for SDG 10 (on reduced inequalities), SDG 14 (on life below water), SDG 1 (on poverty reduction), SDG 2 (on hunger), and SDG 4 (on quality education). The social dimension is mostly absent. This can be expected since UNECE does not include the “social” agenda in its name, unlike two of the other five regional commissions, namely UNESCWA (for Western Asia) and UNESCAP (for Asia and the Pacific).

The UNECE, with its long history of working on public-private partnerships, has taken the lead in introducing a format for public-private partnerships for the SDGs, called “People-Proof” public-private partnerships.

Secretariat

The ECE secretariat has been characterized as a "strong" secretariat in 1957. The ECE secretariat was led by Gunnar Myrdal in its first decade. Myrdal refused efforts by the Soviet Union to dictate what staff would be employed in the secretariat. During this period, the secretariat sought to promote European integration efforts.

Executive secretaries

Years	Country	Executive secretary
1947–1957	Template:Country data Sweden	Gunnar Myrdal
1957–1960	Template:Country data Finland	Sakari Tuomioja
1960–1967	Template:Country data Yugoslavia	Vladimir Velebit
1968–1982		Janez Stanovnik
1983–1986	Template:Country data Finland	Klaus Sahlgren
1987–1993	Template:Country data Austria	Gerald Hinteregger
1993–2000	Template:Country data France	Yves Berthelot
2000–2001	Template:Country data Poland	Danuta Hübner
2002–2005	Template:Country data Slovakia	Brigita Schmögnerová
2005–2008	Template:Country data Poland	Marek Belka
2008–2012	Template:Country data Slovakia	Ján Kubiš
2012–2014	Template:Country data Bosnia and Herzegovina	Sven Alkalaj
2014	Template:Country data Denmark	Michael Møller (acting)
2014–2017		Christian Friis Bach
2017–2023	Template:Country data Slovakia	Olga Algayerova
2023–present	Template:Country data Moldova	Tatiana Molcean

Publications

Template:Namespace detectTemplate:Template otherTemplate:Main otherTemplate:Main otherTemplate:Main other From 1982 to 2007 the IOS Press published the Statistical Journal of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe on behalf of the UNECE.

See also

• OSCE
• UNECE Population Activities Unit
• United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (overlapping membership)
• United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (overlapping membership)
• UN/CEFACT—Trade facilitation via standardised business communication.
• UN/LOCODE—location codes, maintained by UNECE
• International E-road network, numbered by UNECE
• World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulations
• Green card system—motor insurance scheme of UNECE
• International Union of Tenants (IUT)

External links

• Official website
• UNECE Statistical Database