International Trade and Development

A/RES/73/219View PDF

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

A Resolution of the General Assembly, under agenda item 18a International trade and development, published in 2018.

What other versions does this mandate have?

33 versions · 1994–2025

This is an older version — the most recent is A/RES/80/121

Year	Symbol	Title	Word length	Text similarity
2025	A/RES/80/121	International trade and development	4,299	75%Compare
2024	A/RES/79/195	International trade and development	3,895	73%Compare
2023	A/RES/78/134	International trade and development	3,332	85%Compare
2022	A/RES/77/151	International trade and development	3,008	50%Compare
2022	A/RES/76/190	International trade and development	2,140	76%Compare

Which reports were submitted under this mandate?

16 reports · 2003–2024

Year	Symbol	Title	Mandate resolution
2024	A/79/256	New trade dynamics and industrial policies : realizing inclusive trade gains report of the Secretary-General	A/RES/78/134
2020	A/75/225	International trade and development report of the Secretary-General	A/RES/74/201
2019	A/74/221	International trade and development report of the Secretary-General	A/RES/73/219
2017	A/72/274	International trade and development report of the Secretary-General	A/RES/71/214
2016	A/71/275	International trade and development report of the Secretary-General	A/RES/70/187

What subjects does this mandate have?

4 subjects

Development International Trade Multilateral Trade Negotiations Trade Facilitation

What’s in this document?

24 operative paragraphs

Takes note of the report of the Trade and Development Board of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development¹ and the report of the Secretary-General;²

¹A/73/15 (Part I) and A/73/15 (Part II).

²A/73/208.

Reiterates that Member States will not be able to achieve the ambitious Goals and targets of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development³ without a revitalized and enhanced global partnership and comparably ambitious means of implementation, and that a revitalized global partnership will facilitate an intensive global engagement in support of the implementation of the 2030 Agenda, bringing together Governments, civil society, the private sector, the United Nations system and other actors and mobilizing all available resources;

³Resolution 70/1.

Reaffirms that international trade is an engine for inclusive economic growth and poverty reduction and that it contributes to the promotion of sustainable development, while taking note of its possible catalytic effect towards structural transformation and industrialization, particularly in developing countries;

Also reaffirms the commitments made through the adoption of the Addis Ababa Action Agenda of the Third International Conference on Financing for Development⁴ in, inter alia, international trade as an important action area for sustainable development;

⁴Resolution 69/313, annex.

Further reaffirms that the gender-responsive implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals is essential to achieving sustained, inclusive and equitable economic growth, and notes the need for a broader use of gender impact assessments of trade policies before, during and after their implementation;

Reaffirms that global collective action through multilateral trade cooperation is essential in tackling challenges to development, that revitalizing a global partnership is critical for the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals and that the multilateral trading system continues to be the cornerstone of such a partnership and should be regarded as a global public good;

Recognizes that the World Trade Organization is increasingly affected by insufficient progress in multilateral trade negotiations and that it is imperative for the World Trade Organization to address issues that are at the heart of current problems in international trade, and recognizes in this regard the need to strengthen that organization, with a view to ensuring the continued viability and effectiveness of its dispute settlement, negotiating and monitoring functions;

Calls upon all members of the World Trade Organization to conclude negotiations on fisheries subsidies in 2019, consistent with the instructions from the eleventh Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization and with a view to meeting the Sustainable Development Goals;

Recommits to promoting a universal, rules-based, open, transparent, predictable, inclusive, non-discriminatory and equitable multilateral trading system under the World Trade Organization, as well as meaningful trade liberalization;

Emphasizes the need to combat protectionism in all its forms and to rectify any trade-distorting measures that are inconsistent with World Trade Organization agreements, recognizing the right of countries, in particular developing countries, to fully utilize flexibilities consistent with their World Trade Organization commitments and obligations, and recognizes that the work of the World Trade Organization shall maintain development at its centre, with provisions for special and differential treatment remaining integral;

Urges the international community to adopt urgent and effective measures to eliminate the use of unilateral economic, financial or trade measures that are not authorized by relevant organs of the United Nations, that are inconsistent with the principles of international law or the Charter of the United Nations or that contravene the basic principles of the multilateral trading system and that affect, in particular, but not exclusively, developing countries;

Welcomes the entry into force of the Trade Facilitation Agreement of the World Trade Organization on 22 February 2017, calls upon members of the World Trade Organization that have not yet done so to ratify the Agreement, and stresses the importance of providing developing and least developed countries with assistance and support for capacity-building in implementing the Agreement;

Notes the commitments to working to ensure that bilateral, regional and plurilateral trade agreements complement the multilateral trading system, and recognizes that they can play an important role in complementing global liberalization initiatives;

Emphasizes the importance of facilitating the accession of developing countries to the World Trade Organization, recognizing the contribution that their accession would make to the rapid and full integration of those countries into the multilateral trading system, urges in this regard the acceleration of the accession process on a technical and legal basis and in an expeditious and transparent manner for developing countries that have applied for membership in the World Trade Organization, and reaffirms the importance of that organization’s decision WT/L/508/Add.1 of 25 July 2012 on accession by the least developed countries;

Takes note of the fourteenth session of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, held in Nairobi in July 2016, as well as the outcome of the eleventh Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization, held in Buenos Aires from 10 to 13 December 2017, and expresses its appreciation to the Government of Argentina for hosting the meeting;

Looks forward to the convening of the twelfth Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization in Astana from 8 to 11 June 2020, and expresses its appreciation to the Government of Kazakhstan for hosting the meeting;

Recalls the importance of members of the World Trade Organization working together with a view to achieving positive outcomes at the twelfth Ministerial Conference and beyond in a balanced, inclusive and transparent way, with a sense of urgency and solidarity, and to further working to strengthen the World Trade Organization;

Reiterates the important role of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development as the focal point within the United Nations system for the integrated treatment of trade and development and interrelated issues in the areas of finance, technology, investment and sustainable development, and in contributing to supporting the implementation of the 2030 Agenda;

Invites the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development to continue to monitor and assess the evolution of the international trading system and its trends from a development perspective, with particular attention to its potential contribution to the Sustainable Development Goals, and to monitor and assess persistent and emerging development challenges to trade from a sustainable development perspective, in accordance with its mandate;

Recognizes the commitment to continue to address the needs of small, vulnerable economies and to favourably consider the adoption of such measures as would facilitate their fuller integration into the multilateral trading system, taking into account the needs of small, vulnerable economies in all areas of negotiations, without creating a subcategory of members of the World Trade Organization, and in this regard encourages progress on the implementation of the World Trade Organization work programme on small economies, which supports their efforts towards sustainable development, as also reflected in the outcome document of the third International Conference on Small Island Developing States, the SIDS Accelerated Modalities of Action (SAMOA) Pathway;⁵

⁵Resolution 69/15, annex.

Calls upon the relevant organizations of the United Nations system, within their respective mandates and resources, to ensure that no one is left behind and no country is left behind in the implementation of the present resolution;

Takes note of the advances by the Enhanced Integrated Framework in supporting the least developed countries in their use of trade as an engine of growth and as a means of achieving sustainable development and poverty reduction;

Highlights the importance of promoting the integration of least developed countries into the international trading system, including by doubling their share of world exports by 2020, as recognized in Sustainable Development Goal 17, and in this regard calls for greater efforts in implementing fully the duty-free, quota-free market access initiatives for least developed countries and strengthened efforts to operationalize the World Trade Organization services waiver for least developed countries, consistent with that organization’s decision WT/MIN(15)/48-WT/L/982 of 19 December 2015 on the implementation of preferential treatment in favour of services and service suppliers of least developed countries and increasing their participation in services trade;

Requests the Secretary-General, in collaboration with the secretariat of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, to submit to the General Assembly at its seventy-fourth session a report on the implementation of the present resolution and on developments in the international trading system, and decides to include in the provisional agenda of its seventy-fourth session, in line with the content of paragraph 19 above, under the item entitled “Macroeconomic policy questions”, the sub-item entitled “International trade and development”, unless otherwise agreed.

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

What other versions does this mandate have?

Which reports were submitted under this mandate?

What subjects does this mandate have?

What’s in this document?

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