United Nations in Geneva

Around 8,500 staff work for the United Nations family in Geneva, which is the largest concentration of United Nations personnel in the world. They are active in many of the major fields of work of the United Nations, including health; labour; intellectual property; human rights; humanitarian action and disaster relief; economic, trade and development activities; disarmament efforts; science and technology; as well as research and training (for more information klick www.unog.ch). Among the respective institutions, three more prominent partners of FES Geneva are:

ILO – The International Labour Organization

The International Labour Organization engages in the areas of universal labour standards, universal social standards and respective employment and social policy worldwide. With its research and monitoring activities it intends to strengthen a basic set of principles: the Core Labour Standards, laid down in legally binding Conventions and non-binding Recommendations. Within the UN-family, it is the only institution with a tripartite structure meaning that not only governments, but also employers and workers form part of its decision making bodies. Apart from the workers’ group within ILO, FES Geneva has also been involved with employers and government representatives in order to promote just and fair conditions at work, universal social protection, and social standards in general.

OHCHR – The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights is part of the UN Secretariat. One of its main functions is to lend service to the Human Rights Council (also based in Geneva) and its Special Rapporteurs and Independent Experts dealing with human rights. It also serves the treaty-established Committees which oversee the various human rights conventions. The OHCHR is spearheading research in the two broad fields of civil and political rights as well as economic, social and cultural rights. Having established human rights-related work as a major pillar of our work as a political foundation, FES Geneva has entered into close collaboration with OHCHR in various fields, with common activities in the area of economic and social rights. Joint seminars have been conducted among others with regard to the Right to Development and to “Guiding Principles” on Business and Human Rights. Regular consultations with the Committee on Economic Social and Cultural Rights and the support of their work on “General Comments” form part of our work as do jointly organized “Side Events” at the Human Rights Council.

UNCTAD – The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development

The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development promotes the development-friendly integration of developing countries into the world economy. It aims at facilitating and influencing current policy debates; it serves as a forum for intergovernmental deliberations and undertakes research, policy analysis, and data collection. UNCTAD provides technical assistance and publishes yearbooks on trade and development and related material. FES Geneva and UNCTAD have jointly been organizing expert meetings on trade-related topics. Furthermore, FES Geneva has involved experts from UNCTAD in information seminars for journalists from developing countries and in workshops on technical trade issues. These workshops are targeted at Geneva based Missions of developing countries as well as international NGOs.