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EIGHTH ITEM ON THE AGENDA

Other financial and general questions

Regional meetings: Proposed new arrangements

1. At the 271st Session (March 1998) of the Governing Body, representatives of the three groups that had attended the Twelfth Asian Regional Meeting, held in Bangkok from 9 to 11 December 1997, specifically requested the Governing Body to review the arrangements recently adopted by the Governing Body for this type of meeting, of which the Asian meeting was the first trial. They all stressed that the duration of three days, with the possibility of only two simultaneous meetings, had proved much too short to allow delegates to complete their work.

2. The proposed new arrangements address both the possibility of increasing the duration and according the Government group the same facilities for meetings as the two other groups. As regards the duration of the meetings, the Officers of the Governing Body propose that the Governing Body authorize them to decide, on an ad hoc basis for each regional meeting, whether to increase its duration to four days.

3. Should the Governing Body decide to provide additional interpretation facilities for the Government group, the meetings would have to be provided with an additional team of interpreters and a third meeting room equipped with interpretation booths.

4. As regards the regional meetings for the Americas, now planned for August, and that for Africa, which has been set for December 1999, the additional costs arising from these proposals are as follows:
 

	3 days		4 days
	With additional interpretation		With additional interpretation	Without additional interpretation
Americas	$5 000		$11 250	$4 950
Africa	$17 000		$30 000	$9 600

5. The Committee may wish to recommend to the Governing Body --

(a) either:

(i) that the current arrangements concerning interpretation facilities should be maintained;

or

(ii) that additional interpretation facilities and an additional meeting room should be provided for the Government group at regional meetings, as described above, and that the additional cost, as set out in the above table, be financed from savings in Part I of the Programme and Budget for 1998-99;

(b) that it authorize its Officers to decide, on an ad hoc basis for each regional meeting, whether to increase its duration to four days;

(c) that, should the Officers of the Governing Body decide to increase the duration of the regional meetings for the Americas and/or Africa, then the additional cost, as set out in the above table, be financed from savings in Part I of the Programme and Budget for 1998-99.

Geneva, 10 November 1998.

Point for decision: Paragraph 5.