United Nations Commission on International Law (UNCITRAL)

The United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL or the Commission) was established in 1966 by the General Assembly (GA Res. 2205 (XXI), 17 December 1966) to promote the harmonization and modernization of the law of international trade. UNCITRAL gives effect to its mandate by preparing and promoting the use and adoption of legislative and non-legislative instruments (such as conventions, model laws, legislative guides, etc.) in a number of key areas of commercial law. To date, the Commission has adopted texts in the following domains: International Sale of Goods; International Commercial Arbitration and Conciliation; Security Interests; Insolvency; International Payments; International Carriage of Goods; Electronic Commerce; Procurement and Infrastructure Development. In compliance with its mandate, UNCITRAL also undertakes a range of technical cooperation and assistance activities to promote its work and the adoption, use and uniform interpretation of the legislative and non-legislative texts it has developed.

UNCITRAL members are selected from among States Members of the United Nations and represent different legal traditions and levels of economic development. Since 2002 UNCITRAL membership comprises 60 States which represent the various geographic regions and the principal economic and legal systems of the world. Member States include 13 African States, 17 Asian States, 9 Eastern European States, 10 Latin American and Caribbean States and 11 Western European and other States. The General Assembly elects members for terms of six years; every three years the terms of half of the members expire.

UNCITRAL’s work is organized and conducted at three levels. The first level is UNCITRAL itself, which works through an annual plenary session. The second level is the intergovernmental working groups, which to a large extent undertake the development of the topics on UNCITRAL’s work programme: the membership of the task forces currently includes all member states of UNCITRAL. The third level is the secretariat, staffed with United Nations legal officers, which assists the Commission and its working groups in the preparation and conduct of their work (e.g. drafting studies, reports, texts on topics that are being considered for possible future inclusion in the work programme, legal research, etc.).

United Nations Member States not members of UNCITRAL, as well as international and regional organizations (both intergovernmental and non-governmental) with expertise in the topics under discussion, are invited to attend both UNCITRAL annual sessions and working group sessions as observers. While decisions are taken by member States, the views of non-member States and observer organizations can be taken into account by the Member States in determining their positions on the issues to be decided upon. The long-standing practice in the Commission is to reach decisions by consensus. As a result of this inclusive negotiation process, the texts are widely accepted as offering solutions appropriate to different legal traditions and countries at different stages of economic development.

UNCITRAL technical cooperation and assistance activities include: organizing briefing missions and participating in seminars and conferences, organized at both national and regional levels; assisting countries in assessing their trade law reform needs, including by reviewing existing legislation; assisting with the drafting of national legislation to implement UNCITRAL texts; assisting bilateral and multilateral development agencies to use UNCITRAL texts in their law reform activities and projects; providing advice and assistance to international and other organizations, such as professional associations, organizations of attorneys, chambers of commerce and arbitration centres, on the use of UNCITRAL texts; and organizing training activities to facilitate the implementation and interpretation of legislation based on UNCITRAL texts by judges and legal practitioners. A summary of the technical assistance activities conducted each year is included in the annual report of UNCITRAL.

To fulfill those parts of its mandate concerning the promotion of ways and means of ensuring uniform interpretation of international legal texts and dissemination of information on international trade law, in 1988 UNCITRAL decided to develop a system known as Case Law on UNCITRAL Texts (or CLOUT). Court decisions and arbitral awards relating to UNCITRAL legislative texts are collected in and disseminated through CLOUT with a view to promoting uniformity in the interpretation and application of those texts. The system is meant for use by judges, arbitrators, lawyers, parties to commercial transactions, academics, students and other interested persons. CLOUT relies on a network of national correspondents designated either by States parties to a convention or by States have enacted legislation based on a model law. CLOUT provides the background material to the digests, i.e. compilations of case law from different jurisdictions that analyze trends in the interpretation of a given UNCITRAL text. To date, UNCITRAL has published a digest on the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (4th edition) and a digest on the Model Law on International Commercial Arbitration (1st edition). Both CLOUT and the Digests are available in the six United Nations official languages from the UNCITRAL website.

UNCITRAL ensures dissemination of information also through its Law Library, which is the specialized trade law library of the United Nations. Since its establishment, in 1979, the Library has supported the research needs of the UNCITRAL Secretariat, participants in intergovernmental meetings convened by UNCITRAL, permanent missions, other Vienna-based international organizations, legal scholars and practitioners from around the world. The collection of the UNCITRAL Law Library focuses mainly on the area of international trade law. Currently, it consists of: over 10,000 monographs; 150 active journal titles; legal and general reference material, including non-UNCITRAL UN documents, and documents of other international organizations; and electronic resources (restricted to in-house use only). The UNCITRAL library collection covers materials in the six official UN languages, as well as in other languages.

In addition to official documents, UNCITRAL traditionally maintains two series of publications, namely the texts of all instruments developed by the Commission and the UNCITRAL Yearbook. Publications are regularly provided in support of technical cooperation and assistance activities undertaken by the Secretariat, as well as by other organizations where the work of UNCITRAL is discussed, and in the context of national law reform efforts.