Greening international institutions

In focusing their efforts on the structural causes of poverty, unemployment and social disintegration, environment and development NGOs are increasingly turning their attention to the need for procedural and institutional reform of international institutions: the UN General Assembly, specialized UN agencies and the new Commission for Sustainable Development, UNCTAD, UNCTC, GATT, NAFTA, the IMF and the World Bank, particularly the effects of the World Bank/IMF Structural Adjustment Programmes and the implications of GATT's Uruguay Round. They are pressing for substantive policy initiatives which reflect a philosophy of sustainability, greater accountability for major economic institutions, the need for debt reduction and a code of conduct for transnational corporation.