A/RES/49/217 Page 2 3. Endorses the recommendations of the Committee for Programme and Coordination and of the Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions; 4. Invites the Secretary-General to prepare his proposed programme budget for the biennium 1996-1997 on the basis of the total preliminary estimate provided by the Advisory Committee of 2,574,000,000 United States dollars at the initial 1994-1995 rates, recosted to 2,548,400,000 dollars at revised 1994-1995 rates and taking into account also actual expenditure data as available for 1994; 5. Notes that the preliminary estimate includes a provision to reinforce backstopping of peace-keeping operations, and requests the Secretary-General, in preparing his proposed programme budget for the biennium 1996-1997, to base his request on such decisions as the General Assembly may take on the question of criteria for sharing the costs of backstopping peacekeeping operations; 6. Decides that the contingency fund shall be set at the level of 0.75 per cent of the preliminary estimate at 1996-1997 rates, namely, at 20.6 million dollars; 7. Requests the Secretary-General to submit, in the context of his proposed programme budget for the biennium 1996-1997, information on the nature of expenses charged to the contingency fund thus far, as requested by the Advisory Committee in paragraph 10 of its report. 3/ 95th plenary meeting 23 December 1994