A/RES/50/227 Page 4 the financial picture of the programmes and funds coordinated by the Economic and Social Council should be stressed, as well as the relationship between programming requirements and available funding. 14. The recommendations and priorities set out in General Assembly resolution 50/120, regarding measures to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the operational activities for development of the United Nations system should be fully implemented, including, inter alia, programmes focused on meeting the specific needs of developing countries, giving priority allocation to developing countries, in particular the least developed countries and Africa, appropriate cooperation among United Nations programmes, and keeping administrative costs to a level that allows effective programme delivery. 15. All organizations of the United Nations development system should focus their efforts at the field level on priority areas in accordance with the priorities identified by recipient countries and the mandates, mission statements and relevant decisions of their governing bodies in order to avoid duplication and enhance the complementarity and impact of their work. 16. By its fifty-second session, the General Assembly should review the above-mentioned funding modalities. A decision regarding the future of the United Nations Pledging Conference for Development Activities will be postponed pending the results of this review. In the event that this review is not completed by the end of the fifty-second session of the General Assembly, a decision on whether to effect changes in the scheduling of the Pledging Conference for the fifty-second session will then be made. 17. The Secretary-General is requested to prepare a report on new and innovative ideas for generating funds, to be considered by the General Assembly, on a priority basis, not later than at its fifty-first session, taking into account the discussions at the substantive session of 1996 of the Economic and Social Council, analysing various proposals that have been advanced on innovative funding sources and modalities for operational activities, including national, international and private sources, and setting forth his views on the advantages and disadvantages associated with each. Innovative funding sources could be an additional element for the provision of resources for operational activities for development. II. GENERAL ASSEMBLY 18. The General Assembly should exert greater policy leadership on development issues inasmuch as the Charter of the United Nations provides the Assembly with broad mandates concerning these issues. The General Assembly is the highest intergovernmental mechanism for the formulation and appraisal of policy on matters relating to the economic, social and related fields, in accordance with chapter IX of the Charter. It is the main forum where Governments pursue the development dialogue, which includes all these issues, in its political context. The purpose of the dialogue is to take an integrated view of matters relating to the economic, social and related fields in order to build and deepen the political understanding required for enhanced international development cooperation, to generate impulses for action and to launch initiatives. /...

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