UNESCO

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization was founded in London on 16 November 1945, and has been operative since 1946.

UNESCO is a UN organization, born from the common purpose of contributing to maintaining peace and respecting human rights and equality among populations, through educational, scientific, cultural and communication channels.

The aim of the organization is contributing to peace and security by promoting cooperation among nations through education, science and culture, in order to guarantee universal respect of justice, law, human rights and fundamental freedoms that the United Nations Charter recognizes to all populations, without distinctions of race, gender, language or religion.

 

UNESCO is composed of three governing bodies:
– The General Conference is the sovereign organ of UNESCO and it gathers all Member States every two years to set programmes and budgets.

– The Executive Board, in which 58 Member States are represented, is basically the board of directors, with the task of verifying the fulfilment of the General Conference’s decisions and preparing work for the latter.

– The Secretariat has the responsibility of putting into practice the obligations undertaken by member states.

 

The UNESCO headquarters are in Paris and has 195 Members and 9 Associate Members, representing one of the UN system’s highest membership (2013).