The?Committee for Development Policy, an expert advisory body of the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC),?will hold its 19th?Plenary Meeting at UNHQ in New York from 20-24 March to discuss a range of emerging economic, social and environmental issues relevant to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

The CDP is celebrating its 50th?anniversary, having started life as the Committee for Development Planning in the late 1960s under the chairmanship of Jan Tinbergen, who was in 1969 jointly awarded the first Riksbank prize in economics in memory of Alfred Nobel.

The CDP helped put into practice the idea, now widely accepted, that developed countries should contribute 0.7% of their GDP in aid to developing nations.

In 1971 the CDP created the?least developed country (LDC) category, allowing these countries access to special support measures such as trade preferences, technical assistance and aid.

Renamed the Committee for Development Policy in 1998, among its main tasks have been to review the LDC category, to recommend which countries should be on the list, and to monitor graduating or graduated countries. This year the Committee will monitor Angola, Equatorial Guinea, Samoa and Vanuatu.

The disciplinary, geographical and professional background of the Committee has from the start been diverse. The?24 members?work in their personal capacity, meeting every year to submit a report to ECOSOC on important contemporary issues.

The chair from 2013 onwards has been Professor Jose Antonio Ocampo, former UN Under-Secretary General of Economic and Social Affairs and former Colombian government minister.

The CDP has always been ahead of its time, addressing together the three dimensions of sustainable development – economic, social and environmental – well before they were incorporated into the 2030 agenda.

Half a century after its launch the CDP remains at the forefront of international development thinking, providing innovative, timely and practical advice from across the disciplines.

In a panel discussion on?Developing Productive Capacity for Sustainable Development: Lessons Learned from Least Developed Countries,?scheduled for Tuesday, 21 March at 1:15 pm in Conference Room 6, members of the CDP will present the results of a detailed review of the experiences of 14 LDCs and two middle income countries. The discussion will cover how countries moved towards graduation and how countries can sustain development afterwards.