On 3 May, the United Nations Asian and Pacific Training Centre for Information and Communication Technology for Development (UN-APCICT), a regional institute of ESCAP based in Incheon Korea, launches Indonesian- Bahasa and Russian language versions of its online training course for government policy makers. The APCICT Virtual Academy (AVA), “Academy of ICT Essentials for Government Leaders” offers courses covering the three AVA Modules; “ The Linkage between ICT Applications and Meaningful Development”, “ICT for Development Policy, Process and Governance”, and “e-Government”. In partnership with Microsoft, APCICT will conduct its first virtual workshop on 24 May: on “Climate Change and ICT” will be delivered through an online platform with simultaneous participation of experts and APCICT partners from numerous countries.

The Trade and Investment Division of ESCAP, in partnership with the World Trade Organization (WTO), will organize an advanced regional seminar on the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) and Services Negotiations, from 4 to 7 May in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The seminar will outline the application of the GATS to specific sectors such as telecommunications and financial services and review recent developments in the ongoing services negotiations under the Doha Development Agenda. About 35 participants from across the Asian and Pacific region will attend the regional seminar.

ESCAP’s flagship publication, the Economic and Social Survey of Asia and the Pacific 2010, will be released on 6 May in Bangkok, in parallel with launches in 25 other cities, including UN Headquarters in Geneva, New York, and Vienna. Dr. Noleen Heyzer, UN Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of ESCAP will launch the Survey 2010 at the UN Conference Centre in Bangkok. This year’s Survey reviews the impact of the global financial crisis on the economic performance and social development of the Asian and Pacific economies in 2009. It identifies key policy responses that proved successful in restoring growth and stability in 2010 and emerging challenges that Governments are likely to face in generating additional aggregate demand for sustaining the region’s dynamism while fostering inclusive development at the national as well as regional levels.

An International Seminar on Application of Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) Facility in Agricultural Sector: Conservation Tillage and Household Biogas, will be organized in Beijing from 10 to 11 May in Beijing. The seminar is being organized by the United Nations Asian and Pacific Centre for Agricultural Engineering and Machinery (UNAPCAEM), a regional institution of ESCAP, in partnership with the Department of Climate Change of the National Development and Reform Commission of the People’s Republic of China (NDRC) and the Institute of Environment and Sustainable Development in Agriculture, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (IESDA-CAAS).While sharing the output of the studies and experiences in implementing CDM projects in agricultural sector, the seminar will focus on deriving lessons and examples of good practices for countries, especially developing countries in the Asia-Pacific region. Experts and scholars from relevant UN and government agencies, research institutes, and the private sector are invited to the seminar which is part of a component of the Joint Programme of the UN Country Team in China on China Climate Change Partnership Framework (CCPF). The project is exploring the CDM potential in the agricultural sector and promoting the development of CDM projects to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and support sustainable development of agriculture.

The sixty-sixth Commission session of ESCAP, hosted by the Government of the Republic of Korea and Incheon Metropolitan City, will take place from 13 to 19 May at the Songdo ConvensiA Convention Centre in Incheon, the Republic of Korea. The theme topic for this year’s session is “Promoting a Stable and Supportive Financial System and Green Growth through Technology and Financing for Achieving the Millennium Development Goals in the Asia-Pacific Region.” The session will comprise two parts: the senior officials segment, which will be held from 13 to 15 May in preparation for the ministerial segment which will be held from 17 to 19 May. A ministerial round table on the theme of the sixty-sixth session will be held on Monday, 17 May followed by a high-level panel on the topic of sustaining the recovery and dynamism for inclusive development to be held on Tuesday, 18 May.

The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), New York, in collaboration with the Statistics Division of ESCAP, will organize the United Nations Regional Workshop on the 2010 World Programme on Population and Housing Censuses: Census Evaluation and Post Enumeration Surveys, from 10 to 14 May in Bangkok. The Workshop will review census evaluation methods, focusing on post-enumeration survey (PES) methodology. More specifically, the Workshop will cover elements of the PES relating to: (1) planning and implementation; (2) frames and sample design; (3) methodologies for evaluating content and coverage errors; (4) matching procedures; (5) imputation of missing values; and (6) tabulation and dual system of estimation. Participants will share and discuss national experiences on different aspects of census evaluation and the post enumeration survey of their countries.