United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization

The Executive Board of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) held its 50th session in Paris, from April 21 to May 24, 1958. The main item on the agenda was the consideration of the organization's proposed program and budget for the next two years. The major purposes of the proposed program in its present form were to consolidate the achievements of the past few years, to reinforce priority activities, to ensure ever closer cooperation between UNESCO and the other UN organs and, in general, to maintain activities at the 1957–1958 level. In order to carry through this program, a budget of slightly over $24 million would be required. The organization would continue to devote a large part of its resources to the three “major projects†which were initiated in 1957, dealing with the extension of primary education in Latin America, scientific research on arid land, and mutual appreciation of eastern and western cultural values respectively. It was not intended to embark on any new “major projects†in 1959–1960, but special attention was to be paid to various projects which might be extended at a later date, namely the development of. secondary and vocational education in Africa, the production of reading material for new literates, and the study of the social implications of technological progress. The Board also discussed preparations for the next session of the General Conference: it approved a draft of the provisional agenda for the Conference; examined various documents for submission to the Conference; and discussed the list of states and organizations which were to be invited to send representatives to take part in the discussions or observers to follow them.