Specialised agencies and global fora

The first principle

States create international bodies to manage problems that no state can solve alone, such as pandemics, trade, shipping and climate, but they do not give these bodies power over themselves. An agency therefore works only as well as its members fund it, obey it and agree within it. That is why every agency in this note faces the same three questions: who pays, who decides, and whether the rules bind the powerful. For India the aim is the same everywhere: rules that leave room for a developing country to grow, and a larger voice in writing them.

The core

What a specialised agency is

• Separate but linked. A specialised agency, such as the World Health Organization (WHO) or the International Maritime Organization (IMO), has its own treaty, members, budget and governing body, and is linked to the United Nations (UN) by an agreement with the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) under Articles 57 and 63 of the Charter. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank are also specialised agencies, while the World Trade Organization (WTO) is a related organisation outside the UN system.

World Health Organization

• Mandate. Founded in 1948 and based in Geneva, WHO directs international health work, sets norms and runs the International Health Regulations (IHR, 2005), which oblige states to report outbreaks and let WHO declare a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC).
• The pandemic. WHO declared a PHEIC on 30 January 2020 and called coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID 19) a pandemic on 11 March 2020. It set up COVID 19 Vaccines Global Access (COVAX) with partners to share vaccines, issued technical guidance and coordinated research.
• Criticism. Critics said WHO declared the emergency too late, relied on China's early account and could not inspect outbreaks without consent. Assessed contributions fund less than a fifth of its budget, so earmarked voluntary money from a few donors shapes its priorities, and COVAX could not stop rich countries buying most early doses.
• After the pandemic. Amendments to the IHR were adopted in 2024, and the World Health Assembly adopted a Pandemic Agreement in May 2025 on prevention, equitable access and technology transfer. In January 2025 the United States announced its withdrawal from WHO.

UNESCO

• Mandate. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), founded in 1945 and based in Paris, works through education, science and culture, and runs the World Heritage Convention (1972).
• "Too little cash, too much politics." The United States left in 1984, alleging politicisation, and returned in 2003. After Palestine was admitted in 2011, American law cut off United States funding, about a fifth of UNESCO's budget, and arrears mounted. The United States announced withdrawal in 2017, citing anti Israel bias and the need for reform, after the old city of Hebron was listed as a Palestinian heritage site in danger; Israel left too. The United States rejoined in 2023 and announced another withdrawal in July 2025. The lesson is that an agency dependent on one large donor loses both money and neutrality when politics enters.

Dimensions

World Trade Organization and the trade war

• Structure. The WTO was created by the Marrakesh Agreement (1994) and began on 1 January 1995. It works by consensus, its Ministerial Conference meets every two years, and its two tier dispute settlement system made trade rules enforceable.
• The crisis. The United States blocked appointments to the Appellate Body, which stopped working in December 2019, so a losing party can appeal "into the void". The United States China trade war from 2018, and the wide tariffs announced by the United States in 2025, including a tariff of 25 per cent on Indian goods and an additional 25 per cent linked to India's purchases of Russian oil, which took the duty on many Indian goods to 50 per cent in August 2025, showed members acting outside WTO rules.
• Reform areas. Restoring two tier dispute settlement; special and differential treatment, which developed countries want to deny to large economies such as China and India; a permanent solution on public stockholding for food security, protected for now by the Bali peace clause (2013), which India first invoked for rice in 2020; the moratorium on customs duties on electronic transmissions; and fisheries subsidies, where an agreement on harmful subsidies was reached at the twelfth Ministerial Conference (2022) and entered into force in September 2025.
• India's interests. India defends food security, minimum support prices and policy space, opposes joint statement initiatives (such as investment facilitation) that bypass consensus, and wants an end to the moratorium on electronic duties to protect tariff revenue and digital industry.

International Maritime Organization

• Structure. The IMO convention was adopted in 1948 and came into force in 1958; the body is based in London. India is a member of its Council in the group of states with the largest interest in international seaborne trade.
• Safety and security. The International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS, 1974) sets standards for ship construction and equipment, and the International Ship and Port Facility Security (ISPS) Code, adopted after the attacks of September 2001, secures ships and ports. The IMO also issues guidance against piracy and supported the Djibouti Code of Conduct (2009) for the western Indian Ocean.
• Environment. The International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (MARPOL, 1973 and 1978) controls oil, sewage, garbage and air pollution, including the global limit of 0.5 per cent sulphur in fuel from 2020. The Ballast Water Management Convention (2004) stops invasive species, and the IMO set a goal of net zero shipping emissions by about 2050 in 2023 and approved a Net Zero Framework in April 2025, whose formal adoption was deferred in October 2025.
• Ship recycling. The Hong Kong Convention (2009) entered into force in June 2025. India acceded in 2019 and passed the Recycling of Ships Act, 2019, which matters for Alang in Gujarat, one of the world's largest ship breaking yards.

In practice

India in the climate fora

• The framework. The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC, 1992) set the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities (CBDR RC). The Kyoto Protocol (1997) bound only developed countries, while the Paris Agreement (2015) asks every country to set its own Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC).
• India's changing policy. India once negotiated mainly defensively, insisting that developed countries act first. Since Paris it has combined CBDR with its own targets: its updated NDC (2022) commits to cut the emissions intensity of gross domestic product (GDP) by 45 per cent from 2005 levels by 2030 and to reach 50 per cent of installed power capacity from non fossil sources by 2030, a target it reached in 2025. At the twenty sixth Conference of the Parties (COP26) in Glasgow (2021) it announced the Panchamrit, including 500 gigawatts of non fossil capacity by 2030 and net zero by 2070.
• Leadership through coalitions. India launched the International Solar Alliance with France (2015), the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (2019), Mission LiFE, or Lifestyle for Environment (announced 2021), and the Global Biofuels Alliance (2023).
• Finance and fairness. India backed the loss and damage fund agreed at COP27 (2022), and called the New Collective Quantified Goal of at least 300 billion dollars a year by 2035, agreed at COP29 (2024), far too small. In geopolitical terms, clean energy is now also about supply chains, critical minerals and carbon border taxes such as the European Union's mechanism.

Finance and the G20

• IMF and World Bank. Both were born at Bretton Woods in 1944 and are based in Washington. The IMF watches exchange rates and lends to countries in balance of payments crises, while the World Bank lends for development through the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and the International Development Association (IDA). In both, votes follow quotas or shares, so the United States holds a veto over major IMF decisions, and India seeks quota reform that reflects its weight.
• The Group of Twenty (G20). It began in 1999 as a meeting of finance ministers after the Asian financial crisis and became a leaders' summit in 2008. Under India's presidency, the New Delhi Leaders' Declaration (September 2023) was adopted by consensus, admitted the African Union as a permanent member, and backed reform of multilateral development banks and the Global Biofuels Alliance.

Issues and way forward

• Funding. Agencies dependent on voluntary money follow donors' priorities. Raising assessed contributions, as WHO members agreed in 2022, gives agencies independence.
• Politics and withdrawal. Withdrawals by a large member weaken agencies but also open space for others; India can contribute more in money, staff and ideas.
• Enforcement. Without a working Appellate Body, WTO rules lose their bite; restoring it is the first test of reform.
• Representation. Voting shares in the IMF and World Bank still underweight emerging economies, and the G20's push on multilateral bank reform needs follow up.

Common confusions

• Specialised agency and related organisation. WHO, UNESCO, IMO, the IMF and the World Bank are specialised agencies linked to ECOSOC; the WTO is outside the UN system.
• PHEIC and pandemic. A PHEIC is a legal declaration under the IHR; a "pandemic" describes spread across continents, and the IHR amendments of 2024 add a higher alert, the pandemic emergency.
• Peace clause and permanent solution. The peace clause protects public stockholding from challenge for now; a permanent solution would change the rules on how support is counted.
• Kyoto and Paris. Kyoto set binding targets for developed countries only; Paris asks all countries for self chosen targets.

For the exam

• Keyword bank: specialised agency, IHR, PHEIC, Pandemic Agreement, World Heritage, Appellate Body, special and differential treatment, peace clause, SOLAS, MARPOL, Hong Kong Convention, CBDR RC, NDC, Panchamrit, New Delhi Leaders' Declaration.
• Practise the previous year questions on this topic →
• Use in an answer:
  • Introduction with data: "Assessed contributions fund less than a fifth of WHO's budget, so the agency that coordinates global health security depends on the priorities of a few voluntary donors."
  • Introduction with a fact: "Since December 2019 the WTO's Appellate Body has been unable to hear appeals, so the trade rules India relies on can no longer be enforced in full."
  • Conclusion: "International agencies are only as strong as the will of their members, so India's interest lies in funding them, reforming their voting and staying at the table where the rules are written."
  • Conclusion: "India's shift from climate defensiveness to coalitions such as the International Solar Alliance shows how a developing country can lead while still defending common but differentiated responsibilities."