The activities carried out by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) to support and promote technical cooperation among developing countries and regions are governed by the United Nations regulatory framework on cooperation activities and by the recommendations formulated by member countries through the ECLAC sessional Committee on South-South Cooperation (see annex 1). In implementing these activities, the ECLAC secretariat takes into account the regular programme of work and the projects financed with extrabudgetary resources.

In the 2004-2005 biennium, ECLAC conducted numerous activities that included important elements of South-South cooperation. These included comparative studies, which enabled countries to expand their knowledge of the initiatives launched in countries with a greater or similar degree of development; foster the exchange of experiences, best practices and new methodologies through analytical seminars and training workshops; and establish and expand formal and informal networks of experts or government representatives to facilitate a more constant and long-standing exchange of knowledge and experience.

As indicated below, a number of issues have been covered and have included all the subprogrammes of the ECLAC Programme of work. Detailed information on projects linked to South-South cooperation can be found at the website on ECLAC Cooperation: http://www.eclac.cl/cooperacion/. Some initiatives in the economic, environmental and social areas have been selected and are shown below.