Summary
The nine-member board proposed in Report to the General Assembly (UNSCOP)‘s majority partition plan to organize and administer the Economic Union of Palestine — the customs union, common currency, common services and joint development that were to bind the proposed Arab and Jewish States and the City of Jerusalem after partition (Report to the General Assembly (UNSCOP), lines 2010-2050).
Details
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The Board was to consist of three representatives of each of the two States and three foreign members appointed by the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations, in the first instance for a term of three years; its functions were to organize and administer, directly or by delegation, the functions of the Economic Union, the States binding themselves to put its decisions — taken by a majority vote — into effect (Report to the General Assembly (UNSCOP), lines 2010-2040).
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Its objectives were a customs union, a common currency, operation in the common interest of railways, inter-state highways, postal, telephone and telegraphic services and the ports of Haifa and Jaffa, and joint economic development, especially irrigation, land reclamation and soil conservation; in development its role was planning, investigation and encouragement, and it was not to undertake a project except with the assent of both States and the City of Jerusalem (Report to the General Assembly (UNSCOP), lines 2010-2040).
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Tariff schedules were to be drawn up by a Tariff Commission of equal numbers from each State, disagreements or failure to approve a schedule by the fixed date being settled by the Board’s arbitration; the Board’s administrative expenses were a first charge on customs revenue, and after three years the division of the customs surplus — not less than 5 and not more than 10 per cent to the City of Jerusalem, the residue equally to the two States — was reviewable by the Board (Report to the General Assembly (UNSCOP), lines 2020-2045).
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The unsigned Commentary on Partition presents the Board’s three outside members as introducing arbitral decision into joint economic matters, where day-to-day rulings are imperative and the two States could not be expected easily to agree; such a device, it holds, would be unacceptable as a general method of political decision, which limits the functions the Board can be given (Report to the General Assembly (UNSCOP), lines 2060-2079).
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The partition justification adds that constructive work by the Board on comprehensive irrigation schemes in both States’ interest should be made possible by international loans on favourable terms (Report to the General Assembly (UNSCOP), lines 1880-1910).
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In Resolution 181 (II), Part I, Section D, the Board is the Economic Union’s implementing authority: it is the sole currency-issuing authority, arbitrates the Tariff Commission’s schedules, may withhold a non-co-operating State’s customs revenue by a vote of six members and impose further sanctions by simple majority, and for the first two years after the Mandate must secure each State imported goods and services equivalent to its consumption in the twelve months ending 31 December 1947, so far as total foreign-exchange revenues permit (PDF p.9-11). The surplus after the first charges (customs and joint services, the Board’s expenses, the outstanding public debt and superannuation benefits) goes 5 to 10 per cent to the City of Jerusalem, the residue allocated equitably to the States, neither State’s share to exceed its contribution by more than approximately four million pounds in any year, the distribution principles revisable after five years (PDF p.11). This differs from the UNSCOP majority plan’s treatment recorded above: an equal division of the residue, reviewable after three years.
Related pages
Resolution 181 (II): Future government of Palestine, Report to the General Assembly (UNSCOP), UNSCOP, Partition, Customs union