The United Nations (UN), currently made up of 193 member states, is an international organisation founded in 1945 following World War 2. Here are five things that wouldn’t exist without it.
Global radio frequencies
The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) coordinates the shared use of radio frequencies and satellite orbits.
Without the ITU to coordinate global radio frequencies, signals would overlap, leading to interference in cellular phones, Wi-Fi, international broadcasts, weather tracking, and more.
Calling codes
The ITU divided the world into 9 telephone zones. The first digit of a country code represents the global zone it belongs to (+9 for South Asia), followed by 1 or 2 additional digits to make the code unique (+91 for India).
Aviation English
Not only does the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) set global aviation standards, it also recommends that English be the lingua franca of the sky.
Aviation English is the internationally established language of the skies, consisting of about three hundred terms that are a combination of professional jargon and plain English.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) is one of the primary bodies responsible for tracking disease outbreaks. Its global surveillance system tracks public health 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
Global outbreak surveillance
The UN General Assembly officially adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) on December 10, 1948.
Universal Human Rights
The critiques of the UN often point towards its failures in conflict resolution, inequality of representation, and moral and ideological failures.
Criticism
However, multilateral collaboration is complicated, and despite the valid criticism levied against the organisation, the world would be worse off without the UN.
Thanks for reading!
See next