Illicit Trade Forum

UNCTAD / TRACIT co-hosted event
Geneva, 3-4 February 2020

Illicit trade significantly endangers achievement all of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It creates a triple threat to the financing of development: crowding out legitimate economic activity, depriving governments of revenues for investment in vital public services and increasing the costs of achieving the SDGs by eroding the progress already made.

To address these issues, UNCTAD, in collaboration with TRACIT, hosted the first Illicit Trade Forum.

The two-day Forum set out the main reasons why actions to combat illicit trade must be prioritized and why intergovernmental leadership is necessary to coordinate resources, share expertise, establish guidelines and promote international cooperation among UN Member States.

Representatives from UN Members States, intergovernmental organizations, non-governmental organizations, and the private sector participated in four interactive panel discussions on the following topics:

Understanding the size and shape of illicit trade
The impacts of illicit trade on achieving the SDGs
Illicit trade and illicit financial flows
The role of the private sector in combating illicit trade

The Illicit Trade Forum was held as a follow up to the UNCTAD / TRACIT Dialogue on Illicit Trade and the Sustainable Development Goals on 18 July 2019.

Documents