Almost all the organizations in the UN family contribute in one way or another to development planning—by helping to evolve and introduce new planning methods, by assisting governments in establishing realistic growth targets, and by trying to ensure that overall plans take account of the needs of the different sectors of society.
Within the UN, problems relating to development planning are the concern of the Economic and Social Council's Committee for Development Planning. The 24-member committee, established in 1966, is a consultative body that meets annually to consider problems encountered in implementing development plans.
The UN Secretariat provides an account of the state of the world economy through its annual publication of the World Economic and Social Survey, which has appeared every year since 1948. Since 1990 UNDP has stimulated debate about the concept of human-centered development through the publication of the annual Human Development Report , written by an independent team of development specialists and published by Oxford University Press. Statistical data, considered indispensable for economic and social development planning, also appears in a number of UN publications, including the Statistical Yearbook, Demographic Yearbook, Yearbook of National Accounts Statistics, Yearbook of International Trade Statistics, World Energy Supplies, Commodity Trade Statistics, Population and Vital Statistics Report, and Monthly Bulletin of Statistics.