Now in its 16th year, the NILOS Documentary Yearbook provides the reader with an excellent collection of documents related to ocean affairs and the law of the sea, issued each year by organizations, organs and bodies of the United Nations system. Documents of the UN General Assembly, Meeting of States Parties to the UN Law of the Sea Convention, CLCS, ISBA, ITLOS, Follow-Up to the UN Small Island States Conference, ECOSOC, UNEP and UNCTAD are included first, followed by the documents of FAO, IAEA, ILO, IMO and UNESCO/IOC.
As in the previous volumes, documents which were issued in the course of 2000 are reproduced, while other relevant documents are listed.
The NILOS Documentary Yearbook has proved to be of invaluable assistance in facilitating access by the international community of scholars and practitioners in ocean affairs and the law of the sea to essential documentation. The entry of the 1992 UN Law of the Sea Convention into force on 16 November 1994 and of the Part XI Agreement - on 28 July 1996, as well as of the UN Fish Stocks Agreement - on 11 December 2001, coupled with the review of the UNCED Agenda 21 at the 2002 Johannesburg World Summit, make continuation of this assistance of particular significance in the years to come.
The members of the Yearbook's Advisory Board are: Judges Abdul Koroma and Shigeru Oda of the ICJ, UNDOALOS Director Mrs. Annick de Marffy, Judges Thomas Mensah, Dolliver Nelson and Tullio Treves of the ITLOS, as well as Rosalie Balkin, Edward Brown, Lee Kimball, Bernard Oxman and Shabtai Rosenne.

Translated by: H.L. Sutcliffe, M. McDonald