Art. 17 deals with the Centre's administrative expenditures. The cost of individual conciliation and arbitration proceedings are to be borne by the parties to these proceedings in accordance with Arts. 60 and 61.

All drafts leading to the Convention reflected the basic concept for the Centre's financing contained in Art. 17 (History, Vol. I, pp. 86, 88). In the deliberations on what became Art. 17, the overwhelming majority of opinions favoured a financing of the Centre's administrative costs by the World Bank (History, Vol. II, pp. 90, 92, 114, 116, 121, 128, 146, 254, 319, 381/2, 388, 483, 490, 544, 562, 651/2, 660, 733, 735/6). But a preference for the expenses to be borne at least partially by Contracting States to the Convention was expressed by other delegates. This was also designed to assure the financial participation of non-Members of the Bank who might ratify the Convention (at pp. 56, 100, 115, 122, 123, 128, 176/7, 722).

The phrase “or out of other receipts” was contained in all drafts to the Convention (History, Vol. I, pp. 86, 88). This was meant as a reference to the possibility that the World Bank might finance the costs of the Centre (History, Vol. II, pp. 146, 254, 319, 733, 971). Mr. Broches explained that the purpose of having the World Bank underwrite the Centre's administrative costs was “to avoid excessive administrative complexity while insulating the Center from the effects of delay by Contracting States in paying their contributions” (at p. 490).