Neil MacFarquhar

(The fact that it costs the United Nations an average of $2,473 per page to create every single document in its six official languages, while outside contractors complete the same work for around $450.)

That ultimately leaves the operating budget as the place to cut, hence the questions raised about costs like the $2,473 per page. “They are not printed on gold leaf,” one diplomat dryly noted.

That price tag, said Ms. Kane, the budget czar, reflects the fact that the body keeps a staff of translators on call 24 hours a day to make sure any document can be translated instantly into English, Russian, French, Arabic, Spanish and Chinese. Outside contractors, while cheaper, cannot work as quickly, she said.

Negotiators note that the Fifth Committee alone produces some 10,000 pages of documents per year, and that hard copies of every single page do not need to be distributed to all 192 missions. The proposal to limit distribution to the Web prompts some grumbling, however.

“You have the small missions and small countries saying, ‘What is this Internet?’ ” one Latin American negotiator said.