Distinguished representative,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
It is my great pleasure to close this session on the SDG Stimulus. It is most appropriate that we are talking about financing today, as the SDG Action Weekend comes to a close, and as leaders gather for the SDG Summit.
Financing challenges are at the heart of our inability to make sufficient progress on the SDGs. With nearly a third of SDG targets in regression, it is clear that we need a massive and concerted effort to turn things around.
The SDG Stimulus is key to that effort – a concrete, ambitious, but entirely achievable set of actions that will allow us to mobilize finance at scale and support an investment push for the SDGs.
At its heart is the call to rapidly scale up long-term and affordable financing for sustainable development, by at least 500 billion US dollars per year.
This can be achieved through the institutions and instruments already at our disposal. There are concrete initiatives, technically sound and ready to be implemented, not least from the Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) that have joined us today.
It is also in line with proposals discussed at the G20, made by the ‘G20 Independent Expert Group on Strengthening MDBs’, from which we will hear during the High-level Dialogue on Financing for Development (FfD) on Wednesday.
The ideas and solutions are there, but what we really need is the political will to get them off the ground, at the required scale and speed. That is why I am heartened by what I have heard today.
Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
The SDG Summit will endorse the SDG Stimulus. Countries from both the North and the South have today spoken to the actions they are taking to push it forward, both at national and global levels. Representatives of the MDBs have shared their insights on how they intend to deliver on the additional financing needed.
I am particularly hopeful that we will have ambitious outcomes at the annual meetings of the international financial institutions a month from now, and at COP 28 at the end of the year.
The SDG Stimulus and the related calls by the Secretary-General to reform the international financial architecture, along with complementary initiatives such as the Bridgetown Initiative and the Summit on a New Global Financing Pact, will keep financing high on policy makers’ agenda, including at the UN.
Both the Summit of the Future and a potential Fourth FfD Conference present opportunities to continue our push for the rapid scaling up of affordable financing, and for the architecture reforms we so urgently need to rescue the SDGs.
We look forward to continue working with you all to deliver these transformative changes.
Thank you.