ECLAC urges the implementation of enabling policies that allow effective compliance with the SDGs

Financing for development, food security, the energy transition, the integrated management of natural disasters and climate action must be enabling policies that allow the effective fulfillment of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Mario Cimoli, Secretary Interim Executive of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), during a session of the High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development 2022, dedicated to listening to the messages coming from the regions.

The highest representative of ECLAC participated in the segment entitled “Messages from the Regions: Regional Action and Leveraging Regional Frameworks to Support Countries on the Road to Recovery and Rebuilding from the Devastating Effects of the Pandemic” (Messages from the Regions: Regional action and leveraging regional frameworks to support countries on the road to recovery and rebuilding from the devastating impacts of the pandemic).

Along with Mario Cimoli, Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana, Executive Secretary of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP); Rola Dashti, Executive Secretary of the Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA); Vera Songwe, Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission for Africa (UNECE), and Olga Algayerova, Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE).

On behalf of the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, Arnoldo André Tinoco, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Costa Rica, spoke in his capacity as President of ECLAC and of the fifth meeting of the Forum of the Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean on Sustainable Developmentheld from March 7 to 9, 2022 in San José, who presented the main conclusions and recommendations of the last meeting of the regional platform.

In his speech, the Foreign Minister highlighted the importance of strengthening political dialogue and regional cooperation for a sustainable, inclusive and resilient recovery, and underlined that the 33 countries of Latin America and the Caribbean reaffirmed their commitment to effectively implement the 2030 Agenda and expressed that it is crucial to reach the furthest behind first and empower those in vulnerable situations.

He also reported on the presentation of the fifth report on the regional progress and challenges of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in the region, entitled A decade of action for a change of eraprepared by ECLAC.

For his part, Mario Cimoli warned that only eight years after the deadline for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, the structural challenges for their implementation have increased in a context of multiple crises. In this context, he pointed out, the implementation of enabling policies that allow its effective compliance is urgent.

“Both the importance of the SDGs and the difficulties in meeting them are clear. Without financing for development and without fiscal space for the economies of Latin America and the Caribbean and middle-income countries, it will be impossible”, he specified.

The Acting Executive Secretary of ECLAC added that it is imperative to guarantee food security and manage the rapid increase in food prices that the region is experiencing. Likewise, he underlined the importance of international cooperation for the implementation of the energy transition in developing economies that are under pressure on prices and with a historical debt that they cannot pay.

Previously, both authorities participated in a virtual event parallel to the High-Level Political Forum organized by the Government of Costa Rica and ECLAC, where the participants highlighted the multidimensional nature of development and the importance of multilateral action, and reaffirmed Development in Transition as the new paradigm for international cooperation.

The meeting entitled “Towards an inclusive and sustainable recovery in Latin America and the Caribbean – The 2030 Agenda through the lens of development in transition”, included a panel discussion with the participation of Félix Ulloa, Vice President of El Salvador; Marina Sereni, Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs of Italy; Ragnheidur Árnadóttir, Director of the Development Center of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD); and Enrique O’Farrill-Julien, Executive Director of the Chilean Agency for International Development Cooperation -AGCI (representing the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Chile, Antonia Urrejola). Jutta Urpilainen, Commissioner for International Associations of the European Commission, and Santiago Cafiero, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Worship of Argentina also sent a recorded greeting as special guests.

At the meeting, the participants agreed to reaffirm the concept of “Development in Transition” as a new paradigm of international cooperation, so that it is guided by the recognition of the multidimensional and continuous nature of development processes and the specificities of the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, moving towards alliances based on shared agendas adapted to the specific needs of the countries and with the aim of addressing structural development gaps, contributing to the generation of regional and global public goods.

“The new reality is a possibility of change and of raising the common ambition in a great impulse of international cooperation focused on a resilient and sustainable recovery that meets the urgent needs of the people. Our main challenge must be that no one is left behind. That is why we must continue advocating for a transformation that adapts our development cooperation and financing systems to the objectives and goals agreed in the 2030 Agenda, to promote a true recovery,” said Foreign Minister Tinoco at the opening of the meeting.

For his part, the Acting Executive Secretary of ECLAC indicated that the need to rethink cooperation is an imperative that is being addressed within the UN system and with the countries. Development in Transition, which crosses Latin America and the Caribbean, is on the international agenda and is being discussed, Mario Cimoli pointed out.

“It seems important to us to face what is coming. ECLAC has said it well and will say it again at its session, to be held in Argentina in October: the reconstruction or recomposition of another way of rethinking globalization and multilateralism considers middle-income economies, or the process of development as something in transition, where not only the internal product can measure it, it seems to us an extremely relevant issue”, said Cimoli.

The senior United Nations official also stressed that the alliance between Europe and Latin America and the Caribbean plays a crucial role, of understanding, because that is where the concept of Development in Transition was born. “The region is working for greater integration,” he emphasized.

Finally, the Acting Executive Secretary of ECLAC, accompanied by the Director of the ECLAC Subregional Headquarters for the Caribbean, Diane Quarless, met with the Ambassadors and permanent representatives of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries to the UN . They discussed the priorities of the Commission’s work program in the subregion, with emphasis on initiatives in the areas of financing for sustainable development, vulnerability and climate action, and statistics.