Madame President of ECOSOC,
Excellencies,
Distinguished delegates,
Dear colleagues,
Today, the ECOSOC High-level Segment has two sessions.
This morning’s session will address “Multilateral solutions for a better tomorrow: the role of ECOSOC towards a sustainable and resilient path by 2030”. And this afternoon, you will consider “Current trends and their impacts: Looking to the future and the realization of the SDGs”.
These sessions are informed by two complementary reports of the Secretary-General, which I will briefly introduce.
The first report E/2024/52, focuses on this year’s theme of “Reinforcing the 2030 Agenda and eradicating poverty in times of multiple crises: the effective delivery of sustainable, resilient and innovative solutions”.
Allow me to share five key takeaways from the report:
First, a confluence of catastrophic global and national events is negatively affecting the ability of developing countries to eradicate poverty and end hunger.
SDG investment serves as a cost-effective resilience-building strategy because it addresses economic, social and environmental challenges simultaneously. The COVID-19 experience, for example, showed that countries that had made more progress in achieving the SDGs before the onset of the pandemic were in a better position to deal with the impacts of the pandemic.
Second, countries must prioritize eradicating poverty and ending hunger. When people are lifted out of poverty and hunger, they contribute and benefit from a thriving economy. This cycle of prosperity fosters resilience to deal with new and emerging risks.
Third, by choosing investment pathways that impact policies and programming across multiple goals, we can accelerate progress on the SDGs and build greater resilience.
The UN development system has identified food, energy, digital connectivity, education, jobs and social protection, and climate action as six such pathways or transitions. The report assesses challenges and opportunities across each of these six action areas including:
- increasing agricultural efficiency and promoting circular agriculture;
- accelerating the renewables revolution;
- leapfrogging toward greener development trajectories for developing countries by leveraging technology;
- strengthening digital public infrastructure;
- improving access to quality education for girls and better equipping learners with skills for the future; and
- accelerating decarbonisation and promoting more sustainable consumption and production practices.
Fourth, enabling just transitions requires that we rethink development finance and the structure of international cooperation that supports it. We need to move faster to find solutions for countries that face high levels of debt and other constraints that prevent them from investing in the SDGs.
Fifth and finally, recognising that the global system is only as strong as its weakest link, we need stronger multilateral cooperation to achieve sustainability and resilience for countries, individually and collectively.
Excellencies,
The second report of the Secretary-General before you today is E/2024/55, entitled "Long-term impacts of current trends on the realization of the Sustainable Development Goals".
This report assesses five major, interconnected and mutually reinforcing current trends and their potential long-term impacts on the future realization of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
These trends are:
- the impact of geopolitical tensions on the global economy;
- changing labour markets;
- rapid technological change;
- continuing and intensifying adverse impacts of climate change; and
- the evolving nature of social contracts.
More effective policies and institutional actions in these five interconnected areas will improve our capacity to achieve all the Goals.
Allow me to highlight a few key recommendations from the report:
First, to eradicate poverty and achieve the SDGs, we must resist and reverse geoeconomic fragmentation through stronger multilateral efforts.
Second, countries need to adapt to rapidly changing labour markets. Here again, the critical role of education, digital connectivity and social protection are highlighted. Policies should also address workers' vulnerability to working poverty and precarious employment and promote equal labour market participation.
Third, countries need to enact policies aimed at facilitating access to new technologies and bolster the ability of economies to adopt and utilize them.
Fourth, policy approaches are needed to integrate climate adaptation, mitigation, and sustainable development efforts into all SDG areas. This includes adopting climate-resilient strategies, significant investments in science and early warning systems, and strengthening international cooperation on high-impact science and technology.
Finally, the opportunity to reshape social contracts based on the 2030 Agenda and Sustainable Development Goals presents a pathway to a world that is systemically more inclusive, just, peaceful, resilient, and sustainable.
Colleagues,
As reinforced by the messages and recommendations of these two reports let us reaffirm our commitment to collective action.
In just a few weeks, Heads of State and Government will meet here, in New York, for the Summit of the Future.
We must use this opportunity to raise our ambitions to the needs of the moment.
Let us harness the power of multilateralism to secure a sustainable and prosperous future for all.
Thank you.