Launch of the Global Development Report

(check against delivery)

H.E. Mr. WANG Yi, State Councilor and Foreign Minister of P.R. China,

H.E. Mr. MA Jiantang, Minister of the Development Research Center of the State Council,

H.E. Mr. ZHAO Changwen, President of CIKD,

Excellencies,

Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen,

I would like to thank the Center for International Knowledge on Development (CIKD) for inviting me to join the launch of their Global Development Report. I look very much forward to receiving the report and exploring opportunities for sharing knowledge and experiences between CIKD and the UN in China.  

Today’s event provides a timely opportunity to reflect on the state of the world and our responsibilities as development actors, in the interest of our planet and the people that inhabit it.

The world today is facing profound, growing and interconnected challenges: a persisting global pandemic; climate change; conflicts; a fragile and uneven recovery; growing inflation; more poverty and hunger; and rising inequality between and within countries.

Combined, these crises are reversing the progress made in recent decades and severely undermine our prospects for the future. For the first time in decades, the number of people living below the international poverty line is growing.

This is not acceptable.

With less than eight years from the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) deadline, we need to redouble our efforts to realize the ambitions of the 2030 Agenda and achieve a more just and sustainable world.

China’s responsible leadership at this critical time is welcome. The Global Development Initiative (GDI) announced by President Xi last September is a promising response to the call of the Decade of Action to accelerate the achievement of the SDGs globally.

From what we know about the initiative, many of its priorities are aligned with the SDGs, including in the areas of poverty eradication, food security, health, climate action, the planet, industrialization, innovation and means of implementation.

At the same time – as I mentioned at the First GDI Workshop at Diaoyutai State Guesthouse on 9 December 2021 – as custodians and guarantors of the 2030 Agenda, the UN also needs to underscore possible departures of the GDI from the international agreement reached in 2015.

The 2030 Agenda is one cohesive and integrated agenda, encompassing all three pillars of the UN system: peace and security, human rights, and development. There is equal prioritization of all three pillars along with the principle of Leaving No One Behind, which should be specifically centred on the individual.

Important aspects of the 2030 Agenda, such as gender equality and women’s empowerment, youth employment and digital education also need to be included in the GDI. I also wish to highlight the enormous potential of GDI to address specific development challenges faced by vulnerable populations, including migrants, refugees and people living with HIV/AIDS. UN stands ready to support on this.

Since the announcement of the initiative, the UN in China has expressed its readiness to provide the best possible technical assistance to make this ambitious development initiative fully aligned to international norms and standards. To this effect, the UN in China has offered to join forces with China to articulate how GDI can best contribute to achieving the SDGs.

Our offer stands.

After all, as the largest developing country, China has important lessons to share with the rest of the developing world. Since its reforms in the late 1970s, China has witnessed remarkable economic and social transformations, and eventually lifted over 750 million people out of extreme poverty.

Such a socio-economic development leapfrog is nothing short of miraculous, and its lessons need to be shared.

The UN in China is keen to act as a conduit and independent broker to leverage China’s development experiences to the benefit of other developing countries.

Partnerships is one of the three strategic priorities identified in the UN Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework for China (2021-2025). The UN works with China as a provider of South-South Cooperation (SSC) towards advancing global progress on the SDGs and the fight against climate change.

In just one year of implementation of the Cooperation Framework, the UN in China helped facilitate SSC partnerships between China and more than 60 partner countries in the Global South, connecting their demand with the expertise and resources that China has to offer.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Global challenges require global solutions. And global solutions are found through multilateralism. The world must come together to strengthen multilateralism.

I would like to conclude with the words of Secretary-General António Guterres to the recent meeting of the Group of Friends of the GDI last month in New York: “We cannot lose more ground. It's time to rescue the SDGs and give sustainable development a fighting chance -- for people, for planet, for our common future”.

I wish you successful deliberations.