G77+China demand for action as World leaders gather for the summit for the Future in New York

By: Ismael Kasooha

NEW YORK

The G77 plus China, has demanded action during the summit for the Future that is going on at the United Nations headquarters in New York.

This was during Uganda’s Prime Minister Rt. Hon. Nabbanja Robinah presentation of the statement on behalf of the G77 plus China during plenary at the UN Headquarters in New York on Sunday.

Uganda is the current Chair of the G77 plus China which is the largest intergovernmental organization of developing countries in the United Nations, which provides the means for the countries of the South to articulate and promote their collective economic interests and enhance their joint negotiating capacity on all major international economic issues within the United Nations system, and promote South-South cooperation for development.

“Today, we live in a global scenario that has changed dramatically since the adoption of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and progress at the halfway point of the Agenda is slow or fragile. The gap between developed and developing countries continues to widen and major challenges generated by the current unfair international economic order for developing countries have reached their most acute expression in current times,” noted Nabbanja.

The Prime Minister of Uganda Rt. Hon. Nabbanja Robinah making a presentation at the United Nations on behalf of the G77+China in New York

The Prime Minister noted that world leaders are gathered in New York for the ‘Summit of the Future’ to recommit to international cooperation in the ‘Pact for the Future’, that has been the result of long, complex but constructive negotiations at different levels over the past one year.

“Our hope and conviction is that this Pact should not become another futile exercise, but must garner political will and commitment across all levels of global leadership to pragmatically address current issues and lay a foundation for solutions for our future global progress and challenges. The Theme for this Summit says it all; we need ‘Multilateral solutions for a better tomorrow,” said Nabbanja.

Nabbanja while delivering the statement on behalf of G77+China noted that the future we want should be free from any oppression and free from global inequalities and ‘divides’ in levels of development, financing, technology and innovation.

“It must deliberately offer opportunities and capacity to the majority global south to catch up. Therefore, the global community should commit to the practical implementations of all the agreed Actions in the Pact for the Future,” said Nabbanja.

The Premier noted that the impacts of climate change, biodiversity loss, environmental degradation and desertification, unfairly burden developing countries and pose additional challenges to their pursuit of sustainable development and poverty eradication.

“We remain concerned about the growing gap between the needs of developing countries and the support available to face these challenges,” noted Nabbanja.

In that regard, we regret that the Pact falls short in recognizing the actions needed to close this gap, including for developed countries to fulfill their obligations to provide the Means of Implementation, including capacity building, technology transfer, and adequate, sufficient, predictable, quality and additional financial resources for supporting developing countries to implement their Nationally Determined Contributions, adapt to the growing impacts of climate change and respond to the associated losses and damages.

Nabbanja said that the G77+China has hope and conviction that this Pact should not become another futile exercise, but must garner political will and commitment across all levels of global leadership to pragmatically address current issues and lay a foundation for solutions for our future global progress and challenges.

“Nonetheless, in the pact we had adopted, we have decided to take concrete actions to prevent people falling back into poverty, including by establishing well designed, sustainable and efficient social protection systems for all that are responsive to shocks. We reaffirm our commitment to the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, to accelerating our efforts to the empowerment of all women and girls in all domains,” said Nabbanja.

She said that they have agreed to remove all barriers inter alia through addressing those barriers to their full equal and meaningful access to and participation and leadership in science, technology and innovation, including through improving education, employment and research opportunities for women and girls in areas such as science, technology, innovation, mathematics and engineering.

 Relatedly, the Kenyan President Dr. William Ruto noted that multilateral systems are not giving the desired solutions for equitable development and demanded that Africa be given permanent membership on the UN security committee.

The UN Secretary General António Guterres highlighted that the pact for the future offers solutions to the prevailing challenges in the world.

The Prime Minister was accompanied by the Minister for Foreign Affairs Gen. Hon. Jeje Odong and State Minister for Foreign Affairs Hon. Okello Oryem, Uganda’s Permanent Representative at the United Nations, Ambassador Adonia Ayebare and the Head of SDG Secretariat in Uganda Dr. Albert Byamugisha.

The Summit of the Future at the margins of the UN General Assembly in New York aims at producing an intergovernmental negotiated, action-oriented Pact for the Future with chapters on Sustainable development and financing for development, International peace and security; Science, technology and innovation and digital cooperation, Youth and future generations and Transforming global governance.

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