New framework to implement and finance sustainable development: Switzerland welcomes outcome of Addis Ababa conference
Bern, 16.07.2015 - The Third International Conference on Financing for Development in Addis Ababa, attended by some 30 heads of government, over 100 ministers and around 7,000 representatives from politics, civil society, the private sector and academia, has come to a close. After tough negotiations, the international community has agreed on a new framework to implement and finance sustainable development. The framework opens the way for adoption at the United Nations Summit to adopt the post-2015 development agenda in September of the new goals to replace the Millennium Development Goals, which expire at the end of this year. The Swiss delegation qualified the outcome of the Addis Ababa conference as a "groundbreaking" success.
After four days of consultations, the participants of the Third International Conference on Financing for Development agreed on a series of measures, including:
• increasing the inclusion of the private sector to achieve global sustainable development.
• facilitating technology transfer to developing countries.
• promoting new public-private financing models.
• making it easier for migrants to send remittances to their countries of origin including reducing transaction costs.
• promoting the restitution of stolen assets.
• strengthening international cooperation in tax matters.
This means that the conference achieved its most important objectives. "The results are groundbreaking for the modernisation of international cooperation. The partnerships and financing models agreed in Addis Ababa will help shape global efforts to overcome poverty and inequality," said the head of the Swiss delegation, Ambassador Manuel Sager. According to the director-general of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), the conference in Ethiopia's capital will pave the way for the adoption of the sustainable development goals at the summit on the post-2015 agenda in New York. Switzerland has been actively involved in the development of the sustainable development goals and joint financing mechanisms from the outset. The greater involvement of private business in financing development was one of Switzerland's aspirations that Addis Ababa has endorsed.
The Millennium Development Goals expire at the end of the year. The international community has chosen a different approach for the period after 2015. Whereas the Millennium Development Goals primarily addressed extreme poverty in developing countries, the sustainable development goals will include a balance of social, economic, and environmental dimensions. The goals will apply to all states since many problems both in the South and North are connected to global developments, as climate change shows.
Switzerland has been working hard to ensure the success of the conference in Addis Ababa and of the sustainable development goals. Ambassador Michael Gerber, who attended the conference as Switzerland's chief negotiator for the post-2015 agenda and financing development, stressed that the process is now entering its most pivotal stage. "The agreement on a new implementation and financing framework in Addis Ababa has laid the foundation for the adoption of the new agenda for sustainable development in September in New York and for a new climate agreement in December in Paris," he said. "The negotiations in these two processes will also be challenging, but the ambitious desire of all parties for a shift in favour of global sustainable development has been confirmed in Addis Ababa".
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