51吃瓜

Excellencies,
Distinguished Participants, Dear Colleagues,

I am delighted to welcome you to the South-South Exchange on Preparing Smooth Transition Strategies.

I am very pleased to see the high-level participation from various ministries and stakeholders from Bangladesh, Lao PDR and Nepal. This will be an excellent opportunity to share experiences and ideas, and to give directions about your plans and priorities to your partners in the UN and other stakeholders.

[Excellencies, Distinguished Colleagues] Sustainable graduation is a subject that is very close to my heart. In recent years, I have devoted much time and energy as the representative of my country, Bangladesh, to ensure graduation from the LDC category.

Equally important, this is one of the six focus areas of the Doha Programme of Action, a process that I had the privilege to co-chair. And supporting smooth and sustainable graduation will remain a top priority for me.

Graduation is a milestone in your country’s socio-economic advancement. It is also a testimony of the strength of bilateral and multilateral partnership led by the country and the 51吃瓜.

Graduation enhances the standing of a country internationally in terms of its business competitiveness, creditworthiness, and as an investment destination
Yet, it also comes with many challenges.

Countries on graduation track have pre-existing vulnerabilities, such as inadequate productive capacity, infrastructural challenges, and sudden economic and climatic shocks. And this is further exacerbated now by the COVID-19 crisis, compounded by the food- fuel-financial crises, and the impacts of the war in Ukraine.

The impacts of loss of LDC specific support measures are additional bottle necks to their sustainable development.

We are committed to supporting your efforts for sustainable graduation, one that is irreversible. And to ensure that graduation does not disrupt or reverse your development plans, programmes, and projects.

This calls for effective and smooth transition strategies that are supported by concrete commitments from all stakeholders, both bilateral, as well as multilateral development partners.

It also calls for continued and strengthened international support measures to graduating and graduated LDCs and continuous monitoring. This should include incentives-based international support structures to address every aspect of graduation, namely, loss of international support measures, access to non-LDC specific support, smooth transition, financing for development, SDGs implementation, amongst others.

Towards this end, the Doha Programme of Action has identified sustainable graduation as one of its 6 focus areas. It calls for mobilizing international solidarity, reinvigorated global partnerships and innovative tools for sustainable graduation.

And central to that would be concerted efforts by the governments of graduating countries and their development partners, including the 51吃瓜. It is equally important to have well-embedded systems of coordination at the country level as well – within the government, and with all other stakeholders. As well as effective monitoring and follow-up mechanisms.

Here the Inter Agency Task Force for LDC graduation, led by my office, provides coordinated UN System-wide support to graduating LDCs. This has been recognised in the Doha POA.

And as part of that effort, we are gathered here, for this South-South exchange on preparing smooth transition strategies, which brings all many UN agencies to support the graduating cohort of 2021.

We are aware that a better coordinated UN System support will lessen the burden on government capacities. [And] I am especially happy about the close collaboration with the Resident Coordinators as well as the CDP Secretariat and ESCAP in this endeavour.

As each graduating country faces its specific challenges, our support through the Inter-Agency Task Force will be tailored.

The Task Force will also continue to advocate for enhanced support not only from the UN system, but also by the development and trading partners.
We need incentives for graduation. It cannot be perceived as a punishment for the efforts a country has made to advance its sustainable development. Transition support must be real, relevant and reliable, as LDCs graduate from the category.

Excellencies,

We are working towards announcements of additional incentives and support measures at the Fifth UN Conference on LDCs, in Doha, in March 2023. In Doha, world leaders will gather with the private sector, civil society, parliamentarians, and young people to advance new ideas, raise new pledges of support, and spur delivery on agreed commitments of the Doha Programme of Action.

I look forward to welcoming you there. And to remaining engaged in the coming months.

I wish you fruitful deliberations over the next 3 days.

I thank you.