South-South Economic Integration for Sustainable Recovery

The objective of the Thematic Solution Forum is to provide an opportunity to governments, international organizations, and academia to reflect and debate on the role of South-South economic integration in the post-Covid recovery of developing countries.
 

Issues to be addressed:

• Boosting sustainable recovery from the Covid-19 shock.

  Covid-19 pandemic has hit the world economy heavily and the developing countries has been affected disproportionately given their vulnerabilities and limited fiscal space to deploy stimulus packages. Despite some positive recovery signs from last year, the inflationary pressures may cause the rise of interest rates in advanced economies which could further result in global liquidity constraints particularly for developing countries. Meanwhile, other structural issues such as unequal access to the vaccines, narrow economic structure, and deteriorating terms of trade remain.

  The consequences of the crisis in such a difficult context should be carefully examined, and the recovery strategies and scenarios, including the contribution of South-South economic integration, need to be explored at both international and regional level.

  As UNCTAD suggested in a publication on “South-South Cooperation at the time of COVID-19: Building solidarity among developing countries”, South-South cooperation could contribute significantly to the crisis response and post-covid recovery of developing countries through various action areas including scaling up South-South finance, building SSC for trade and industrial recovery, strengthening regional integration and regional value chains, and building strategic partnership.
   

• Building resilience through successful climate adaptation.

  Boosting economic recovery from the pandemic shock will also require effective climate adaption strategy in the medium and long run. Humanly induced climate change has become a major concern for all economies across the globe. According to the IPCC analysis, global mean surface temperature (GMST) for the decade 2011-2020 is 1.09°C above the 1850-1900 period.

  The global warming and associated extreme events have caused widespread adverse impacts on land and ocean ecosystems, which in turn have reduced food and water security, affected physical health of people, impacted settlement and infrastructure and hindered efforts to achieve UN 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda.

  Climate change has also resulted in huge economic damages and lower economic growth that disproportionately affect developing countries. Therefore, they will have to adapt to the adverse impacts of climate change to foster economic and climate resilience through integrated policy strategies. However, developing countries are also constrained by inadequate institutional capacity, insufficient access to climate finance and green technologies in developing successful climate adaption strategy.

  In this regard, South-South cooperation could play a unique role as it may not only provide complementary resources to ODA but also facilitate South-South technology transfer, and peer learning of policy strategies.
   

Programme

• Welcome remarks, Rashmi Banga, Senior Economic Affairs Officer, UNCTAD
• Opening remarks and key messages, Supachai Panitchpakdi, former Secretary-General, UNCTAD

High-Level Panel Discussion

Chair: Supachai Panitchpakdi

• Jurin Laksanawisit, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Commerce, Thailand (tbc)
• Ryan Straughn, M.P., Minister in the Ministry of Finance, Barbados
• Chad Blackman, Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the UN Office and other international organizations in Geneva, Barbados; Chair, G77 and China (Geneva Chapter)
• Safdar A. Sohail, Dean, National Institute of Public Policy, Lahore, Pakistan
• Jomo Kwame Sundaram, Senior Advisor, Khazanah Research Institute Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Floor Discussions: 10 mins

Launch of UNCTAD Video on South-South Cooperation

Video interactive message with Chair

• Rebecca Grynspan, Secretary-General, UNCTAD

Closing Remarks: Supachai Panitchpakdi

About GSSD Expo 2022

The Global South-South Development Expo is an annual event organised by the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation (UNOSSC) to showcase evidence-based successful development solutions and initiatives, in collaboration with United Nations agencies and all other partners.