Mr. Chairman,

I have the honour to speak on behalf of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC). We thank the Secretary General for the presentation of the reports related to items 17b and 18.

We take note that the world´s economy recovery is far from certain, with scattered and insufficient signs of improvement, especially in developed countries. Despite noticeable progress in some developing regions, the world gross product is forecast to grow modestly. Indeed, unemployment remains dangerously high in several countries, and growing youth unemployment is particularly challenging for most developed countries, and developing ones. In this context, CELAC highlights the need for more forceful and concerted policy actions at both national and international levels, to mitigate major risks and ensure stronger and sustained economic recovery. In particular, we believe that fiscal policies across the world should become more countercyclical, more supportive of job creation and more equitable.

We believe that at the national level, development success depends on effective design and implementation of, macroeconomic and social policies, in the context of sustainable development. At the international level, success depends on the support and commitment of the international community and the need to have adequate policy space and an enabling global environment that ensure an appropriate pace and pattern of integration into the global economy.

The international context must therefore take into account the different development stages, priorities, circumstances and capabilities of developing countries, as well as the multidimensional nature of all developing processes and the enhancement of coherence, consistency and coordination of the international monetary, financial and trading systems. This will require, both at the national and international level, policies to create a stable macroeconomic environment, pursuing explicitly long-term sustainable growth, employment and lowering income inequality. We believe this is the best way to achieve the overarching international goal of poverty eradication.

CELAC Member States further believe it is critical, as well, to enhance transparency, supervision, regulation and good governance of the international financial system, in order to assure international stability. This is particularly relevant on the performance, management and competition of credit-rating agencies and mechanisms. Effectiveness and competition among such agencies need to be improved and we need to develop alternative instruments and frameworks to measure the quality of credit, financial services and financial products, in order to diversify and expand the market and build national capacities.

We also consider it essential for the stability and predictability of international financial architecture, to ensure that agreements reached between debtors and creditors within the context of sovereign debt restructuring processes are respected, allowing payment flows to be distributed to cooperative creditors as agreed with them in the process of consensual readjustment of the debt. We must count on instruments making reasonable and definitive agreements between sovereign creditors and debtors, allowing them to confront debt sustainability problems in an orderly fashion.

 

We therefore welcome the resolution adopted by the UN General Assembly 68/304, entitled “Towards a multilateral convention to establish a legal regulatory framework for sovereign debt restructuring processes” as a first step in the objective of improving the international architecture for sovereign debt restructuring.

 

On international trade, we strongly believe in the need of the completion of the Doha Round of multilateral trade negotiations with a balanced, ambitious and comprehensive outcome. In that direction, in order to fully harness the potential of trade, it is important to uphold a universal, rule-based, open, non-discriminatory and equitable multilateral trading system that promotes recovery, growth, sustainable development and employment, taking into account the needs and interests of developing countries.

CELAC member states reiterate the importance of addressing the distortions on international trade, in particular non-tariff measures, the persistence of tariff peaks, agricultural export subsidies and trade distorting domestic support which continues to affect market access opportunities for developing countries. Tariff escalations impacting products at later stages of production increased in 2013. Additionaly, while promising, the Bali package only covers a subset of the issues of the Doha Round, and a clearly defined work program to conclude the Round is yet to be completed.

All these efforts need to be properly coordinated along with the advancement on the reform of the Bretton Woods institutions, particularly their governance structures, quotas and voting rights, improving their representativeness, effectiveness and legitimacy.

Mr. Chairman,

Financing for development is  crucial for implementing the internationally agreed development goals, and therefore the Third Conference on Financing for Development shall consider that the report of the OWG on SDGs is called to constitute the central element of the Post-2015 Development Agenda, as it shall be the basis for integrating SDGs into it. We express our strong interest on the establishment of a truly global partnership for development, building upon Monterrey Consensus, the Doha Declaration on Financing for Development and the Rio+20 outcome document, that integrates all the development agenda issues to be galvanized through the Third International Conference on Financing for Development in July 2015. And in that context, we recognize the importance of the CELAC preparatory meeting to take place in March 2015, in Santiago de Chile, with the intention to contribute to the regional dimension of the process.

We further recognize the importance of having a strong, transparent, and comprehensive process and the need for this process to be based on Monterrey and Doha in order to reinvigorate the financing for development process and support the implementation of the new development agenda. We look forward to build on Monterey´s experience and strengthen its follow-up process, including through the possibility to establish new institutional arrangements, so as to measure up to the aspirations of developing and developed countries for achieving sustainable development. The difficult economic situation of the past decade made ​​it difficult to meet some of the agreed commitments and the new Conference opens the opportunity to redouble efforts towards poverty eradication, achieve development and fight inequality.

We recognize that an effective strategy of financing for sustainable development will require the mobilization and effective use of new and additional financial resources, public and private, domestic and international; and underscore the central role of ODA in achieving international agreed development goals. In this regard, we stress the need for developed countries to urgently fulfill their ODA commitments of 0.7% of GNI for developing countries. In the post-2015 development agenda we also see ODA as leveraging and sustaining financing for development in developing countries, including through increased levels and more regular flows of ODA.

CELAC holds the view that current and future international agreed development goals should be linked to a strengthened and genuine global partnership for development with effective means of implementation. The notion of means of implementation consists of, among others, a mix of financial resources, development and transfer of technology, as well as capacity-building and policy space. These means of implementation must be supported by concrete actions from developed countries, including through quantitative time-bound financial targets besides those established for ODA, in accordance with the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and the universal scope of the Post-2015 Development Agenda.

CELAC countries also believe in the need to establish a holistic, inclusive and transparent financing strategy that considers the particular needs and aspirations of all developing countries and takes fully into account the report of the Open Working Group on Sustainable Development Goals, as well as all relevant outcomes from other intergovernmental processes such as the Third International Conference of the Small Islands Developing Countries, held in September 1-4, the Second International Conference on Landlocked Developing Countries to be held in Vienna in November 3-5.

CELAC further believes in the need to continue undertaking efforts towards the establishment of a comprehensive Plan of Action for cooperation with Middle-Income Countries. In that regard, we recognize that, despite the achievements of the MICs, a significant number of people are still living in poverty and inequalities remain, and that further investment in social services and economic opportunities are needed in order to reduce those inequalities; and noting that national averages based on criteria such as per capita income do not always reflect the actual particularities and development needs of the MICs, we look forward to advance in these issues within the scope of the new financing strategy.

 

Thank you.