Mr. President,

It is a great honor for the Lao PDR to serve as ECOSOC member for the first time. The convening of this Coordination Segment is timely for us to better address the issues related to coordination and synergy among different subsidiary bodies, principal organs and specialized agencies.

My delegation supports this year’s theme as it complements our national priorities and immediate concerns which includes addressing the lingering impact of COVID-19. In this context, I wish to underline 3 following points:

First, enhancing support and assistance to the most vulnerable countries is of particular importance so they are not left further behind. While many economies have begun to show signs of recovery, groups of countries in special situations are still struggling to overcome multifaceted challenges.

Second, emerging insecurity combined with food, energy and climate crises have further hampered the recovery efforts. Therefore, more concerted efforts are needed and it is crucial for all UN agencies and international financial institutions to act together in a more coordinated manner.

Finally, building resilience and preparedness for future shocks remain critical. In this regard, under the auspices of ECOSOC, we should focus on finding ways and means to safeguard our hard-earned development gains and attain the SDGs by the set timeframe with predictable and sufficient resources to finance development programs.

I wish to conclude by expressing my delegation’s full support to various proposals expressed earlier on how to formulate “risk-informed policies” and means of implementations. I thank you.