Virtual forum at the level of heads of state and governments held at the initiative of the UN Secretary General António Guterres, prime ministers of Canada and Jamaica Justin Trudeau and Andrew Holness. The event was dedicated to consolidating international efforts in financing for development in the era of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Speaking as Chairman of the Group of Landlocked Developing Countries, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev noted that since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, LLDCs have faced a deadly combination of declining foreign investment, trade and remittances, growing debt burdens, and severely reduced fiscal spaces, due to which, LLDC economies contracted an average 2.4%.
Kazakhstan President made a number of practical proposals aimed at reducing the financial gap in the LLDCs countries caused by the pandemic.
The President believes that it is critical that the World Bank’s 160 billion dollar COVID response and the IMF’s 1 trillion dollar lending capacity – be focused on the hardest hit countries. Kassym-Jomart Tokayev called on international financial institutions, UN system and other international and regional organizations to prioritize the special needs of LLDCs in their recovery efforts.
Besides this, President Tokayev drew attention to the UN Roadmap for Accelerated Implementation of the Vienna Program of Action that takes on new urgency. He urged all development partners to deliver collectively across all seven action areas of the Addis Ababa Agenda and to protect current ODA levels.
The Head of State called on the international community to support the development of strong health systems, as well as the timely and adequate procurement of vaccines. He also stated the need for boosting the resilient infrastructure and trade facilitation mechanisms, achieving the digital transformation in the LLDCs, as well as urged private sector to partner fully in all recovery efforts.
Speaking about the measures taken at the national capacity, President Tokayev recalled that Kazakhstan donated to the Global Humanitarian Response Plan and provided humanitarian aid to several countries fighting the virus. Kassym-Jomart Tokayev informed about the launch of «KazAID» ODA agency and the work on establishing the UN Regional Centre for SDGs for Central Asia and Afghanistan in Almaty.
Concluding his speech, the President assumed that the vaccination process and economic recovery may take years, while in the long-term negative effects, unfortunately, will likely linger for decades. As far as he is concerned, every effort now to protect the most vulnerable populations, countries and economies will serve the interest of all in the future. As the President is convinced, this is the only way, and our responsibility.
The leaders of Argentina, Venezuela, Egypt, Italy, Canada, Pakistan, Turkey, Qatar, France, Ecuador, Japan, Jamaica and other countries, as well as the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, the heads of the IMF, OECD, World Bank, WTO, the European Union and the African Union also took part in the forum.
