Speaking at the United Nations in New York on Tuesday 20 January 2015, Dr Debapriya Bhattacharya, Distinguished Fellow, CPD urged for incorporation of aspirations of transformative changes, a credible work plan, and strong expression of political will in the upcoming international development agenda.
Being invited by the President of the UN General Assembly, Dr Bhattacharya was addressing the first session of inter-governmental negotiations on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
The session was co-chaired by the co-facilitators of the negotiations Macharia Kamau, Ambassador of Kenya and David Donoghue, Ambassador of Ireland.
Dr Bhattacharya, also chair of Southern Voice on Post-MDGs – a network of 48 think-tanks from Asia, Africa and Latin America, in his presentation highlighted the issues that should find place in the political declaration on post-2015 agenda.
He emphasised that the global leaders need to commit themselves to a new framework of international partnership for development cooperation. This would entail provisioning adequate resources for implementation of the SDGs, making space for private sector and non-state actors in the implementation process, putting in place a rigorous accountability mechanism and operationalising an effective monitoring and review procedures.
The global partnership for development for post-2015 should ensure an early and successful conclusion of other parallel international processes currently underway in the different areas, pointed out Dr Bhattacharya. These processes include negotiations in the areas of trade, transfer of technology, climate change, intellectual property rights, taxation and financial rules.
Dr Bhattacharya called upon the member-states of the UN to demonstrate visible political will to endow the post-2015 international agenda with necessary momentum.