Pakistan for global support for middle income countries achieve SDGs

Pakistan for global support for middle income countries achieve SDGs – sustainable development goals.

The acting permanent representative of Pakistan to the UN, Aamir Khan, called for this at a high-level huddle on the situation of such countries.

Pakistan for global support for middle income countries achieve SDGs

President of United Nations General Assembly, Volkan Bozkir, convened the meeting.

It held under the theme “Finetuning the development system approach to address the needs of MICs.

He called for urgent international support to enable Middle-Income Countries (MICs) deal with the challenges that are obstructing them in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

He further emphasized the need for the UN Development System, the international community, the global economic ecosystem and the private sector to come together.

They all should come together in support of the efforts of middle-income countries.

While noting that MICs have almost 70 per cent of the global poor, the Pakistani envoy said the coronavirus pandemic hit hard many of them.

Moreover, he said that crippling debt, global economic inequalities and vulnerability to the effects of climate change and natural disasters, stunt prospects for growth in the lower echelon of middle income countries.

Equitable access to the COVID-19 vaccine for all

Aamir Khan said that if we are to build back better from the pandemic our first priority should be equitable access to the COVID-19 vaccine for all.

He further said that Intellectual Property Rights and export controls should not prevent countries from saving lives.

He also pointed out that the biggest challenge lies in access to affordable and concessional financing and debt relief for these countries.

Furthermore, he welcomed the G-20 countries’ Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI) .

However, Khan noted more than 40 percent of the MICs excluded from many forms of assistance for pandemic response.

Fear of downgrading

He said that of those eligible, only half of the middle income countries are participating due to the fear of downgrading by credit rating agencies that might result in the loss of access to private external financing.

Clearly, he said, concessional finance, debt relief and restructuring, with the participation of all bilateral, multilateral and private creditors were required to augment efforts by these countries to overcome their multifaceted challenges.

He underlined it as imperative that we recognize multiple dimensions of the vulnerabilities of MICs, in the criteria for accessing concessional resources of finance.

Moreover, he also noted technology transfer and bridging the digital divide a key for developing countries to leapfrog in this domain, in particular.

GTV