Development

A proposal to create a group of experts under the United Nations umbrella, which would assess existing mechanisms for innovative development finance, and husband new initiatives, was proposed at the United Nations today by Philippe Douste-Blazy, Special Adviser to the Secretary-General on Innovative Financing for Development. This would enhance the United Nations role as a catalyst to new ideas and as an implementing agent in this area.

Government officials and development experts from small island developing States are conducting a series of regional meetings to discuss how their sustainable development plans are faring in a difficult global financial environment and at a time when the impact of climate change is being more keenly felt.

The United Nations General Assembly has declared 2012 as the International Year of Cooperatives, highlighting the contribution of cooperatives to socio-economic development. In adopting resolution 64/136 on 18 December, the Assembly noted that cooperatives impact poverty reduction, employment generation and social integration.

As it concluded in Nairobi, Kenya, today, the High-Level United Nations Conference on South-South Cooperation encouraged developing countries –- with support from developed countries and international organizations –- to take concrete steps to make their cooperative efforts work better in tackling the serious challenges they faced in achieving socio-economic advancement.

Officials from dynamic emerging economies asserted today that their Governments were ready to improve socio-economic conditions at home and help raise development prospects across the global South, proof that many developing countries were now capable of taking the lead in designing and implementing their own long-term development plans.

The many challenges now facing the international community called for stronger and more innovative cooperation between developing countries -– particularly neighbouring States -- as well as between them and developed countries, United Nations Deputy Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro said today as she helped to open the most significant United Nations meeting on the subject in decades, in Nairobi, Kenya.

The most important United Nations meeting on South-South cooperation in decades will highlight growing political and economic ties within the developing world, as countries of the South assume leading roles in decisions on hot global issues ranging from economic recovery to food security and climate change. Taking place at the United Nations Office at Nairobi, the 1-3 December conference will seek to promote and sharpen the benefits of mutual support among developing and transition economies.

Twenty-two Member States pledged approximately $58 million today, during a pledging conference in support of United Nations development activities for 2010.

A high-level United Nations conference on South-South cooperation is to be held in Nairobi, Kenya, from 1-3 December, 2009, the General Assembly has decided.

A new $2.8 million project that will bring cutting-edge technology to small island States has been signed into action by the Government of Spain and the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs.