Distinguished Co-Chairs
Honourable Ministers
Excellencies
Ladies and gentlemen,
My delegation aligns itself with the statements made by Fiji and Benin on behalf of
G-77 and China, and LDCs respectively.
Once Mahatma Gandhi observed that 'God has created enough to meet the needs of
people but not enough to meet the greed of the few'. The global community is
producing enough but in spite of this, over a billion people go to bed every night with
a burning belly and nearly 900 million people still find poverty a guaranteed partner
in their life time. While they suffer for a bowl of food, sadly, nearly a quarter
habitants of this planet earth are misusing and abusing the provisions of life and
livelihood in such a way that environmental and economic sustainability are being
compromised.
Good news is; to address these issues; I mean the issues of sustainability, the issues of
inequality and inclusive development, to ensure minimal livelihood of the have-nots,
to eradicate poverty and hunger, and to facilitate development of less developed
countries; the LDCs, LLDCs, SIDs, the developing and the developed ones the world
has agreed in Rio+20 Conference to develop and design certain achievable goals
popularly known as the Sustainable Development Goals or SDGs, a holistic approach
to achieve economic, social and environmental sustainability.
Distinguished Co-Chairs,
We are going to charter the future of humanity for at least next 20 or 30 years. Unless
we rise to the occasion and take a bow for the good of humanity, for the sustainability
of this planet earth, this small village, our future generations may not pardon us. With
this conviction, may I put forward some specific suggestions, as the nature of the
meeting has largely been described as open and interactive?
First: Out of the three pillars of Sustainable Development, the Social and the
Environmental Pillars have been addressed over a long period of time under the guise
of MDGs and CSD. With some reservations, a partial achievement has also been
obtained in those fields. But I am afraid, nothing could sustain and most achievements
could be reversed in many of the developing countries on the wake of multifaceted
global crises and emerging challenges like environmental risks. It has been pointed
out that, without economic development, development in social and human rights
areas are not sustainable and therefore, time has come to put utmost emphasis on
economic pillar of sustainable development to make a real difference on the ground
and end poverty and hunger and ensure respect for fair rule of law and justice.
Second: Since Economic pillars have been neglected in the past, it should be
prioritized in the formulation of SDGs or/and post-2015 agenda, more so to ensure a
balanced treatment among the three pillars of sustainable development.
Third: Eradication of poverty is the overarching goal of the Rio+20 Conference; the
'Future We want'. All probable SDGs should, therefore, be targeted towards a job-rich
growth to ensure sustained economic growth leading to social and economic safety
locally, regionally and globally. In this connection, SDGs should be tailored to the
country and region specific requirements with specific vision, with clear mission,
targeted goals, objectives, time-line, appraisal, indicator, evaluation and means of
implementations. Poverty anywhere means poverty everywhere; if critical elements of
SDGs are not implemented in the field owing to paucity of resources, financial,
technical and technological co-operations, the world will continue to be an unequal
world busy with containing repercussions of injustice.
Fourth; Special emphasis should be put on, on the economic development of the
developing countries, particularly LDCs, so that these countries can chart their social
development and environmental protection plans by themselves. Instead of helping
for economic emancipation, if the development partners continue to aid them in the
social and human rights safety nets, they will ever remained bottle-fed, while the
partners will not be excused from the blame of keeping them ever dependent and not
helping them stand on their own feet. However, short-term social safety net assistance
should be continued and phased out with economic development in the long run.
Fifth: In this regard, Means of implementation such as ODA, trade, investment, debt
relief, global financial restructuring and technology transfer should be integral part of
each of the SDGs. This is of special importance for LDCs, and I urge to all
deve!opment partners, irrespective of the South and North, to fulfil their long pledged
ODA of 0.2% GDP and to open their market for 100% duty free quota free market
access for all LDC products in the spirit of the WTO Hong Kong Ministerial Meeting.
In the same note, I urge to implement the provisions of TRIPs for LDCs to facilitate
transfer of technology in the industrialization of these countries' commodity and
service sectors.
Sixth: Members should ponder on framing SDGs in the fields of crucial importance
for countries like Bangladesh. These include productive capacity, infrastructure
development, agriculture development, food and energy security and efficiency, water
development, migration and population management, implementation of big projects
like roads, railways, ports, electricity, gas and telecom to aide industrialization,
development of skills, quality education, funds and service line for youth and women
for SMEs to ensure maximum employment, Migration, Trade liberalization for
developing counties, particularly for LDCs and indicator-specific health and
education development to build healthy nations locally and also globally.
Seventh; the world will face newer and emerging challenges and unless people, both
men and women are empowered, they will find difficulty to face the upcoming
challenges. Therefore, it is necessary to empower them. Bangladesh Prime Minister
has outlined seven interlinked variables to empower people. You can empower them
by providing education, skills and training, ensuring their participation in governance;
empower them by eliminating poverty and hunger, by eliminating all sorts of
discrimination and deprivation, by including the excluded people, and empower them
by eliminating all forms ofterrorismo
Last but not the least, the SDGs should not be considered as 'new and improved'
MDGs; neither they should be solely built on the MDGs which are mostly social
goals. However, considering the lessons learned from MDGs and considering their
social nature, the SDGs under Social Pillars of Sustainable Development may be built
on the vestige of MDGs. But they should in no way, undermine the Economic
priorities of SDGs, which are essential for the 'Future We Want', an inclusive world
without poverty and hunger, a world with decent jobs and decent living for all.
In conclusion, distinguished Co-Chairs, while I am thrilled to observe that the UN
Secretariat and its agencies are focusing their energy and resources on the post-2015
development agenda, a non-mandated agenda, may ! kindly request them, to come up
with equal enthusiasm and with specific suggestions in framing matrix-oriented SDGs
which is the sole mandate given by all 193 member states of this august body. Let's
respect the will of this august body with full sincerity and honesty. Let's address this
with all our energy, creativity, skills and efforts. This call is to my fellow Member
States, UN Agencies, all civil society, major groups and other non-government
organizations, private sectors and the media. And this is a call from the poor people of
the world, the most vulnerable, the most at stake. May I remind you that if there is no
development especially in LDCs, LLDCs, SIDs or in post-conflict countries, can we
be proud of our performance?
I have a hope, with your commitment, one day, we will overcome hunger and poverty,
we will overcome social injustice and misuse of resources, one day we are sure to
achieve our goals of economic, social and environmental sustainability that would
surely lead us to sustainable peace and prosperity for all.
I thank you.
