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Statement
By
Mr. Salihu Ahmed-Sambo
Minister
Permanent Mission of Nigeria to the United Nations
At the
Intergovernmental Preparatory Meeting for the Fifteenth Session of the
United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD-15)
On cluster item
Policy options and possible Actions to expedite implementation: Interlinkages
and cross-cutting issues
New York, 1st March 2007
Mr. Chairman
On behalf of Nigeria, I wish to align myself to the statement by the representative
of Pakistan on behalf of the G-77 and China.
The means of implementation including financial resources, technologies and other
related cross-cutting issues are key to the effective implementation of all the ideas
generated on policy options for energy, industry and air pollution/atmosphere. As such
there is urgent need to support efforts of developing countries through technical
assistance to strengthen domestic credit and capital base, capacity building to strengthen
technical and administrative skills, strengthening the role of the international financial
institutions in the flow of investments related to developing infrastructure, development
of micro-financing mechanisms, joint research and development programmes, transfer of
new and emerging technologies. Without addressing these key issues not much could be
achieved.
Mr. Chairman
It is certainly inevitable that the international community must enhance the role of
women in the implementation of the sustainable development agenda for us to achieve
the targets of the international development goals, including the MDGs. In this regard,
Nigeria supports gender mainstreaming in all facets of implementation of Agenda 21 and
the outcomes of the WSSD. Nigeria also firmly supports public and private partnerships,
especially for SMEs to promote affordable, efficient, advance fossil fuel and renewable
energy technologies as well as safe, affordable and efficient transportation and overall
reduction in air pollution.
Africa and the LDCs require urgent attention from the international community in order
to fulfill their commitments with regard to ODA, JOI, Monterrey Consensus, Bali
Strategic Plan on capacity building and technology. We cannot deal with implementation
without cancellation of the mounting foreign debts of the African countries as well as
other critical issues such as the removal of tariff and non-tariff measures, etc. We fully
recognize the linkages of all the thematic themes, which will require all-inclusive actions
to fully address.
I thank you.
