Statement
Delivered by AOSIS
1. I have the honor to speak on behalf of the Members of the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) and to align ourselves with the statement delivered by the distinguished Permanent Representative of the State of Palestine on behalf of the Group of 77 and China. Excellency, 2. A singular message emanating from the High-level Week is that the weight of urgency is upon us. Science, nature, people all point to an alarming trajectory for humanity and the planet if we fail to take decisive and ambitious action to get on track to meet the SDGs, and the Paris goals. 3. The second committee will have a critical role to play in evolving the right mix of political signaling, policy direction, and institutional action, at all levels, to set the pace for how the United Nations can best respond to the urgency of the task before us. 4. For the Members of AOSIS, our starting point is the S.A.M.O.A. Pathway, our blueprint for sustainable development; and the recently endorsed High-level Political Declaration, which sets out key areas for action to help accelerate the pace of implementation of the core priorities of this sustainable development agenda for small island developing states. 5. And because of the congruence between our agenda and the 2030 Agenda as well as the Addis Ababa Action Agenda, the Sendai Framework, and the Paris Agreement, we can capitalize on progress in S.A.M.O.A. Pathway to garner progress across all these interrelated agendas. Excellency, 6. On the surface, the outlook is positive. Small island developing States continue to do well in the human development index rankings, climate finance flows have increased, and tourism continues to boost economies. But a closer examination reveals a more troubling position. SIDS remain highly dependent on a limited natural resource base, social fissures persist, and climate change is already having severe, and in some case, irreversible impacts on countries. The pace of economic growth in SIDS has been described as slow, restrained and inconsistent. In fact, most small islands developing States are not even meeting the SGD 8.1 target of growth of 7% or higher. 7. Small island developing States have never given up on their own development, even when the statistics paint such a bleak outlook. But even as we try to advance our development, by doing what the international community tell us is the right thing to do, we have faced roadblocks, unscable walls and narrow paths. Some SIDS have made less progress than countries in other vulnerable groups, or even regressed, in economic terms, especially in terms of poverty reduction and debt sustainability. We have not achieved sustained high levels of economic growth owing in part to the ongoing negative impacts of external financial, economic and environmental shocks. 8. When you couple these challenges with overseas development assistance, that according to the OECD, has waned and stagnated; external debt that remains at unsustainable levels and is exacerbated by the need to borrow for disaster recovery; and severe structural constraints and low savings rates, then the reality of the challenges for SIDS development becomes clearer. 9. We seek a system that is responsive to our needs, where we are not boxed out of resources that we require, or left to shoulder burdens we did not create. These requests are in no way exceptional. They are all in keeping with the international commitment to small island developing states, fully vetted by leaders and endorsed in the halls of this Assembly. They simply have not yet been implemented. What can we seek to gain by reiterating age-old messages and renewing commitment to increasingly vulnerable people? We implore the international community to instead reflect critically on the well-known issues and challenges facing SIDS and act in earnest and with haste. 10. The core areas for action therefore that require attention in the work of the Second Committee are: a. fashioning an appropriate response or responses to drive a wedge between the cycle of extreme events and attendant high debt so that SIDS can sustain socioeconomic gains and build the resilience of our fledgling islands and low lying coastal states; b. sending an unequivocal call for urgent integrated action to stem the quickening pace of biodiversity loss, and to rapidly decelerate global greenhouse gas emissions through investments in low emissions climate resilient 1.5 C pathways; c. revisiting the terms of access to grant and concessional finance for SIDS d. enhancing data capacity gaps and developing a monitoring and evaluation framework to support evidence based decision making; and e. retrofitting the multi-country offices and orienting regional commissions so that we see greater gains on the ground with the steady support of the United Nations system Thank you.
