Context:
According to the recently released Financing for Sustainable Development Report: Financing for Development at a Crossroads (FSDR) 2024, trillions of dollars are needed to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030.
Key highlights of the report
- A massive surge of financing and a reform of the international financial architecture can rescue the Sustainable Development Goals.
- Bold actions are needed to scale up SDG investment and reform the global financial system.
- Financing for Development at a Crossroads (FSDR 2024) says urgent steps are needed to mobilise financing at scale to close the development financing gap.
- With only six years remaining to achieve the SDGs, the UN estimates that almost 600 million people will continue to live in extreme poverty in 2030 and beyond, more than half of them women.
- Around $4.2 trillion is needed in investments to close the development financing gap. This number was $2.5 trillion before the COVID-19 pandemic began, according to the 2024 Financing for Sustainable Development Report: Financing for Development at a Crossroads (FSDR 2024).
- According to the report debt burdens and rising borrowing costs are large contributors to the crisis.
- The report points to the UN Summit of the Future in September 2024 as a crucial opportunity to change course. It highlights the June 2025 Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development (FfD4) as the critical moment for countries to commit to closing the development financing gap and invest in achieving the SDGs.
- Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development FfD4 is an opportunity for countries to:
- Close credibility gaps and rebuild trust in multilateralism.
- Close financing and investment gaps, at scale and with urgency.
- Reform and modernize the outdated international financial architecture and adjust international rules for trade, investment and finance.
- Formulate and finance new development pathways to deliver on the SDGs and ensure no one is left behind.
About Sustainable Development Goals
- In June 1992, at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, more than 178 countries adopted Agenda 21, a comprehensive plan of action to build a global partnership for sustainable development to improve human lives and protect the environment.
- Member States unanimously adopted the Millennium Declaration at the Millennium Summit in September 2000 at UN Headquarters in New York. The Summit led to the elaboration of eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to reduce extreme poverty by 2015.
- In January 2015, the General Assembly began the negotiation process on the post-2015 development agenda. The process culminated in the subsequent adoption of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, with 17 SDGs at its core, at the UN Sustainable Development Summit in September 2015.
