The Guardian - Global Development - and Global Team Work - Are Key to Humanity's Prosperity

Op-Ed

By Jacob J. Lew, Luis Videgaray Caso and Sufian Ahmed

The past 15 years have yielded unprecedented gains in the fight against extreme poverty and hunger, with emerging economies heralding record economic growth.

The number of people living in extreme poverty is half of what it was in 1990, as is the proportion of people without access to safe drinking water. More than 3m deaths from malaria have been averted since 2000. Women's labor force participation has jumped significantly. And technological innovations -- led by the increasingly ubiquitous mobile phone -- have brought dramatic economic, social and financial opportunities to remote parts of the world.

Yet the progress achieved is not nearly enough. Poverty -- including extreme poverty -- is pervasive. One in seven people in the world still survive on $1.25 a day or less. Dramatic levels of inequality persist, impairing growth in some countries. And there is no guarantee that the gains made in recent years will be permanent. Climate change, civil unrest and terrorism can rapidly undo hard-earned progress even as demands increase: people around the world rightly want more than access to basic services -- they want an equal shot at opportunities to thrive, not merely to survive.

This week, we will convene with other ministers, the private sector and civil society in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, for the Third International Conference on Financing for Development. This year's conference represents a unique opportunity to protect, enhance and even accelerate the gains of the last 15 years. We are determined to seize the opportunity.

Reducing the risks of climate change, promoting resilient infrastructure and boosting productivity will help us to protect these gains, as will empowering and including every citizen in order to contribute productively to economic growth, and tackling inequality and unemployment to offer hope and opportunities to both women and youth. Ensuring that everyone can share in the benefits of economic growth will help us to enhance those gains. And making critical investments in science, technology and innovation can help accelerate them. All the while, it is vital that there be improved transparency, a sounder business climate and an end to corruption. Together, those goals represent the key to sustainable development.

The First International Conference on Financing for Development in Monterrey, Mexico, in 2002 set this foundation. The Monterrey Consensus -- the outcome of that first meeting -- emphasized that every nation has primary responsibility for its own economic and social development. This year's conference presents the next chapter, providing a platform from which to implement the United Nations Post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals, that will be agreed upon in September, setting an ambitious new stage following the Millennium Development Goals.

The new chapter of Financing for Development goes much further. It moves away from merely managing poverty and toward spurring transformation. That requires three primary sources of development finance: donor assistance, domestic resources and private investment.

Donor assistance plays a critical role, particularly in the most vulnerable countries, helping to disseminate knowledge and best practices and reaching sectors often shut off from other sources of finance. But it must be used as a catalyst for attracting other financial flows to support economic growth, including domestic resources and private investment. Increasing domestic public resources is vital for governments' ownership of their own development while private investment is critical to job creation and infrastructure development.

To maximize the impact of money spent on development, we also must do more to incorporate key enablers of development -- including making better use of science, technology and innovation. Data, for example, is key to generating new development solutions and driving evidence-based policy making. Similarly, we must recognize that climate change impacts all aspects of development -- social, economic and environmental. Together, we must redouble our efforts to build a low-carbon, climate-resilient world.

We are committed to working together and urge others to join us in seeking to revitalize a partnership for sustainable development -- a partnership that, for the first time, can be built on a shared and universal agenda for change. We live in an increasingly interconnected world where our prosperity, peace and security are linked. That is why Financing for Development holds such promise as we work to translate this exciting new vision into concrete actions and commitments for years and decades to come.

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