Regional Consultative Meetings on Financing for Development in Preparations for the Global Event

The Regional Commissions are presently preparing, in cooperation with UNCTAD as well as regional development banks, to hold regional meetings in their respective regions on Financing for Development. They have undertaken this important task in response to GA resolution 54/196 and the decision of the Preparatory Committee for the High-level International Inter-governmental Event on Financing for Development, taken at its organizational session, held from 27-31 March 2000.

The Asian financial crisis and its contagion affect vividly underlined the significance of integrating regional perspectives and concerns in the global decision-making process on the vital issues of finance and development in order to ensure sustainable economic and social development.

   The regional meetings will be organized in the second half of the year 2000 in order that their results will be fully integrated in the substantive preparations for the global event. Arrangements are under way for an ESCAP meeting to be hosted by Indonesia in August; an ECA meeting to be held in November in Addis Ababa, back-to-back with the ECA meeting of Ministers of Finance and Trade and on LDCs; and an ECLAC meeting to be hosted by Colombia in November. The ECE and ESCWA meetings will be held in December, in Geneva and in Beirut, respectively.

   The Executive Secretaries of the Regional Commissions, in conjunction with their meeting in early May in New York, held informal consultations with the Bureau of the Preparatory Committee on the scope and areas to be covered by the regional consultations in their respective regions. They also held discussions, within the context of EC/ESA, with DESA, UNCTAD and UNDP on the preparations for the regional meetings.

    The regional meetings will be organized in line with the guidance provided by the Preparatory Committee, although it is understood that each regional meeting may evolve its scope and its agenda according to the region’s specific needs and priorities. It has been stressed that the regional meetings should be seen as an integral part of the overall global process and their results will be treated as primary inputs into that process. The regional meetings are expected to involve an interaction, in a meaningful way, between ministers and institutional and non-institutional stakeholders, such as regional and subregional development banks, the business sector and relevant NGOs.