BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:unctad.org BEGIN:VEVENT UID:6a8d0ce543a73 DTSTART:20240121T133000Z SEQUENCE:0 TRANSP:OPAQUE DTEND:20240121T163500Z LOCATION:Kampala\, Uganda SUMMARY:Side-event of the Third South Summit - High-level Seminar CLASS:PUBLIC DESCRIPTION:Enhancing Economic Resilience through Broader South-South Econo mic Cooperation\n\nSince 2020\, the COVID-19 pandemic and multiple cascadi ng crises that range from the geopolitical tensions and conflicts\, financ ial distress\, inflationary pressures\, to food and energy insecurity have shocked global economy with lasting impact.\n\nAccording to UNCTAD estima tes\, global income would have experienced a cumulative income loss of abo ut USD 13 trillion in 2020-2022. Following a rebound in 2021 the global ec onomy would only revert to its 2017-2019 trend by 2030\, on the obviously optimistic assumption of an annual growth rate of 3.5% from 2023 onwards. However\, the global growth in 2023 and 2024 is projected to decelerate to 2.4% and 2.5%.\n\nIn parallel to increasingly fractured global economy\, which is again in a state of flux\, climate change is fast becoming one of the most serious global challenges. Research shows that the global mean s urface temperature in 2011–2020 was 1.09°C above that in 1850–1900\, yet mitigation commitments in nationally determined contributions fall far short of what is required\, and will\, based on current trajectories\, pu sh warming well above the target to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels.\n\nFor the Global South\, the cascading c rises and climate urgency poses serious challenges to the economy and deve lopment. The economic shocks have revealed weaknesses and hindered progres s towards the Sustainable Development Goals. For SDG 1 of no poverty\, the number of people living in extreme poverty rose to 724 million in 2020\, surpassing the pre-pandemic projection by 90 million and reversing approxi mately three years of progress on poverty reduction.\n\nUnder current tren ds\, 575 million people will still be living in extreme poverty in 2030\, and only about one third of countries will meet the target to halve nation al poverty levels. For the climate crisis\, developing countries\, particu larly the Least Developed Countries and Small Island Developing States\, h ave been impacted by climate change more than developed countries due to t heir greater vulnerability\, limited response capacities and lack of adequ ate financial and technical resources. UN Secretary-General has therefore warned that “unless we act now\, the 2030 Agenda will become an epitaph for a world that might have been”.\n\nEconomic cooperation and integrati on among developing countries is increasingly significant for the global a ctions to advance the SDGs. It has witnessed historical change in the last three decades. The developing region has now accounted for about 40% of g lobal real GDP as of 2022 while the ratio was only 18% in 1993.\n\nThe Glo bal South has also played a more important role in terms of trade\, financ e\, investment\, technology\, and global governance. The South-South trade in goods takes the share of 25% of global total. In 1995\, the figure was just 10%. South-South merchandise trade has surpassed South-North trade w hich means developing countries are now more self-reliant in terms of expo rt market. The emergence of BRICS and its recent expansion indicate a bigg er role of the Global South in global economic governance and more concret e South-South initiative such as the New Development Bank can be pushed fo rward.\n\nHowever\, comparing to the steadily expanded scale\, the policy debate focusing on economic cooperation and integration among developing c ountries remains disproportionately under the radar. For the policy debate on South-South Cooperation\, more attention was given to development coop eration which is considered complementary rather than substitute to the OD A.\n\nSouth-South development cooperation is certainly crucial but only a part of the whole story. In fact\, the scale of economic cooperation is wa y much larger than development cooperation. Just South-South merchandise e xports reached over 5.4 and 6.1 trillion USD in 2021 and 2022 while the to tal ODA\, which remains the main channel of the development cooperation an d larger than South-South official aid flow\, was only 33.3 billion in 202 1.\n\nTherefore\, strengthening South-South economic cooperation and integ ration would mobilize significant development finance and economic opportu nities for developing countries\, which will play meaningful role in assis ting them to reach the 2030 Agenda.  \n\nHow to scale up and diversify So uth-South trade? How to encourage South-South investment in productive sec tor? How to encourage South-South industrial and digital cooperation? What is the role of South-South Cooperation in both green transition and struc tural transformation of developing countries? How to mobilize financial an d monetary cooperation among developing countries? Those broader policy is sues concerning economic cooperation and integration among developing coun tries needs to be explored and discussed among policy makers particularly those from the Global South.\n\nObjective\n\nThe main objective of this se minar is to convene high-level representatives of the Third South Summit\, renowned scholars\, head of international organizations and development b anks\, and business leaders to discuss how to scale up South-South economi c cooperation and integration to enhance the resilience of the Global Sout h\, given the current global economic and development context.\n\nQuestion s\n\n\n\nIn view of external shocks and individual growth scenario\, what are the key challenges at national level to economic growth of developing countries? Does the developing region share some common binding constraint s in building strong and resilient growth in the post-covid age?\n\n\nHow to design tailored national policy strategies to enhance economic diversif ication and resilience? What is the role of South-South cooperation in fac ilitating the process?\n\n\nWhat are the trends and the state of play of S outh-South cooperation in the areas of finance\, trade\, investment\, indu strialization and digital transformation\, and climate change? How to crea te an enabling environment to scale up such cooperation? At the internatio nal level\, how does the Global South can advocate for more inclusive and fairer global economic governance?\n\n\n<\;h3 class="\;text-align-ce nter\n\nView meeting on unctad.org\nhttps://unctad.org/meeting/side-event- third-south-summit-high-level-seminar DTSTAMP:20260825T033253Z END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR