As prepared for delivery
Minister Reete, Secretary-General Al Nowais, Excellencies,
Thank you all for a frank and practical discussion.
On a small island, the whole economy can rest on a handful of assets: one port, one power plant, one airport, often one main industry. A single cyclone can strike all of them in one night.
Allow me to close with a thought.
Projects in small islands are smaller, their costs higher and their risks harder to price. Last year, foreign direct investment to small island developing States rose by 4%, to almost $10 billion. That is about one dollar in every hundred invested across the developing world. In the Caribbean, where inflows fell, high perceived risk and narrow project pipelines continue to hold investment back.
For the people of these islands, that gap is concrete: it shows up in electricity bills that rise with every spike in oil prices, in shipping costs that make local goods expensive and in the years it takes to rebuild when public budgets are thin.
But the same scale that concentrates risk also concentrates impact. On an island, one renewable power project can change what an entire country pays for electricity. One modern port can open a new export market. One well-run tourism project can sustain the livelihoods of a whole coastline.
Tourism already shows that potential. Last year, coastal and marine tourism earned island States $63 billion, more than a third above its level before the pandemic.
In minutes, Secretary-General Al Nowais and I will sign a memorandum of understanding between UN Tourism and UNCTAD. Together, we will help countries develop tourism projects that generate local value, protect natural assets and create reliable livelihoods.
An advance copy of our first Caribbean Investment Report is also available today. It identifies concrete opportunities across the region, and the policy actions needed to unlock them.
Both serve the Antigua and Barbuda Agenda for SIDS, and its ambition to turn priorities into power plants, stronger ports, digital links, competitive enterprises and decent jobs.
Excellencies,
For a small island, every good project counts twice: once for growth, and once for resilience. Let us leave Doha with many more of them in motion. I thank you.