Responding to the many challenges faced by Small Island Developing States: UK statement at UN Second Committee

Thank you Madame Chair.

The United Kingdom would like to thank Mr. Vladamir Budhu from the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, for his excellent facilitation of the ‘SAMOA Pathway and the Mauritius Strategy for the Further Implementation of the Programme of Action for the Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing States’; and the G77 negotiator, Mr. Tumasie Blair, from the Permanent Mission of Antigua and Barbuda.

The UK is pleased to join consensus on this resolution, and we welcome the outcomes of this year’s text. It affirms the significant challenges that SIDS face in accessing sufficient financing for sustainable development, including concessional and climate finance. Our discussions also progressed planning for the fourth International Conference on Small Island Developing States. This will be a critical opportunity to drive forward global action and coordination to better support SIDS sustainable development. We look forward to being a strong partner for this work.

The UK is committed to working with governments, civil society organisations, development partners, the private sector and multilateral development banks to scale up support to address the unique challenges experienced by SIDS.

We are pleased that the resolution references the Call to Action on Access to Finance, and an invitation for Member States to join the ‘Friends of SIDS’ group. The UK affirms the position set out in the Glasgow Climate Pact that vulnerability should guide decisions on the allocation of finance, and hope this will be included in future resolutions. We look forward to the final report from the High-Level Panel on the Development of a Multidimensional Index next year, which should enable better targeting of financing towards climate-vulnerable countries. The UK looks forward to engaging with further consultations over the coming months.

We would also like to encourage all partners to engage with the ‘Principles for Improved Aid Impact in SIDS’, which will be launched next month at the Effective Development Cooperation Conference in Geneva. The Principles have been developed in partnership with AOSIS, Canada, UN agencies and OECD. They aim to improve the quality and effectiveness of aid to SIDS through guidance, responding to SIDS challenges on aid quality and proposing positive changes.

This resolution is an important step forward on some of the key issues affecting SIDS, and we look forward to working with you on them.

Thank you.