UNITED NATIONS, Could 26 (IPS) – With simply 5 years to 2030, the world stands at a pivotal juncture. The collective guarantees of our 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Growth – to finish poverty, shield the planet, and guarantee prosperity for all – stay pressing and important. But, progress is uneven, and in lots of areas, we threat falling quick.
The twenty second session of the Excessive-level Committee on South-South Cooperation shall be convened 27-30 Could 2025 to evaluate progress made in implementing the Buenos Aires Plan of Motion for Selling and Implementing Technical Cooperation amongst Creating International locations, the New Instructions Technique, the Nairobi end result doc of the Excessive-level United Nations Convention on South-South Cooperation and the Buenos Aires end result doc of the second Excessive-level United Nations Convention on South-South Cooperation (BAPA+40).
Amid this international uncertainty, we should look not solely at what’s faltering, but additionally the place the rays of hope are shine.
South-South and triangular cooperation brings hope.
Throughout continents and oceans, creating international locations are rising – collectively. They’re innovating, collaborating, and forging new paths towards sustainable growth. It’s on this context that the twenty second session of the Excessive-level Committee on South-South Cooperation convenes beneath the theme: “Accelerating the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Growth: South-South Cooperation as a Driver for Transformation.”
This theme will not be solely well timed; it’s inspiring. South-South cooperation has emerged as a dynamic power, reshaping the worldwide growth panorama and providing new pathways to shared prosperity. It’s a testomony to the ingenuity, solidarity, and resilience of nations of the World South – highly effective brokers of change.
Addressing Shared Challenges Via Collective Motion
The world at the moment faces advanced, interconnected crises: persistent poverty, widening inequalities, the local weather emergency, and the lingering impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, amongst others. These challenges have no idea borders, and no nation can sort out them alone. South-South cooperation affords a robust mannequin for collective motion – one that’s inclusive, adaptable, and rooted within the lived experiences of creating international locations.
A current instance is the African Union’s Peace Fund, which allotted $7 million to help peace initiatives in Burkina Faso, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and different international locations going through instability.1 This dedication demonstrates how regional organizations of the World South are mobilizing assets and experience to handle growth challenges by solidarity and shared accountability.
By supporting data sharing and capacity-building actions, amongst others, the Peace Fund helps to put the groundwork for sustainable growth and regional stability.
South-South cooperation additionally thrives in sectoral partnerships. For example, Brazil and India have collaborated on satellite tv for pc know-how to observe deforestation and enhance agricultural manufacturing, whereas Mexico has invested in meals safety and job creation applications in Honduras and El Salvador, benefitting over 40,000 folks.2 These efforts underscore the variety and flexibility of South-South options.
Leveraging Innovation and Digital Transformation
The digital divide continues to deepen. Over 2.6 billion folks – most of them girls and women – stay offline, excluded from schooling, healthcare, and financial alternative.
The promise of digital transformation should not change into the privilege of the few. That is why South-South cooperation issues now greater than ever.
Throughout the World South, international locations are harnessing digital applied sciences to leapfrog conventional growth boundaries. For instance, AI is being deployed to strengthen early warning methods for local weather resilience in Dominica, to enhance crop forecasting with satellite tv for pc knowledge in Kenya, and to help multilingual schooling platforms in India.
In Brazil, AI helps optimize public well being responses, whereas Rwanda is utilizing AI-driven instruments to increase monetary providers to rural communities. When developed and deployed ethically, AI can supply scalable, low-cost options tailor-made to native realities.
UNOSSC’s South-South Galaxy platform is a dwelling repository of such options, connecting practitioners and policymakers; and the South-South and Triangular Cooperation Options Lab is incubating and scaling up profitable initiatives. From cellular banking in East Africa to e-governance initiatives in Asia, digital transformation is increasing alternatives and empowering communities.
Science, know-how, and innovation (STI) are nice equalizers – if we guarantee equitable entry. Synthetic Intelligence holds monumental potential to rework growth: optimizing crop yields, predicting illness outbreaks, advancing renewable vitality. However it additionally brings actual dangers – of deepening inequality, displacing jobs, and eroding belief.
To make sure AI and frontier applied sciences serve folks and planet, we should form them with inclusive governance, moral foresight, and sturdy worldwide cooperation.
South-South and triangular partnerships are vital to this effort. By pooling assets, data, and expertise, international locations within the World South can leapfrog outdated methods and construct resilient, inclusive digital economies. The Havana Declaration, adopted by the Group of 77 and China, underscored this collective dedication to harnessing STI for sustainable growth.
The Transformative Energy of South-South Cooperation
South-South cooperation is grounded in mutual respect, solidarity, and partnership. It’s about international locations with related challenges and aspirations coming collectively to seek out options that work in their very own contexts. Throughout the World South, we see a myriad of homegrown improvements which are making a tangible distinction. UNOSSC is proud to mandate belief funds which are scaling up these improvements.
The United Nations Fund for South-South Cooperation stands a beacon of this spirit. Over the previous 30 years, 47 authorities entities have contributed to the Fund. Working in partnership with 45 United Nations entities, initiatives and initiatives supported by the Fund have reached over 70 international locations and benefited folks in 155 international locations and territories globally — strengthening establishments, constructing capability, and fostering lasting cooperation.
For instance, due to the partnership with the Authorities of China, beneath the World Growth Initiative, over 1,000 growth practitioners from 100+ international locations have been skilled in cross-border e-commerce and digitalization.
Since its institution in 2017, the India-UN Growth Partnership Fund has supported greater than 75 demand-driven, transformational initiatives in 56 creating international locations, with a robust deal with Least Developed International locations and Small Island Creating States. Its initiatives vary from strengthening local weather resilience in Pacific Island nations, to increasing renewable vitality in Africa, and supporting pandemic response within the Caribbean.
Throughout the COVID-19 disaster, the India-UN Fund rapidly mobilized assets to supply medical provides and private protecting gear to fifteen international locations, demonstrating the pace and responsiveness that South-South cooperation can ship in instances of disaster.
Equally, the IBSA Fund – a novel partnership amongst India, Brazil, and South Africa – has supported over 40 initiatives in additional than 35 international locations, specializing in poverty discount, meals safety, entry to wash water, schooling, and gender equality.
In Haiti, the IBSA Fund supported the development of neighborhood well being facilities and the institution of a stable waste administration system, instantly benefiting hundreds of susceptible folks. In Sierra Leone, the Fund contributed to the rehabilitation of agricultural infrastructure, boosting meals safety and livelihoods in rural communities.
These initiatives are concrete expressions of solidarity and South-South studying, designed to be replicable and scalable throughout the creating world.
The Group of 77/Pérez-Guerrero Belief Fund for South-South Cooperation (PGTF), established by the United Nations in 1983, has been instrumental in selling financial and technical collaboration amongst creating nations. Over the previous 4 many years, the PGTF has supported over 400 initiatives benefiting 140+ international locations, specializing in areas resembling meals safety, renewable vitality, commerce, and know-how.
For example, in Uruguay, the PGTF facilitated refurbishment of small hydropower facilities, enhancing entry to sustainable vitality in rural communities. Amongst others, in Africa, the Fund is supporting initiatives that strengthen meals methods and empower women-led cooperatives.
By offering seed funding and fostering partnerships, the PGTF exemplifies rules of South-South cooperation, selling shared data and collective self-reliance amongst nations of the World South.
The Position of Triangular Cooperation
Whereas South-South cooperation is led and owned by creating international locations, it’s additional strengthened by triangular cooperation – partnerships that carry collectively international locations of the South, conventional donors, and multilateral organizations. These collaborations mix assets, experience, and networks, amplifying the affect of growth efforts.
A current UNDP publication showcases how these partnerships are delivering ends in environmental safety, catastrophe threat discount, and gender equality, supporting international transformational shifts aligned to the SDGs.3
A notable instance – with the help of the Republic of Korea – the UNOSSC PLINK initiative, targeted on the Water-Vitality-Meals Nexus, is supporting susceptible communities within the Decrease Mekong Basin (Cambodia, Lao PDR, Thailand, and Viet Nam) to co-create and scale sustainable options to the compounding results of local weather change, unsustainable agriculture, and fast urbanization. Such partnerships display the worth of mixing South-South management with international experience.
To additional institutionalize and increase the attain of such collaborations, UNOSSC has established a Triangular Cooperation Window beneath the United Nations Fund for South-South Cooperation (UNFSSC). Launched as a devoted facility, the Triangular Cooperation Window is mobilizing assets, data, and experience from a variety of stakeholders-including governments, UN entities, intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations, and personal sector companions. Partnership to the Window has been supplied by Colombia, Morocco, Portugal, and Spain.
A Name to Motion
As we collect for the twenty second session of the Excessive-level Committee on South-South Cooperation, and put together for the 4th Worldwide Convention on Financing for Growth, I urge all growth companions and stakeholders to spend money on the transformative potential of South-South and triangular cooperation.
Allow us to draw inspiration from the successes of the World South and decide to sharing data, constructing capability, and mobilizing assets for sustainable growth. Allow us to be sure that the voices and experiences of creating international locations are on the coronary heart of world decision-making.
1 Report of the Secretary-Basic on Measures taken by United Nations organizations to implement determination 21/1 of the Excessive-level Committee on South-South Cooperation by help for South-South and triangular cooperation to speed up the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Growth SSC/22/2
2UNCTAD helps international locations measure South-South cooperation
3Strengthening South-South and Triangular Cooperation for Individuals and Planet
Dima Al-Khatib is the Director of the United Nations Workplace for South-South Cooperation. She took up her duties as Director of UNOSSC on 1 March 2023. She is a Sustainable Growth Skilled bringing greater than 25 years of management and administration expertise in a number of obligation stations to her function. Previous to becoming a member of UNOSSC, Ms. Al-Khatib served because the UNDP Resident Consultant within the Republic of Moldova. Previous to that, she held a number of positions together with that of Programme and Coverage Coordinator on the UNDP Regional Hub in Amman, UNDP Deputy Resident Consultant in Kuwait, and UNDP Deputy Nation Director in Libya.
Ms. Al-Khatib holds a Diplome d’Etudes Approfondies (DEA) in Environmental Well being from the Lebanese College and France College of Bordeaux II, and a Bachelor of Science and a Educating Diploma in Environmental Well being from the American College of Beirut. Dima Al-Khatib tweets at @dimaalkhatib
IPS UN Bureau
© Inter Press Service (2025) — All Rights Reserved. Authentic supply: Inter Press Service
