Download Ambitious, Actionable, Accountable

Ambitious,
Actionable,
Accountable:
Securing a ‘triple-A rating’ for the Third
International Conference on Financing
for Development
Ambitious, Actionable, Accountable:
Securing a ‘triple-A rating’ for the Third
International Conference on Financing for
Development
Securing a ‘triple-A rating’ for the Third
International Conference on Financing for
Development
2015 is a momentous year for global development. It’s the year world leaders have the opportunity
to set the world on course to end extreme poverty and protect the future of the planet, while
ensuring that no one is left behind by progress. The stakes have never been higher.
Within 2015, the Third International Conference on Financing for Development (FFD3) in Addis
Ababa in July is a critical moment. A strong outcome at FFD3 will unleash significant new resources
for sustainable development – and set the mood for success at the Post-2015 Summit in September
and the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP21) in November.
The fact that these three conferences are taking place in quick succession increases not only the
potential for FFD3 to be transformative, but the need for it to be so. The post-2015 goals and
targets that are currently under discussion are hugely ambitious. They will require nothing short of a
paradigm shift in financing for development if they are to be achieved, including, for the first time, a
commitment for development finance to be environment and climate-sensitive, ensuring
complementarity with and support for the climate deal that is so urgently needed at COP21.
FFD3 has to be a conference that delivers, spurring real and tangible change.
The triple-A challenge
Save the Children is setting a ‘triple-A challenge’ for FFD3. To merit that rating, the conference
needs to meet expectations on three fronts:
1 Ambition: Ambitious financing commitments are needed to match ambitious sustainable
development objectives – to end extreme poverty in all its forms for the world’s poorest and most
marginalised children, leave no one behind and respect planetary boundaries.
2 Action: Ambition by itself will not be enough – we need an action plan too. Without clarity about
who is meant to do what and when, the fanfare surrounding the new FFD agreement will soon
dissipate.
3 Accountability: Accountability is essential to spur and maintain action. Signatories to the FFD
agreement must be held accountable for their commitments at local, national and global levels.
What must facilitators and negotiators of the FFD3 agreement do to secure the conference a Triple
A rating? This short discussion note sets out key outcomes for the conference to set the global
development financing system on a new trajectory.
Ambition
Opportunities like FFD3 do not come along often. It is therefore a moment to be ambitious, to
make bold proposals and commitments. Anything less would be a let-down to poor and marginalised
communities that are not benefiting from globalisation, that are suffering from rising inequalities, and
that need better national policies backed up by enhanced international support. As a global
community, we have a shared responsibility to uphold the rights and wellbeing of all children, no
matter where they are born. Adequate and effective financing is key to achieving this.
But what would ambition at the Addis Ababa conference look like in practice?
First, it would mean a strong focus on the world’s poorest and most marginalised children within the
new agreement. Our shared vision of a prosperous world free from poverty depends on children –
the next generation of citizens, leaders and workers – being healthy, educated and empowered.
Priority must therefore be given to financing commitments that will help to ensure that children
have every opportunity to reach their full potential. This must be accompanied by an explicit
commitment to finance the post-2015 agenda’s promise to ‘leave no one behind’, with no target
considered met unless met for all social and economic groups.
Second, an ambitious agreement on development finance must include specific commitments to raise
the resources required to achieve ambitious sustainable development goals. All of the issues being
discussed under FFD3 are important in this regard, including steps to harness the potential of the
private sector to be a force for sustainable development while minimising negative environmental,
social and human rights impact. However, strong commitments on public finance will be particularly
important for helping to build essential foundations for sustainable investment in the world’s poorest
and most marginalised children. Public funds have specific characteristics that make them
irreplaceable for tackling poverty and inequality, most notably that they respond more directly to
publicly motivated objectives and address gaps that markets have little incentive to fill.
Ambitious commitments on domestic and international public finance are therefore a basic
requirement for success at the Addis conference, including:


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Strengthening domestic tax systems to increase investment in Universal Health
Coverage, free quality education, nutrition, child protection, and child sensitive social
protection. All countries should commit to raising at least 20% of gross domestic product
(GDP) from taxation, while ensuring that taxes are progressive and do not place excessive
burdens on the poor.
Preventing tax revenue from leaking out of developing countries, including through
upgrading the UN Committee of Experts on International Cooperation in Tax Matters into
an intergovernmental body, with the resources and mandate it needs to take action.
Increasing official development assistance (ODA) and improving its
effectiveness, with donor countries setting concrete timetables to provide 0.7% of gross
national income (GNI) on ODA, and to provide 50% of this1 to least developed countries
(LDCs).
Third, ambition in Addis would mean that firm commitments are made to ensure that financing
decisions and systems are open to participation and scrutiny to ensure they are responsive to the
needs of poor and marginalised people. At a minimum, the FFD3 agreement must include
commitments to enhance transparency and participation in fiscal processes, and to undertake gender
and inequality-sensitive budgeting and spending. And, given that poor and marginalised groups are
among the most vulnerable to climate change, it must ensure that all financial flows are climatesensitive, environmentally sound and respect human rights. Sustainable development financing must
not undermine efforts to limit global temperature rise to well below 2 degrees or to adapt to the
impacts of climate change.
Action
A high level of ambition in Addis will be rendered meaningless if it remains at the level of rhetoric
and is not translated into action. We must not repeat earlier mistakes and shortcomings.
Commitments made in previous FFD meetings in Monterrey and Doha – framed largely as
1
Or 0.15-0.2% of GNI, whichever is highest.
declarations of intent rather than clear targets – have not been kept, with serious consequences for
poor and marginalised communities. FFD3 must be different.
When commitments are made in Addis, it must be clear exactly what actions are meant to be taken,
by who and by when. Major commitments should be accompanied by detail of the concrete steps
that will be taken, wherever possible through SMART targets, which are specific, measurable,
achievable, realistic and timebound. For example, aspirations to improve domestic resource
mobilisation should be accompanied by tax:GDP targets, to be met in progressive ways;
commitments on aid should be accompanied by clear timetables. FFD3 needs to deliver not just an
aspirational vision, but an action plan, complete with priorities and assigned responsibilities.
Accountability
Defining concrete steps and targets in Addis will go some way towards creating incentives for
governments to follow through on their FFD commitments. But this by itself will not be enough.
Governments must be prepared to be held to account for the commitments they have made, and
establish robust mechanisms for this purpose.
Again, we must learn from previous experience. While there has been some progress on key FFD
commitments since Monterrey and Doha, and there is now a degree of oversight by the UN
Secretary General and UN Development Cooperation Forum, previous FFD agreements have not
been robustly monitored, and states have not been systematically held accountable. In comparison
with the review process of the Millennium Development Goals, FFD monitoring and review has had
a relatively low profile, with less attention and less political engagement.
This year offers potential for significant change. The proximity of the FFD3 conference and the
post-2015 summit – just two months apart – offers the opportunity to strengthen the close
relationship between their proposed commitments and targets. FFD commitments should receive
more political attention than previously, and will therefore potentially be tracked through stronger
accountability processes. In addition, through providing greater clarity and details on the concrete
action needed to achieve post-2015 Means of Implementation (MoI) targets, the FFD process has the
potential to further improve accountability.
Governments must commit in Addis to establish a robust accountability mechanism to review
government and other agencies’ progress on commitments, make recommendations for action to fill
implementation gaps, and assess whether sufficient action has been taken on these
recommendations. Importantly, the synergies between the post-2015 and FFD processes must be
harnessed, and accountability processes closely aligned.
We must not miss this historic opportunity
The unique confluence of potentially transformative international meetings in 2015 presents a
significant opportunity for the international community to ensure that global aspirations to end
poverty, tackle inequality and halt climate change are matched by the financial means to achieve
them.
As Member States participate in FFD negotiations, they must keep their eye on the prize of a tripleA agreement. Outcomes must be ambitious, actionable and accountable, and be endorsed by the
highest level of political leadership. This is an opportunity that must not be missed – an opportunity
for a paradigm shift in global development to build a world where no one is left behind.