The Tribune

MINISTER of Foreign Affairs and Immigration Fred Mitchell delivered an address at the United Nations on behalf of CARICOM on Monday.

Mr Mitchell was speaking at the Special Ministerial Meeting of the UN’s Economic and Social Council.

During his address, Mr Mitchell said CARICOM appreciated the opportunity to share and exchange ideas on how best to strengthen the overall institutional framework for sustainable development, keeping in mind the principles set out at paragraph 76 of the Rio+20 Outcome Document in June of this year.

“In today’s ever-shifting international economic and financial climate which in the last five years has moved from one crisis to another, and against the backdrop of the intensified challenges associated with protecting the environment as a global commons for the future generations of mankind, the need for co-ordinated, effective and sustained international co-operation in these areas is more imperative than ever. “The success of our response to these and other emerging challenges depends to a large extent on the ability of our institutions to deliver the types of assistance that will have a real impact on the lives of our people,” Mr Mitchell said.

In the lead-up to the Rio+20 Conference, CARICOM identified a number of principles that should guide efforts at strengthening the institutional framework for sustainable development.

According to Mr Mitchell, these included greater integration and coherence between the economic, social and environmental dimensions of sustainable development, high-level political attention to sustainable development and focused consideration of the implementation of the Barbados Programme of Action for the sustainable development of Small Island States and the Mauritius Strategy for its implementation.

“We are pleased to note that these principles are now reflected in the outcome document of the conference. “We would also wish to highlight the fact that measures taken to strengthen ECOSOC should take into account the need to adapt to emerging challenges in the field of sustainable development and the role of ECOSOC in the post-2015 development agenda, in particular, the review of the implementation of the Millennium Development Goals.

In addition, such measures should account for the relationship between ECOSOC and future sustainable development goals and the over-riding need to enhance the visibility of the council and strengthen the inter-linkages between the work carried out by ECOSOC and corresponding regional and national processes.

“To this end, we fully support the views expressed by the G77 in the context of the informal consultations on the review of the implementation of General Assembly resolution 61/16 on the need to improve the annual ministerial review preparatory process at the regional level through, inter alia, enhancing the participation of the regional economic commissions.

“For CARICOM it is also essential that such improvements take into account the critical roles played by sub-regional commissions and the consequent need to ensure that they are provided with sufficient resources to make valuable contributions to the process,” he said.

In addressing the issue of strengthening the ECOSOC system as a common platform for policy coherence on sustainable development, Mr Mitchell said it is CARICOM’s view that one of the ways this could be achieved is through expanded co-ordination between ECOSOC and the United Nations General Assembly.

“Closer co-ordination between the two bodies should aim to minimise duplication and maximise synergies between the cross-cutting themes addressed in both bodies. Such an exercise should also ensure that issues are addressed in the body which would be best suited to undertake the task,” he said.