Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Emanuela Del Re, spoke at “Codeway – Cooperation and Development Expo”, a virtual event created and organised by Fiera Roma on the issue of development cooperation at the time of the pandemic.
“The pandemic continues to profoundly impact not just health but the economy and well-being of billions of people around the world. For the first time in twenty years the crisis triggered by the pandemic has led to an increase in the number of people who have fallen into extreme poverty – +71 million compared to the beginning of 2020 – and a further increase in the number of people exposed to food insecurity”.
An “unprecedented multi-dimensional crisis” which, according to the Vice Minister, “has exposed the vulnerabilities of our development models”. “First of all, we must defeat the virus with the tools science provides for us. The recent vaccine announcements are the result of an acceleration in science and research that is unparalleled in recent history of mankind, thanks to a hitherto unmatched international collaboration”.
We will then need “innovative tools to finance recovery and development, striking an overall balance between fiscal, economic and social policies” and encouraging collaboration between “governments, individuals and civil society organisations”. “Italy – she emphasised – has promoted concrete initiatives in all sectors: besides health care, we have also taken steps to ensure food security and keep the food chains going”.
“Italy has taken a leading role in the international health response, first and foremost through our Development Cooperation tools. We have proactively and effectively committed ourselves, in the G7 and G20 forums and at the United Nations, to building a great international alliance, which has become part of the ACT Accelerator – Access to COVID-19 Tools”.
“The pillars of this intervention remain “the Sustainable Development Goals of the 2030 Agenda which, together with the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, constitute “the universal framework for setting in motion what the United Nations, and other international forums, call a “better recovery””. – Ms. Del Re concluded.
