69th session of Trade and Development Board Agenda Item 3 July 2022
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بسم الله الرحمن الرحیم
Statement
By
Mr. Mehdi Aliabadi
Deputy Permanent Representative of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the UN Office
And other international organizations in Geneva
Before
69th session of Trade and Development Board (20 June to 1 July 2022)
Agenda Item 3 (General debate)
Mr. President,
At the outset let me congratulate you for your assumption as the president of 69th session of Trade and Development Board and through you to all bureau members for their election. I thank Madam Secretary General for her informative report and insightful opening remarks to this session.
My delegation associates itself with the statement delivered by Barbados on behalf of the G77 and China and the statement delivered by Philippians on behalf of the Asia Pacific Group.
Mr. President,
The report presented by Madame Secretary General has showed clearly that the world is not on the track of “moving from inequality and vulnerability to prosperity for all” that we shaped in the Bridgetown Covenant and hoped to realize it.
The disparity between and within countries as well as the individual and national vulnerabilities have been widened by persistent and arising poverty, hunger, digital gap and the flow of displaced persons on a glob already menaced by climate change, water crisis and sand and dust storms. And today, not yet recovered from the negative impacts of the pandemic, the global trade and development is facing by food, fuel, fertilizer and finance crisis which resulted to an unprecedented increase of the living-cost of people all around the world and threaten the food security. This situation affects not only the development but also deprive human beings from meeting their basic needs and jeopardize the future of generations.
Mr. President
For decades, the world is suffering from the consequences of divergence and incoherence such as the widening gaps caused by lack of means and sources for financing development, debt instability and more recently, vaccine nationalism and unequal economic recovery between the North and South in post-pandemic situation. But as it has been mentioned in the introduction of the 2021 trade and development report: “Every crisis brings with it an opportunity. As the world economy recovers from the economic paralysis of the pandemic, there appears to be the chance to rethink the model of global governance that has guided the world economy for the past forty years but has largely failed to deliver on the promise of prosperity and stability”.
The current situation would not be managed if the multilateralism will not be respected in all of its aspects including in trade and development. We need urgently a fairer, facilitated and unhindered relationship which guarantee the productive and supply chain and mobilize the natural resources, economic capacities, technological progress and transitional positions of countries all around the world to save us from another lost decade. However, this needed connectivity has been threatened today by the disparaging unilateralism and destructive approaches.
The illegal and inhuman unilateral coercive measures, is a manifestation of the above-mentioned approach. The UCMs have undermined capacities of some countries in tackling the current challenge of energy prices, including my country, in circumstances that, for instance, the price of natural gas increased unprecedentedly since 2020. It is a telling evident of the negative impacts of unilateral coercive measures on the peoples of countries who are indirectly damaged by paying out the cost of UCMS through the compliance or over-compliance of their states to these illegal measures.
Mr. President,
The sustainable prosperity is dependent to free flow of trade and an inclusive development which avoid the instability and disruption of the chain of goods and services. With regard to the dependence of fertilizers and agriculture products to the natural gas, I seize this opportunity to remind the initiative proposed by the President of the Islamic Republic of Iran entitled “the natural gas at the service of global economy recovery in the post-COVID time” and raised in the last session of exporters of the natural gas. This initiative can be taken into account by the Global Response Crisis Group as a part of global solution with tow economic and environmental aims.
As I conclude Mr. President, allow me to reiterate that, the Trade and Development Board is expected to assess and address the direct and indirect negative impacts of financial and trade unilateral coercive measures and their developmental implications on the livelihood and wellbeing of the people of countries imposers of and targeted by such measures, in light of recent challenges and in line with the paragraphs 99 and 127(g) of Bridgetown Covenant.
I thank you