World Bank/IMF Spring Meetings Address Climate Change, FfD and Post-2015 Development Agenda
Thursday, April 23, 2015 at 10:49PM 
(Based on report by IISD Reporting Services)
The World Bank Group (WBG) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) addressed a range of issues including financing for development (FfD) and the post-2015 development agenda at their annual Spring Meetings, 17-19 April 2015, in Washington DC.
Addressing the Spring Meetings, the UN Secretary-General emphasized that financing will be key for creating and unveiling an ambitious post-2015 development agenda and that the public and private sectors will need to cooperate to create incentives and regulatory frameworks to encourage long-term sustainable development. He also called for “a paradigm shift in financing sustainable development.”
The President of the UN General Assembly Sam Kutesa also underscored the importance of ensuring a successful outcome from the Third International Conference on FfD in Addis Ababa, in July 2015. He also noted the importance of data for planning, monitoring and accountability, stressing that high-quality, timely and reliable data will be critical for reviewing implementation of the post-2015 development agenda.
On post-2015 FfD and multilateral development finance, the Heads of the Regional Development Banks highlighted that achieving the SDGs will require moving from billions to trillions in resource flows. Following a statement by the IMF Deputy Managing Director, Min Zhu, that the proposed goals may be too ambitious, others stressed that the new development agenda will require huge financial resources for implementation in the trillions of dollars, and that the private sector must play a role in financing.
UN Development Programme (UNDP) Administrator Helen Clark characterized 2015 as a “once in a generation opportunity to mobilize for sustainable development," and emphasized that a successful outcome at FfD 3 is a prerequisite for securing an ambitious post-2015 development agenda and a comprehensive climate agreement.
The 2015 IMF/WBG Annual Meetings will be held in Lima, Peru, from 9-11 October 2015, with the Development Committee scheduled to meet on 10 October.
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