This will be the 4th International Conference on Financing for Development (FFD4) of the United Nations (UN), which will take place in Seville, Spain, until Thursday, ten years after the previous one, in Ethiopia, in 2015.
The objective now is to "renew the framework for global financing for development", at a time of "severe geopolitical tensions and conflicts" and when the objectives agreed by the international community in the 2030 Agenda are "seriously behind schedule", according to the text "Seville Commitment", the declaration already negotiated within the UN that will be formally adopted this week.
"We are running out of time to achieve our goals and address the adverse impacts of climate change. (...) The gap between our sustainable development aspirations and the financing to achieve them has continued to widen, particularly in developing countries, reaching an estimated value of 4 trillion dollars annually", says the text.
According to UN figures, the current deficit in development aid is 1.5 billion more than it was ten years ago, and in 2024 official development aid fell for the first time in the last six years, with a further 20 percent drop expected by 2025.
In a world with more armed conflicts and new tensions and geopolitical discourses, resources are being diverted to military and security budgets, with a particular impact being the cut in funding for humanitarian aid and UN agencies by the United States since Donald Trump returned to the presidency of the country, which until last year represented 42 percent of total donations.
The United States will in fact be the only UN member country absent from Seville, after withdrawing from the negotiation of the "Seville Commitment" declaration, although it did not veto it, demanding a vote.
"It is regrettable that a major member state walks out of the room on issues that are so important to billions of people," UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohamed said at a press conference to launch the Seville summit on Wednesday.
Mohamed added that the presence of more than 60 world leaders in Seville is a good sign, however, and she believes that the US will eventually be forced to address, in one way or another, the commitments signed by the rest of the international community, so that "it can be part of the success of lifting millions of people out of poverty and achieving the sustainable development goals [of the UN's 2030 Agenda]."
Among the leaders confirmed for Seville are European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, who will host alongside UN Secretary-General António Guterres.
The Prime Minister of Portugal, Luís Montenegro, will be at the conference this Monday, and leaders from other Portuguese-speaking countries will also be in Seville, namely the presidents of Angola (João Lourenço), Cape Verde (José Maria Neves), Guinea-Bissau (Umaro Sissoco Embalo) and Mozambique (Daniel Chapo).
Also visiting Seville during the four days of the conference will be the leaders of the main international financial organizations, such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, heads of development support agencies and programs, private sector organizations and actors, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs).
In the declaration already negotiated, the international community undertakes commitments to create new mechanisms for mobilizing development aid, applying investments and managing the sovereign debt of the most vulnerable or developing countries, recognized in the document as one of the major obstacles to sustainable development.
The 68-page "Seville Commitment" also emphasizes that only by strengthening multilateralism can we respond to the urgent need to eradicate poverty and address the impacts of climate change.
The document should be complemented by unilateral announcements from several countries during the conference and more concrete actions to be developed within the framework of the "Seville Platform for Action", which will be presented in the coming days.
The Seville conference "is a unique opportunity to reform the international financial system", which is now obsolete and dysfunctional, António Guterres said recently.
