The speaker welcomed participants to a regional knowledge exchange on implementing the 2030 Agenda. The exchange aims to provide an opportunity for countries to learn from each other's experiences in achieving the Agenda's goals of sustainable development and leaving no one behind. However, fully adhering to these principles presents challenges for developing and underdeveloped countries, as they still have large populations in need of assistance and face higher costs to reach isolated groups. The speaker believes countries can overcome these obstacles by reforming short-term decision making and integrating long-term development plans like the 2030 Agenda into their national strategies.

1. SALUTATIONS
Good morning! Welcome to Manila!
On behalf of Secretary Pernia, I welcome you to this
Regional Knowledge Exchange on Implementing the Agenda
2030
We are now on our second year of implementation of the
2030 Agenda and many of us have even presented our
voluntary national reports before the UN High Level Political
Forum. This knowledge exchange is about providing a
richer venue to learn from each other.
You may ask why should we learn from each other. Does
not the Agenda 2030 allow for “different strokes for different
folks”? I would say yes, but even then, we can benefit from
learning about each other’s experiences.
The Agenda 2030 is built on two principles: sustainable
development and leave no one behind. And they seem to be
the right things to do. However, this is not entirely
compatible with government protocol.

2. Let me begin with the second principle: leave no one behind;
how this presents a problem for governments in developing
and under-developed countries.
Agenda 2030 goes further by listing the people groups who
are being left behind with respect to a target and reminding
us to prioritize them. For instance,
2.3 By 2030, double the agricultural productivity and
incomes of small-scale food producers, in particular women,
indigenous peoples, family farmers, pastoralists and fishers,
including through secure and equal access to land, other
productive resources and inputs, knowledge, financial
services, markets and opportunities for value addition and
non-farm employment
11.2 By 2030, provide access to safe, affordable, accessible
and sustainable transport systems for all, improving road
safety, notably by expanding public transport, with special
attention to the needs of those in vulnerable situations,
women, children, persons with disabilities and older persons

3. Adhering to these targets is not much of a problem for
developed countries. Most probably, they are already at a
stage where they only need to care for those in the margins.
And those at the margins do not constitute a huge proportion
of the population. But for developing and especially under-
developed countries, there is still that large middle and still a
sizable bottom that require special attention. In addition,
developing and under-developed countries have to hurdle a
higher social discount rate. The example of providing
access to GIDAs (geographically isolated and disadvantaged
areas) comes to mind. Here, the cost of the infrastructure
may be very high, owing to distance from the center, terrain,
lack of local manpower, etc., and yet, may benefit only a few
households.
The second principle: sustainable development requires a
major governance reform. It requires moderating short-term
economic growth, which also means limiting the returns to
the current owners of capital and bearers of highly
specialized skills. But the short-term coincides with term of
most political administrations.

4. It is about ensuring that each segment of society and each
generation is accorded the best opportunity for development.
The short-term planning horizon of governments could be
the major obstacle to the successful implementation of
Agenda 2030.
I believe that many of us here face the same predicament.
But there are some of us who have found a way to address
these issues. Concerning the second issue, some countries
already have a long-term plan. In the case of the
Philippines, we have adopted a long-term vision. The
problem then becomes one of integrating the Agenda 2030
into the country’s development plan.
We have so much to learn from each other and I will no
longer take so much of our conference time. We would like
to thank the UNDP for providing us this venue. I wish us all
a productive exchange of knowledge and experiences on the
implementation of the Agenda 2030.