SRSG Mizutori - "The goals set out in the Sendai Framework cannot be achieved with a financial system that favours prosperity over people and planet"

Ms. Mami Mizutori

Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Disaster Risk Reduction

ECOSOC Forum on Financing for Development Side Event - De-Risking Investments for People, Planet, and Prosperity

co-organized by the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction; the Permanent Missions of Australia, Indonesia, Norway, and Peru as Co-Chairs of the Group of Friends for Disaster Risk Reduction; and the Alliance of Small Island States

Wednesday, 27 April 2022

Excellencies, Distinguished Delegates, Colleagues,

I am pleased to welcome you to this ECOSOC FFD Forum side event on “De-Risking Investments for People, Planet, and Prosperity”.  I would like to express my appreciation to our co-hosts, the Permanent Missions of Australia, Indonesia, Norway, and Peru, as Co-Chairs of the Group of Friends for Disaster Risk Reduction, and Antigua and Barbuda representing the Alliance of Small Island States. The Group of Friends and AOSIS are staunch advocates for DRR in the FFD process and across all intergovernmental agendas in New York.

The first sentence of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development states: “This Agenda is a plan of action for people, planet and prosperity”. It is fair to say that the international financial architecture disproportionately focuses on one of these “three Ps”. Prosperity. The goals set out in the 2030 Agenda, the Addis Ababa Action Agenda, the Paris Agreement, and the Sendai Framework cannot be achieved with a financial system that favours prosperity over people and planet.

We meet today in economic quagmire created by a lingering pandemic, an intensifying climate emergency, and a multifaceted crisis in the Ukraine. The cascading impacts of these challenges have derailed progress towards our global goals.

By now, we must all be convinced of the truly systemic nature of risk that cuts across economic, social, environmental, and political systems. While investors have sophisticated methods for assessing how these risks may threaten their profits, methods to assess the risks created by public and private investments are few and far between. With this systemic lens, the distinction between the risks to our investments and the risks created by our investments begins to blur.  

Yesterday, I launched the 2022 Global Assessment Report for DRR alongside the Deputy-Secretary General and Ambassador Nasir of Indonesia. The report shows how financial and governance systems can evolve to reflect the interconnected value of people, planet, and prosperity. To do so, we must go beyond GDP to measure what we value most. We must collectively rework financial and governance systems to openly and honestly account for the creation or the reduction of risk on balance sheets and in policy decisions. To quote the Secretary-General, this is both a “moral and an economic imperative”. 

We need a mindset shift to a “Thinking Resilience” approach. Today’s speakers from government and the private sector are leaders in this new and risk-informed way of doing business. I look forward to a rich discussion that will provide valuable guidance to the ongoing midterm review of the Sendai Framework.

Thank you.