by Martina Fuchs
GENEVA, Jan. 29 (Xinhua) -- Secretary-General of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) Rebeca Grynspan called for more collective action in fighting the most significant global challenges.
"My top priority is how to revitalize the consensus-building space within UNCTAD, how UNCTAD can really help in this very polarized world, and build the bridges for a better understanding in the most important development challenges that the developing countries are facing," Grynspan told Xinhua in an exclusive interview via video link recently.
Regional agreements such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) could make the developing world more resilient against shocks, she added.
Grynspan, former vice president of Costa Rica and the first woman and Central American to serve as the UNCTAD chief, took up the role in September for a four-year term.
"The developing world is growing at a lesser pace than the advanced economies with the exception probably of China and East Asia, that have shown a very strong recovery from COVID-19," she said.
UNCTAD's Trade and Development Report 2021 released in September projected the global economy to bounce back with a growth of 5.3 percent in 2021, the fastest in nearly 50 years. However, it also warned of a highly uneven rebound along regional, sectoral and income lines.
Grynspan highlighted the importance of closer cooperation at the global level, especially in terms of the inequality of vaccine distribution and financial situation during the COVID-19 crisis.
"That's why I like so much the speech of President Xi at the World Economic Forum, because he talks about strengthening cooperation, about doing this together, about strengthening multilateralism, and this is very much in the DNA of UNCTAD, too," she said.
In his special address to the 2022 World Economic Forum virtual session, Chinese President Xi Jinping called for stronger international cooperation in overcoming shared global challenges including defeating COVID-19, revitalizing the economy and addressing climate change.
"We are seeing a recovery in the trade figures in 2021, and we expect that to continue in 2022 and trade will grow faster than the global economy," Grynspan stressed. "But with the unevenness and disruptions in the global value chain, the least developed and landlocked countries and the small island developing states are suffering much harder."
Grynspan also hailed the role of the RCEP, the world's largest free trade agreement which entered into force on Jan. 1.
The agreement groups the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, as well as China, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand, covering roughly 30 percent of the world's gross domestic product and population, with a mixture of developed and developing countries.
"The regional agreements were more resilient to the COVID crisis than those countries that didn't have one. This is a very important thing for the developing world," Grynspan said. "If the regional agreements make you more resilient to shocks, then this is a step forward in terms of building more resilience for sustainability for the developing world."
Headquartered in Geneva, UNCTAD was established in 1964 as an intergovernmental organization to promote the interests of developing states in world trade. It is the part of the United Nations Secretariat dealing with trade, investment and development issues. ■
