Statement on Behalf of the Group of 77 and China by Mr. Thulani Nyembe, Representative of the Permanent Mission of South Africa to the United Nations, on the Technology Facilitation Mechanism
Co-facilitators,
1. The Group of 77 and China would like to use this opportunity to reiterate its long held and unambiguous position on the establishment of the technology facilitation mechanism which it considers as one of the most transformative means to implement sustainable development.
2. In an environment and context where access to technical innovation is unevenly spread, it is the view of the Group that a technology facilitation mechanism can enable developing countries and the poor to tap into and benefit into technological innovations to widen the possibilities for sustainable development.
3. The Group hopes that these engagements will be used fruitfully towards bringing into reality a global mechanism whose function will be: the development; transfer and dissemination of clean and environmentally sound technology.
4. Towards this end, the recommendations from the Structured Dialogues on the deliverables of a global mechanism remain instructive. These are:
- Better information and mapping of existing facilities and activities;
- Improving coherence and synergy between existing facilitation activities;
- Conducting analysis of technology needs and gaps and addressing them; and
- Promoting the development, transfer and dissemination of clean and environmentally sound technologies through a technology facilitation mechanism.
5. The Group of 77 and China is furthermore supportive of initiatives aimed at addressing fragmentation across different geographical areas and within the UN system. In this connection, the Group is supportive of the initiative that UN agencies have undertaken - Inter-agency Working Group for a Global Technology Facilitation Platform - to improve coordination within the UN system.
6. It is worth recalling that the Open Working Group report on Sustainable Development Goals, which has been adopted by the General Assembly as constituting the basis for the integration of SDGs into the post-2015 development agenda, contains within it the following targets:
17.6 enhance North-South, South-South and triangular regional and international cooperation on and access to science, technology and innovation, and enhance knowledge sharing on mutually agreed terms, including through improved coordination among existing mechanisms, particularly at UN level, and through a global technology facilitation mechanism when agreed;
17.7 promote development, transfer, dissemination and diffusion of environmentally sound technologies to developing countries on favourable terms, including on concessional and preferential terms, as mutually agreed; and
17.8 fully operatinalise the Technology Bank and STI (Science, Technology and Innovation) capacity building mechanism for LDCs by 2017, and enhance thwe use of enabling technologies in particular ICT.
7. The ability of developing countries to sustain healthy levels of economic growth has been affected by the lack of adequate technology infrastructure. The G77 and China reiterates the view that if tangible results are to be harvested from the outcomes of the Financing for Development and post-2015 development agenda processes, then the deliverables should have concrete mechanisms for the transfer of technology for sustainable development.
Thank you.