Dubai, UAE, 18 January 2022 – A high-profile panel discussion on: ‘A Shared Sustainable Recovery Based on SDGs’ was addressed by Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) President and Group Chairman, H.E. Dr. Muhammad Al Jasser, on Tuesday 18 January 2022 where he elaborated that the IsDB Group actively pursues counter-cyclical financing to its 57 member countries when they need it most and stands ready to work together with all Multilateral Development Banks, International Finance Institutes, and other development partners towards achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for its member countries.

The panel discussion, also addressed by Deputy UN Secretary-General, Dr. Amina J. Mohammed, was part of the “International Forum on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development” at the Italian Pavilion in Dubai Expo 2020 during the “Global Goals Week” and aimed to foster a culture of sustainability, with a focus on the governance of the process and the role of the private sector and of civil society.

The panelists also included Italy’s Minister of Infrastructure and Sustainable Mobility, H.E. Enrico Giovannini; the EU Commission’s Deputy Director-General for International Cooperation and Development, Marjeta Jager; and Dr. Bala Yunusa, Senior Technical Advisor, Office of the Nigerian President on SDGs.

In his remarks, Dr. Al Jasser elaborated how IsDB Group, like all other Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) provides a wide array of products and services to increase investment inflows to developing countries and how its sovereign lending through its different entities supports more than 1.7 billion people worldwide.

He then touched upon measures that the Bank Group has rolled out in order to mitigate the socio-economic aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic in its member countries and support their progress towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

“IsDB Group launched a US$ 4.3 billion Strategic Preparedness Response Program (SPRP) in 3R’s approach; to help member countries respond immediately to the challenges thrown by the COVID19 pandemic, and then support to restore their efforts to bring them back up on their feet and help restart their economies,“ Dr. Al Jasser stated.

Furthermore, he added: “More recently, to boost the economy and recovery of the member countries, the Bank has approved development programs and projects amounting to US$1.6 billion.”

The IsDB Group Chairman then referred to the redefined strategic objectives of the Bank and enumerated them as boosting recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic, tackling poverty, building resilience, and driving green economic growth. ”We accentuate these by building sustainable infrastructure and promoting inclusive human capital development while committing to make 35 percent of all of our funding to go to climate-friendly projects by 2025,” he underlined.

Dr. Al Jasser also referred to the significance that IsDB Group attaches to economic empowerment, especially that of women and the youth, and the role this plays in promoting the recovery and sustainability of economies in order to ensure sustainable jobs creation.

Commenting on IsDB Group’s role in empowering people for a sustainable future, he explained how the Bank has scaled up its results-oriented long term technical cooperation mechanisms in the framework of South-South and Triangular Cooperation otherwise known as ‘Reverse Linkage’ modality that is extensively utilized to develop capacity and achieve development results in member countries.

“This approach helps us benefit not only from the expertise that we have amongst our own sector specialists in the Group but also helps us benefit from the expertise in our member countries and even participants from the North with special expertise, that can promote the development and expertise of our member countries,” he noted.