2022 HLPF: TOSSD can inform Voluntary National Reviews (VNRs) on SDG financing

 

Every July in New York, the High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF) gathers the international community to review the progress in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda. At the HLPF, some countries present Voluntary National Reviews (VNRs) on their progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). For the 2022 HLPF, forty-four countries presented their VNRs. A critical dimension included in these reviews is financing to reach the SDGs.  Also, each HLPF session focuses on specific SDG thematic reviews.

The Total Official Support for Sustainable Development (TOSSD) measures the full array of resources to promote sustainable development in developing countries. TOSSD currently stores almost 700,000 activities on development finance. These include official resources flowing into developing countries for their sustainable development, as well as regional and global expenditures aligned to the 2030 Agenda. TOSSD has collected data from almost 100 official providers (countries and international organisations). TOSSD can help countries to have a clearer panorama on the official support they receive. These data is free of charge and available on a dedicated data platform.

This story focuses on recipient countries, in line with the TOSSD recipient perspective. The story shows key data on 2020 flows for the 35 TOSSD recipient countries that presented a VNR at the HLPF 2022. The country-level analysis and graphs use cross-border flows (TOSSD Pillar I) only. Yet, countries might also have interest in some regional and global expenditures (TOSSD pillar II) that contribute to their sustainable development. Finally, the story also presents the 2020 TOSSD data available on the SDGs under thematic review for 2022 (SDG 4, SDG 6, SDG 14 and SDG 15).

Learning from 2022 Voluntary National Reviews (VNRs).

The way in which the 35 countries addressed external support for sustainable development in their VNRs can be broken down in 4 categories:

These 35 countries received more than USD 58 billion in official support for sustainable development in 2020. The 15 countries that did not include any data related to official support, according to TOSSD, received more than USD $21 billion for sustainable development in 2020. This information could have usefully complemented their VNRs. The graph below shows the total amount received by each one of these 15 countries, and a breakdown per grants, loans and other finance instruments. 

TOSSD provides data that can complement mappings of development finance in recipient countries. The figure below presents a comparison between data collected by Liberia, Mali and Senegal on the support they received, and TOSSD data in 2020. For Liberia and Mali, TOSSD respectively provides 19% and 44% more information on disbursements than collected at national level. For Senegal, TOSSD provides almost 7 times more information than presented in the VNR.

TOSSD and the SDGs under thematic review for HLPF 2022.

Five SDGs were under thematic review for the HLPF 2022: Education (SDG 4), Gender Equality (SDG 5), life below water (SDG 14), life on land (SDG 15) and partnerships for the goals (SDG 17).  The graph below presents the percentages of resources allocated to each TOSSD pillar, in SDG 4, 5, 14 and 15.  In 2020, around USD 50 billion of official support targeted these Goals, through cross-border flows and global expenditures.

Some final remarks:

Twenty-one* TOSSD recipient countries have already committed to presenting a VNR at the HLPF 2023. TOSSD data could be helpful for the preparation of these VNRs. TOSSD data are already available for 2019 and 2020. New data on 2021 activities will be accessible in early 2023. Along with other tools (e.g., Integrated National Financing Frameworks, SDG Trade Monitor), TOSSD can help recipient countries fill their data gaps on financing for development.

* Bosnia and Herzegovina, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Central African Republic, Chile, Comoros, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Fiji, Guyana, Maldives, Mongolia, Rwanda, Syrian Arab Republic, Tajikistan, Timor-Leste, Turkmenistan, United Republic of Tanzania, Uzbekistan, Venezuela, Viet Nam and Zambia.

 

 

Publication date: 5 December 2022

Author: TOSSD Task Force Secretariat