What does Sevilla mean for the development finance agenda?
Olivié, Iliana / María Santillán O’Shea / Kathrin Berensmann / Damien Barchiche / Karim Karaki / Ben Katoka / Niels Keijzer / Christian von Haldenwang / Yabibal Walle (2025)
External Publications
We are now back from the UN Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development (FfD4), held in Sevilla.
Despite the record high temperatures, over 8,000 participants – representing UN member countries, multilateral organisations, the business sector, civil society organisations, think tanks, academia and other experts – gathered and exchanged ideas and policy proposals in more than 470 side and special events. Members of the ETTG co-organised and were involved in many of these.
Attention was in fact drawn to parallel discussions and the SPA (Sevilla Platform for Action) announcements, since the Summit’s conclusions, the Compromiso de Sevilla (Seville Commitment), had already been (pre)approved at UN headquarters a few days before the Summit. This happened after the withdrawal of the US from the FfD4 process – since the country’s proposal of 400 amendments to the draft conclusions was not approved. However, several bolder proposals included in previous versions of the text were substantially watered down throughout the process by both the US and other countries. This was the case, especially, with issues related to the reform of the international financial architecture (IFA), where Bretton Woods institutions play a critical role.
The inaugural addresses revealed the more or less prominent role that countries and supra-national bodies have opted to play. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) recalled its mandate, with no references whatsoever to potential reforms. President von der Leyen presented the EU as the main provider of official development assistance (ODA) despite the ODA cuts announced by key member States; underlined the need for developing countries to mobilize domestic resources; and for the private sector to more actively participate in development processes, making reference once again to the EU’s Global Gateway. Iraq and Angola, on behalf of the G77 + China and the African Group respectively, underscored the importance of multilateralism, the 2030 Agenda, the burden of external debt and the risks posed by geopolitical fragmentation to international and global development.
