International governance system failed to protect the interests of Global South: HPM Sheikh Hasina

Highlighting the disparities in the response to the COVID-19 pandemic between rich and poor countries, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has called for a change in the thinking and narratives around international development cooperation.

She lamented the 'failure' of the international governance system to protect the interests of millions in the 'Global South', a term often used to identify lower-income countries, and urged wealthy countries to deliver on their development commitments.

In her address to the Paris Peace Forum on Thursday, the Bangladesh leader said, "We now witness an uneven response to globalisation around the world. During the COVID-19 pandemic, we have seen the international governance system failing millions of people in the Global South. The huge gap in access to vaccines and treatments is only too telling."

Hasina stressed the need for financing and technological support of the Global North, the other side of the so-called divide, to help enhance the transparency and cost-effectiveness of 'South-South cooperation programmes'.

South-South cooperation refers to the technical cooperation among developing countries in the Global South. It is a tool used by the states, international organisations, academics, civil society and the private sector to collaborate and share knowledge, skills and successful initiatives in specific areas such as agricultural development, human rights, urbanisation, health and climate change.

A number of developing countries like Bangladesh have the capacity to mass-produce vaccines and ensure vaccine equity if given the technical support, according to Hasina.

"A good number of home-grown development solutions are already available in the Global South. With additional financing, many of these solutions can be implemented and scaled up across other developing countries. This can help avoid re-inventing the solution in the name of technical assistance."

The prime minister believes there are better chances for South-South cooperation to respond directly to national development priorities.

"Yet, South-South cooperation tends to take a back seat in international development discourse. It has been hard to change the traditional thinking and narratives around international development cooperation. As such, many potential South-South cooperation projects remain under-funded."

The idea of triangular cooperation has not lived up to its potential, she added. Triangular cooperation, as the name implies, involves three actors, two from the South and one from the North.

"This gap needs to be addressed. There are some compelling reasons for that."

"Many developed countries still fall behind their internationally agreed development commitments. For them, supporting South-South development cooperation programmes can be one way of realising their own commitments."

Hasina underscored Bangladesh's "long-standing and proven" commitment to champion the cause of the world’s Least Developed Countries and serve as "the voice of climate-vulnerable countries".

"From Bangladesh, we have been reaching out to a number of our friendly countries with emergency medical supply and other provisions during the pandemic. In one case, we sent out our trained workforce to administer the vaccines. We have been working on sharing our own development experience with other countries for many years now.

"Our achievements in agriculture, community health care, non-formal education, reproductive health, disaster management and micro-finance have reached out in other parts of the world. Building on our work in the last twenty years, we have offered to engage in humanitarian assistance for the brotherly Afghan people under UN initiatives."

Hasina also emphasised Bangladesh's contributions to human resource development over the years for its neighbouring countries.

"With UNDP’s support, our work on community-level digital services and public service innovations is being shared with a number of countries in the Global South. Some of our climate adaptation methods are gaining increased attention in the North."

Pointing to Bangladesh's offer in 2019 to set up a ‘South-South Knowledge and Innovation Centre’ to serve as a platform for co-creating technological solutions for development challenges in the South, she urged the UN, G20 and OECD to consider investing in similar forward-looking proposals.

"On the home front, as Bangladesh graduates from the LDC status, we aim to work on setting up our own platform for international economic and technical cooperation. The platform will help coordinate and expand the work of our value-based diplomacy, and the multiple ways it contributes to international development, peacekeeping and humanitarian efforts."

"This will be one of our enduring legacies from this ‘Mujib Year’ – the year we are celebrating the 50th anniversary of our independence and the birth centenary of our Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman."