At the SDG Action Weekend on 17 September, H.E. Phonevanh Outhavong, Deputy Minister of Planning and Investment of Lao PDR delivered a speech during the Stimulus High Impact Initiative session.
Ms Outhavong shared that Lao PDR faces economic challenges, climate change impacts, and a gap between available resources and development needs. Financial hardships and the need for investments in education and health are pressing. The SDG Stimulus emphasizes global and local reforms. Against this backdrop, Lao PDR's integrated national financing framework (INFF) approach aims to prioritize resources efficiently to accelerate their SDG implementation.
Through INFF, Lao PDR’s first-ever financing strategy for the 9th National Social Economic Development Plan for 2021-2025 was launched by the Prime Minister in June this year. Ms Outhavong stressed that successful strategy implementation requires continued partner support - collaboration is essential for sustainable future success.
The full transcript of the speech is attached below.
Thank you very much. Excellencies, distinguished ladies and gentlemen, firstly, allow me to express my gratitude for the opportunity to take part in this significant discussion today.
As the least developed countries striving to make progress towards achieving Sustainable Development Goals, we are aware of the importance of the SDG Stimulus effort. And this is a particular tool considering the economic challenges we face. As the other colleague has mentioned, we face not only economic challenges, but also climate change and other impacts that we face, including the gap between the available financial resources and our development needs.
As in other countries, especially in other many LDCs, Lao PDR has witnessed a significant increase in financial hardship, including debt, while simultaneously, facing greater pressure to address these shocks. Consequently, it has become an increasing challenge to make the necessary investment in critical areas for our long-term inclusive and sustainable development, such as health, education, social protection, and natural resources management. And these challenges become even more pressing when considering our very young population and ongoing demographic transition. So we do need an investment more for these young people to have better education and good health.
While many aspects of SDG Stimulus efforts require global level reforms, including reforms to the global financial, it is critical to emphasize the actions that individual countries can make or can take to maximize the utilization of available resources and policy tools to pursue development priorities.
In Lao PDR, we have localized and applied the integrated national financing framework or INFF approach to our national development planning structure over the past two years. It was achieved through the development of the first-ever financing strategy for our 9th National Social Economic Development Plan for 2021-2025, which was endorsed by our Excellency Prime Minister in June this year. And the key value of this comes from its integrated nature, bringing together all parts of the government, development partners, and the private sector, and related stakeholders to prioritise and resolve trade off.
The strategy offers an opportunity to assess the current and planned initiative in order to determine whether limited resources are being directed towards the most critical areas and where significant gaps still exist. Additionally, it allows us to address some of the key recommendations from our partners, including the World Bank, ADB, and other development partners, as well as try to tackle the national agenda on economic and financial difficulties through a reform roadmap.
In response to your question, Madam, the financing strategy enables us to identify the concrete steps to strengthen our system and processes regarding resource mobilization, as well as aligning these resources with our development priorities. By doing so, we enhance our capacity not only to absorb the traditional donor resources, which remain crucial for us, and also to attract more private investment from domestic and foreign resources while making more effective use of our state budget.
It is essential to harness the potential of all these different sources in order to achieve our development gaps or goals and reduce the gap that we are facing now. And also, the INFF approach has enabled us to strengthen coherence across various financial flows.
However, it is important to note that having this strategy in place alone is insufficient. The real challenge lies in its implementation, and we rely on continued support and contribution from our development partners, and this includes implementing the specific action outlined in our strategy.
And also, even more importantly, maintain the integrated, coordinated, and coherent approach that we strive to build a sustainable future. As mentioned by other excellencies, if we work together, we go together, and we share a common goal, so we will achieve our goal.
Lastly, I would like to extend my gratitude for your kind attention and inviting me to this important event. And I look forward to working together with you all towards our shared goal. Thank you very much.