Remy Rioux, IDFC Chairperson Intervention

May 28th, 2020

The IDFC Chairperson and Agence française de développement (AFD) CEO, Rémy Rioux, talked on May 28th, 2020 during the United Nations (UN) High-Level Event on Financing for Development in the Era of COVID-19 and Beyond convened by the Prime Minister of Canada, H.E. Mr. Justin Trudeau, the Prime Minister of Jamaica, H.E. Mr. Andrew Holness, and UN Secretary-General António Guterres, the virtual event aims to advance concrete solutions to the development emergency caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Mr. Rioux intervened alongside heads of states, CEOs of international organizations and leaders of CSOs underlined that public development banks in financing SDGs should leave no one behind. He added that, particularly in time of crisis there is need to create new, innovative and comprehensive international coalitions, instilling hope, building momentum and strongly supporting multilateralism.

This is the reason why the IDFC is strongly involved in the  “Finance in Common Summit”, on 12th November  2020, in partnership with the Paris Peace Forum, during which all 450 Public development banks in the world will gather for the first time, with all willing stakeholders and with the support notably of UN DESA and UNDP. The public development banks already represent 10% of total annual global investments. They are already playing a countercyclical role nowadays and are eager to do more.

Along with the World Federation of DFIs, colleagues from Multilateral Development Banks and the regional associations of Public Banks, the IDFC members are working together to forge a global response to the COVID-19 development challenges in the future. Read the full speech.