Egypt’s Minister of International Co-operation Rania al-Mashat said on Tuesday that the successive changes the world is going through require resilient leadership, innovative mechanisms to address emerging challenges and coordination to enhance the exchange of experiences.
This came during her participation as a keynote speaker in a panel discussion titled “Leadership in a Volatile World”, at the World Government Summit (WGS) in Dubai.
Minister al-Mashat said that the government is working to establish innovative solutions to overcome challenges and accelerate development.
She also discussed how multilateral co-operation can be used to address the global environment of uncertainty and the challenges facing the world since the Covid-19 pandemic, noting that the Ministry of International Co-operation is responsible for Egypt’s relations with multilateral and bilateral development partners.
Despite the difficulty of the past years, through an institutional framework for international co-operation and innovative ideas to strengthen communication and coordination between the priorities of the state and development partners, effective results have been achieved over the past three years.
She added that there has been a use of technology to activate multi-stakeholder platforms to maximise integration between development partners and stimulate joint efforts to mobilise technical support and financing mechanisms for all priority projects, along with implementing a methodology to map official development assistance (ODA) to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
During 2020 and 2021, about $20 billion were secured in development financing, about 25% of which was dedicated to the private sector.
She stressed that resilience is a key factor for leadership in times of crisis and promoting multilateral co-operation, and stimulating the exchange of experience with the international community, stressing the importance of South-South co-operation in promoting the exchange of expertise and development experiences.
Al-Mashat highlighted the importance of Triangular Co-operation and South-South Co-operation in advancing development efforts in developing countries and emerging economies, and strengthening partnerships and integration between the countries of the African continent.
She said Egypt has strong and extended relations with all international financing institutions and multilateral and bilateral development partners, which are reflected in the volume of the portfolio that exceeds $26 billion.
The minister also said that, over the past years, Egypt has launched pioneering development programmes and projects, which have won the trust of international institutions, and have implemented practices that advance sustainable development efforts.
