Statement by UN Resident Coordinator on SOTF press briefing.

I am honored to be addressing you, Members of the Fourth Estate and to provide you with information regarding the upcoming Summit of the Future, an event of profound global significance. The Summit, taking place in September in New York, during the High-Level Week, will bring together world leaders, visionaries, and change-makers to explore new solutions and strategies that will define the future of our world. 

WHY THE SOTF

We are at a critical juncture in global history where effective global cooperation is increasingly critical to our survival, yet difficult to achieve.  Our world is saturated with an atmosphere of mistrust, hatred, ferocious threat, conflict and violence. Inequality and injustice are everywhere and growing, and we need new approaches to tackling them. Yet, our structures are outdated and no longer reflect today’s political and economic realities. Reflecting on the UN Secretary-General’s opinion piece on the SOTF, released last week, many global institutions and tools in use today were established in the 1940s, long before globalization, decolonization, universal human rights, gender equality, or space exploration became widespread. The winners of World War II still dominate the UN Security Council, with Africa lacking any permanent representation. The global financial system is skewed against developing countries, failing to offer adequate support during crises, which leaves these nations burdened by debt and unable to invest in their own populations. 

If we are serious about shaping the future toward sustainability, we must change how we approach things today.  Put more succinctly by the UN Secretary-General “we cannot create a future fit for our grandchildren with a system built for our grandparents. The Summit of the Future will be an opportunity to re-boot multilateral collaboration fit for the 21st century.” We must change the way we work to achieve greater impact and results. 

EXPECTED OUTCOME OF SOFT

The SOTF will propose some solutions in five critical areas:

1. Sustainable Development and Financing for Development – Last year at the SDGs Summit, global leaders highlighted the need to reform the global financial architecture to jump-start and accelerate action towards the 2030 Agenda. The Summit of the Future will pave the way to get us back on track to achieve the SDGs through unlocking greater volumes of development finance and addressing the debt crisis that is holding so many developing countries back, especially those in Africa. 
2. International Peace and Security – Peace is the cornerstone for building and maintaining progress. A New Agenda for Peace will be issued calling for a renewed push to rid our world of the elements of conflict, acknowledging the changing nature of warfare and the risks of weaponizing new technologies. This will strengthen our collective security system, enabling us to more effectively foster peaceful relationships between states, resolve long-standing conflicts and threats, advance towards a more sustainable and peaceful world free of weapons of mass destruction, and tackle new and emerging challenges, including the impact of technological advances in domains such as outer space and cyber space. 
3. Science, technology, and innovation and digital cooperation – The SOFT will also focus on harnessing the opportunities and managing the risks of digital technologies by closing digital divides, expanding inclusion in the digital economy, ensuring safety, protecting human rights, managing data governance, and better understanding and addressing risks, including of artificial intelligence; Ensuring that global decision-making is guided by science and that science, technology and innovation benefit more people in more countries;
4. Youth and future generations – Strengthening the meaningful participation of young people in decision-making at all levels, including at the United Nations, and ensuring that they have the opportunities they deserve to thrive; as well as agreeing on practical ways to take the future into account in our collective decision-making today, in keeping with our long-standing promise to meet the needs of the present without compromising the needs of those generations who will come after us.
5. Transforming global governance - so that it can continue to deliver in the future, including through a reform of the Security Council and paving the way for an international financial system that is more representative of today’s world and more responsive to the challenges of our time.

The key outcome document is the Pact for the Future, an inter-governmentally agreed action-oriented document covering the areas highlighted earlier. The Pact for the Future will contain two annexes, namely the Global Digital Compact and a Declaration on Future Generations.

ON GHANA’s PARTICIPATION AND CONTRIBUTION

We express our deepest appreciation to the National Development Planning Commission and the SDG Advisory Unit for leading the charge to ensure Ghana’s voice, and by extension, Africa’s voice is heard through the Position Paper to be presented by His Excellency, Nana Akuffo Addo at this Summit. The UN’s support in facilitating these consultations has been instrumental, offering a platform for inclusive dialogue and fostering innovative solutions to address the region's development priorities.  As a nation at the forefront of pan-African leadership, Ghana has always embraced its responsibility to contribute to shaping the global agenda. The Summit of the Future will therefore provide an unparalleled opportunity for Ghana to share its unique perspectives, foster collaboration, and engage in meaningful dialogue with international partners.

As the UN Secretary-General announced at the recent Forum on China-Africa Cooperation Summit, held in Beijing, the UN is seeking to push for reforms so that the international financial architecture and institutions correspond to the realities of today’s world and can respond to today’s challenges – particularly those faced by developing countries, especially in Africa. This is an opportunity for Africa to seize and stand together in unity to make it a reality. We anticipate that Ghana will play a pivotal role in these discussions and ensure the future we want.

CONCLUSION

We believe that the Summit of the Future will be a defining moment in our collective efforts to chart a course toward a more inclusive, sustainable, and prosperous world. Ghana’s participation underscores its commitment to global leadership and innovation, as well as the desire to see Africa take its rightful place at the center of the global discourse on the future. 

I invite all Ghanaians and partners, and especially the media to follow closely as world leaders and stakeholders from across the world engage at this pivotal event towards building a brighter, more resilient future for generations to come.

Thank you.