Mr. President,

1. The Group of 77 and China welcomes the adoption, by consensus, of the resolution entitled "Recovering from the World Financial and Economic Crisis: a Global Jobs Pact". The resolution reaffirms that employment creation is essential to recovery efforts; and recognizes that the Global Jobs Pact is an important instrument to promote job-intensive growth. It further appreciates the efforts to integrate the policy contents of the Pact into the activities of the international organization, in particular of the United Nations Development System, and requests the Secretary-General to report to the ECOSOC in 2011 on further progress to implement the resolution.

2. The current text follows-up and builds on the resolution E/2009/5 adopted last year by the Council on the same matter. By requesting UN funds, programs and specializes agencies to continue to take the Pact into account, it further emphasizes the importance of job creation as a primary target of UN policies and programs and encourages Member States to continue to promote and make use of the policy options it offers. At the same time, it recognizes the important efforts undertaken by a host of organizations and international bodies to give full effect to the Global Jobs Pact and implement the various policy options contained therein.

Mr. President,

3. Last year, ECOSOC called upon the United Nations funds and programmes and the specialized agencies to take into account, through their appropriate decision-making processes, the Global Jobs Pact in their policies and programmes, as well as to consider the integration of the policy contents of the Pact into the activities of the resident coordinator system and the United Nations country teams in the context of their assistance provided for national crisis response measures, in accordance with national plans and priorities, bearing in mind the importance of national ownership and capacity-building at all levels.

4. As a result, in 22 January 2010, the Executive Board of UNDP/UNFPA adopted decision 2010/11 entitled, "UNDP response to the financial and economic crisis: Promoting the Global Jobs Pact", which requested the UNDP Administrator to identify and implement actions to strengthen inter-agency cooperation and coordination at the country level, in consultation with programme countries to appropriately incorporate the Global Jobs Pact into operational activities.

5. We are pleased to note that in 22 April, 2010, the ILO and UNDP through their Heads signed a memorandum of Understanding to give effect the ECOSOC request and promote the Global Jobs Pact. We wish to commend UNDP for this progress and call upon all those United Nations specialized agencies, funds and programmes that have not done so, to emulate UNDP. We also encourage ILO, as appropriate and in partnership with other UN development system; to work towards meeting the objectives of the United Nations Second Decade for Poverty Eradication whose theme is Decent Work and Full Employment for All.

Mr. President,

6. Despite efforts undertaken and the national and international levels, the G-77 and China believes that the impact of the world financial and economic crisis on human and social development remains significant. In addition, there is a real and present threat that many countries, including a number of developing countries, will face the risk of a double dip recession in the coming months, as a result of the curtailment or even reversal of expansionary measures to address fiscal constraints. It is therefore incumbent on the Council to maintain on its agenda next year the issue of the recovery from the crisis, in particular with respect to the implementation of the Global Jobs Pact. It is well known that employment is often a lagging indicator, rebounding only months or years after the economy as a whole has recovered.

7. Finally, the G-77 and China would like to thank the co-sponsors of this resolution and express our interest to work together with all partners to implement the text. We consider that the Global Jobs Pact can offer Member States a framework for coherent and coordinated policy action to help counteract the effects of economic contraction.

Thank you.