Madam Chair,
Madam Deputy Secretary-General,
Excellencies,
Distinguished Representatives,

1. I have the honor to deliver this statement on behalf of the G77 and China.

2. Allow me at the outset to congratulate you and the members of the Bureau on your election to steer the work of this important Committee during the 65th session of the General Assembly. The Group of 77 and China is confident that through your wise leadership, our deliberations and negotiations will be fruitful.

Madam Chair,

3. The multiple and interrelated crises, particularly food security, climate change, the global economic and financial crisis, have seriously challenged our capacity to respond and to prevent these crises from escalating further. The ongoing world financial and economic crisis has reversed many important developmental gains in developing countries and threatens to seriously undermine the achievement of the internationally agreed development goals, including the Millennium Development Goals. Two years after the outbreak of the global financial crisis, developing countries have still not fully recovered from the social and economic effects of the crisis. In this regard, we urge development partners to implement their part of the commitments whether in external debt, development assistance, financing, trade, and greater technology transfer, increased capacity building and additional and predictable financial resources.

4. At the UN Summit on the Millennium Development Goals held on 20-22 September 2010, it was clearly demonstrated that there is an urgent need to scale up the global partnership for development to mobilize additional resources to address the remaining gaps and continuing challenges faced by the developing countries. We consider the outcome document of the Summit as a global plan of action that requires immediate implementation. We also stress the need for an annual review of this plan of action within the UN system to make the achievement of the MDGs a reality by 2015.

5. The G77 and China stresses the critical importance of official development assistance (ODA) as both a complement to other sources of financing and as a catalyst for development, facilitating the achievement of national development objectives, including the MDGs. In this regard, we call upon developed countries to meet and scale up their existing bilateral and multilateral official development assistance commitments and targets, in particular the commitment to reach the target of 0.7 per cent of gross national product for official development assistance to developing countries by 2015 and to reach the level of at least 0.5 per cent of gross national product for official development assistance by 2010, as well as a target of 0.15 to 0.20 per cent of gross national product for official development assistance to least developed countries.

Madam Chair,

6. The Working Group on the Financial and Economic Crisis has more than proven its worth. The proceedings of the Working Group have shown the importance and usefulness of an open, transparent and inclusive multilateral forum for dialogue and for discussing proposals for addressing the crisis, in line with the mandate provided by the decisions of the conference on the "World Financial and Economic Crisis and its Impact on Development" and the relevant General Assembly resolution. The Member States of the United Nations need a forum in which to discuss the global economic crisis and its impact on development, and to also discuss proposals to address the problems and issues emanating from the crisis.

Madam Chair,

7. Climate change is a global phenomenon that threatens not only our societies' developmental prospects but also their very existence; it is, indeed, one of the most serious challenges of our times. As we approach the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Cancun later this year, it has become incumbent upon the international community, particularly the developed countries given their historical responsibility, to address this universal menace within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and its Kyoto Protocol (KP). This would only be consummated by adhering to the provisions and principles of the Convention, in particular the principles of equity and common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities.

Madam Chair,

8. The Group looks forward to a successful and comprehensive outcome at the Tenth Meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, which will be held from 18 to 29 October 2010 in Nagoya, Japan. We take this opportunity to underscore the need for great mobilization and political will such that we will be able to adopt the protocol on access and benefit-sharing and to ensure that the post-2010 targets are able to be met through new, additional and sufficient financial resources and the transfer of technology to developing countries.

9. The G77 and China also looks forward to the convening of a World Summit on Sustainable Development in Brazil in 2012 to review the 20-year progress achieved in the implementation of the outcomes of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Sustainable Development, held in Rio de Janeiro, on 3-14 June 1992, including the World Summit on Sustainable Development held in Johannesburg, South Africa, from 26 August to 4 September 2002.

10. The G77 and China stress on the special vulnerabilities, structural handicaps and needs of the least developed countries particularly in the face of new and emerging challenges. The least developed countries are lagging behind in their development endeavours, including meeting many of the MDG targets. In this regard, we look forward to a successful outcome of the Fourth United Nations Conference on Least Developed Countries to be held in Istanbul in 2011. We believe that that the Conference should make a thorough review of the implementation of the Brussels Programme of Action and for defining a new generation of ambitious, comprehensive, targeted and results-oriented support measures to establish a new partnership between the least developed countries and their development partners for the next decade, with effective arrangements for follow-up, review and monitoring of the implementation of the new programme of action for the least developed countries.

Madam Chair,

11. The status of international trade negotiations remains an issue that this Committee needs to address. We reiterate the call to the developed countries to demonstrate the flexibility and the political will necessary for breaking the current impasse in the negotiations with a view to concluding the Doha Round this year and achieving an early, successful and development oriented outcome that places the needs of developing countries at its highest priority.

12. We further call upon developed countries to fulfill their commitment expressed in the Hong Kong Ministerial Declaration to address the development interests and concerns of developing countries, especially LDCs, in the multilateral trading system. We look forward to working with our partners in the context of the work of this Committee to enable us to achieve this objective.

Madam Chair,

13. The Group is encouraged by the progress achieved so far in strengthening the Financing for Development follow-up process. Nevertheless, we believe that much more needs to be done to ensure the full implementation of the agreed FFD commitments. It should be recalled that the Monterrey Conference is the only major UN summit in the economic and social field that did not result in a permanent intergovernmental body to oversee and promote the implementation of its outcome.

Madam Chair,

14. The G77 and China will continue to take effective measures to remove obstacles impeding peoples living under foreign occupation from achieving sustainable development as such circumstances continue to adversely affect their economic and social development and are incompatible with the dignity and worth of the human person and must be combated and eliminated. People under foreign occupation must be protected in accordance with the provisions of international humanitarian law.

Madam Chair,

15. The G77 and China greatly values South-South Cooperation. In this regard, we reaffirm the importance of strengthening the current UN institutional mechanisms for South-South cooperation, and call for the implementation of the Outcome document of the UN High-level Conference on South-South cooperation which was held from 1 to 3 December 2009 in Nairobi, Kenya.

16. Finally, Madam Chair, the G77 and China are committed to working closely with you and our partners in this 65th General Assembly to devise action-oriented resolutions and decisions, on a timely and effective manner.

I thank you.