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25. 9. 2019 21:55

Speech by Prime Minister Andrej Babiš at the SDG Summit

Speech by Prime Minister Andrej Babiš at the SDG Summit in New York, 25 September 2019.
Speech by Prime Minister Andrej Babiš at the SDG Summit in New York, 25 September 2019.

Madame Chair, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentleman.

I am deeply honoured to represent the Czech Republic at the Summit and express our commitment to the 2030 Agenda.

In the latest SDG Index, my country Czech Republic ranked as the 7th most developed country. Yet, we face also many challenges. To step up our efforts, we pledge today, on the occasion of the SDG Summit, three new voluntary commitments:

  1. We will reduce our carbon footprint by planting 10 million trees in urban and rural landscape until 2025.
  2. We will enhance stakeholders’ involvement through a new on-line voluntary commitments platform.
  3. We will improve impact assessment mechanisms to take into account sustainability.

To leave no one behind is the central promise of the 2030 Agenda. Without openness, transparency and broad engagement of civil society and other stakeholders, we will never succeed. This is the approach we took when writing the Strategic Framework Czech Republic 2030, the main platform for SDGs implementation at the national level.

Good governance, participation and rule of law are the key elements for increasing public trust. The cornerstone of international partnership is multilateralism. We need effective and inclusive international institutions in order to deliver on the SDGs. We have to work together to preserve and strengthen the rules based international order.

SDGs represent great business opportunities. We need to strengthen the cooperation with the business sector and engagement of private finance in 2030 Agenda implementation. Business sector drives technologic innovations and prosperity. International trade has to be the engine of sustainable development.

To sum up, we need to ensure a broad and active participation of all stakeholders in the 2030 Agenda implementation and its follow-up mechanism.

We can make it, but only together.

Thank you for your attention.

Andrej Babiš, Prime Minister

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