India willing to partner in South-South cooperation, says Akbaruddin

India's Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Syed Akbaruddin, on Friday (local time) said that India is willing to partner with other countries of the global South for South-South Cooperation (SSC) that offers unique ways to accelerate the world towards key sustainable development goals of the 2030 agenda of the United Nations.

"We work here with the office of South-South Cooperation on what I would call a small start-up venture. If I have to describe it in one line, I would say it is 'one for one with one'. It means one project for one country at a time at a cost of no more than one million dollars," Akbaruddin told the panel gathered for the commemoration of the UN Day for the SSC.

"South-South cooperation is the right thing to do. Multilaterally working together is the right thing to do. And this is a small contribution that India with its commitment to multilateralism and South-South cooperation is venturing to support," the envoy stressed.

During the panel discussion, UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, said that the past decades have demonstrated the power of SSC to advance sustainable development.

"Driven by a spirit of solidarity, respect for national sovereignty and equal partnership, South-South cooperation has offered concrete solutions to shared development challenges," he encouraged.

Partnerships among countries of the south has carved a path of progress in the developing world with more children getting an education, child and maternal mortality rates "cut by nearly half," and sharp reductions in extreme poverty, he added.

Despite progress, developments are "not fast enough to meet out 2030 goals," he warned, citing that 2.4 billion people, the majority living in the south, do not have adequate station, while some 840 million are without electricity, and 885 million lack access to clean water.

"These are stark reminders that even as countries reap higher economic gains, we must work to ensure that prosperity is more broadly shared," Guterres urged.

The United Nations South-South Cooperation objectives include fostering self-reliance of developing countries, increasing the quantity and enhancing the quality of international development and cooperation, strengthening technological capacities, and enabling developing countries to achieve a greater degree of international participation, among others.

In addition, the UN's office on the issue (UNOSCC) offers a guide for good practices for implementation of SSC, illustrating characteristics of effective cooperation by highlighting the needs and specific SDGs for individual southern countries.

( With inputs from ANI )