STATEMENT
By H.E. Ms. Nguyen Phuong Tra,
Minister-Counselor,
Deputy Permanent Representative
Permanent Mission of Viet Nam
to the United Nations
at the general debate of the Second Committee of
the 76th Session of the General Assembly
"Crisis, Resilience and Recovery - Accelerating Progress towards the 2030 Agenda"
New York, 8 October 2021
Madam Chair,
Allow us to begin by congratulating you, Ambassador Vanessa Frazier, and the other members of the Bureau on your election. We also wish to thank the previous Chair of the Committee, His Excellency Ambassador Amrit Bahadur Rai, and the members of the previous Bureau for their outstanding work.
Viet Nam aligns itself with the statements made by Guinea on behalf of the Group of 77 and China, and by Brunei on behalf of ASEAN.
Madam Chair,
1. The COVID-19 pandemic has taken over 4.8 million lives globally[1]. Our first and foremost priority is to put the pandemic under control and save lives in order to secure successful economic recovery and deliver sustainable development goals.
We, therefore, echo the United Nations Secretary-General for greater international cooperation towards vaccine multilateralism to ensure equitable, universal and affordable access for all.
We believe the best vaccine is the one you get as soon as you can.
Only with accelerated national vaccination efforts and public health precautions can we adapt ourselves to a "new normal" situation in which the virus could stay on for some time but under control and will no longer be allowed to inflict deadly damage.
A successful curb on the pandemic will be a good basis from which we will speed up our economic recovery and deliver the 2030 Agenda goals.
Madam Chair,
2. Before the pandemic broke out, the world had achieved some progress toward the SDGs but not as much as expected by the 2020 timeline.
At the current rate, it is likely that the Asia Pacific region will achieve less than 10% of SDG targets by the year 2030.
Against this background, we believe the second most important priority is to ensure a reliable social security net in every member state and prevent social disruption or political instability that could arise from of social security failure.
We call for sustained efforts to design and implement risk-informed and shock-responsive social protection systems to mitigate the socio-economic blows on vulnerable populations and strengthen our resilience through the recovery era.
A resilient pursuit and successful realisation of SDGs is the only way for the world to overcome unpredictable non-traditional challenges.
We support the accelerated actions and transformative pathways of the 2030 Agenda, recognising the importance of the means of implementation, including capacity building, technology transfer and financial support as key enablers for developing countries to achieve SDGs.
Madam Chair,
3. With a view to fulfilling its commitments, Viet Nam has been mainstreaming SDGs into national policy priorities and operate a multi-criteria statistical system to monitor and assess our progress.
According to our first National Voluntary Report to review progress towards SDGs in the last five years, we are set to achieve 5 out of 17 goals by 2030 but need accelerated and transformative implementation to achieve the remaining 12 SDGs.
We reaffirm the need for greater efforts and cooperation on environmental protection to address cross-cutting issues for sustainable development such as climate change, marine debris, biodiversity conservation, and transboundary haze pollution.
We are committed to contributing to the goals of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Paris Agreement, and look forward to the 26th Session of the Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC in early November.
Madam Chair,
4. We strongly values the partnership with the United Nations and support the United Nations' leadership in coordinating the global green, resilient and inclusive recovery as a comprehensive strategy to cut down on carbon emissions, conserve natural resources, create good jobs, promote gender equality, bridge social inequalities and development gap among countries.
In closing, we wish to affirm our consistent support for the Chair and the Bureau of the Committee in your mandates to ensure successful performance for the Second Committee in the 76th Session.
I thank you./.
[1] WHO statistics on 2 October 2021.