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Your Excellency, Ambassador Braun, Chairman of the Third CommitteeExcellencies,Distinguished Delegates,Ladies and gentlemen,

First, allow me to congratulate you, Mr. Chairman, and other members of the Bureau on your election. ?DESA is looking forward to working with you during this 74^th session. It is an honour for me to address the Third Committee today.

At the recently concluded SDG Summit, world leaders reaffirmed their commitment to fully implement the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. They committed to a decade of action from 2020 to 2030, and delivery for sustainable development for all, by launching an accelerated response to reach our common vision by 2030.

This SDG Summit follows the High-level Political Forum on sustainable development held last July under the auspices of ECOSOC, where 47 countries presented their Voluntary National Reviews.

Distinguished Delegates,

We continue to see progress and strong momentum for implementing the Sustainable Development Goals.

The decline of global extreme poverty continues, but is not on track to end it by 2030. In 2015 the global poverty rate was at 10 per cent and remained at 8.6 per cent in 2018.? Our projection is that the global poverty rate will remain at 6 per cent if no accelerated efforts are made.

Significant improvements have been made in the world of work since the Great Recession in 2008. According to ILO, the global unemployment rate in 2018 stood at 5 per cent and the number of unemployed totaled 172 million. The last time global unemployment of this low was in 2008. It took ten years for the job market to recover from the devastating impact of the global financial crisis.

We are seeing some progress in promoting gender equality, reducing child and maternal mortality, and providing basic infrastructure and services such as access to electricity, clean water and sanitation.

Yet, progress is still too slow and uneven.? We are implementing the 2030 Agenda amidst major trends that are bringing on risks and challenges to the SDGs. Let me share with you some issues which are of concern to us:

1. In sub-Saharan Africa, the number of extremely poor people continues to rise, from about 280 million in 1990 to about 413 million in 2015. The World Bank estimates that by 2030, close to 9 in 10 people living in extreme poverty will be in sub-Saharan Africa.

2. Slowing global economic growth may disrupt SDG progress, particularly in countries in vulnerable situations. According to DESA¡¯s 2019 World Economic Situation and Prospects, the global growth outlook has darkened due to rising trade tensions, conflicts and the adverse social and employment impact of rapid technological change. At the same time, frontier and technological breakthroughs offer significant hope for achieving the SDGs, but they cannot be taken for granted. It is therefore important to guide the technology development in the right direction to deliver the common good.

3. The unabated effects of climate change, such as extreme weather events, are shattering communities. According to the recent report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, global temperature rise is likely to reach 1.5⁰C between 2030 and 2052 if it continues to increase at the current rate. This poses enormous risks to economic growth, food security, health, livelihoods, water supply and social stability.

4. Hunger is also on the increase. In 2017, an estimated 821 million people were undernourished globally compared with 784 million in 2015.

5. Inequality in income, wealth and opportunities is rising in many countries. The forthcoming World Social Report prepared by DESA, to be published in early 2020, will confirm that inequalities based on gender, age, race, ethnicity, migrant status, disability and socioeconomic status are pervasive in developed and developing countries alike. This poses increasing challenges to global stability and prosperity, social cohesion and trust in public institutions.

6. Decent work deficits remain. Nearly 90 per cent of workers in low-income countries, and close to 84 per cent of workers in lower-middle income countries, are still trapped in informal work. Low-quality non-standard forms of work are rapidly expanding in advanced economies. At the same time, more than 1 in 5 young people worldwide were not in employment, education or training in 2018.

Women, youth, persons with disabilities and older persons continue to face elevated risks of unemployment and underemployment, and they are more likely to be engaged in hazardous work and lack social protection.

7. Gender inequalities also still persist. An estimated 647 million working-age people world-wide ¨C a majority of whom are women ¨C work full-time in unpaid services, robbing women and girls of the opportunities for education, incomes, and skills development.

8. Population ageing is a global phenomenon. In 2018, for the first time in history, persons aged 65 years and over outnumbered children under age five. By mid-century, the number of persons aged 65 years and over will also surpass the number of adolescents and youth aged 15 to 24 years globally. This trend reflects our enormous success in reducing premature mortality. But it also highlights the need for policies to leverage ageing as an opportunity and to recognize older persons as active agents in development efforts.

Mr. Chairman and Distinguished Delegates,

This Committee will reflect on how we can accelerate progress through the important policy issues on its agenda. Indeed, the work of your Committee places people at the center of development. During this session, you will discuss how to advance concrete action to achieve social development.? You will also grapple with the challenges faced by youth, older persons, families and indigenous peoples, as well as the role played by cooperatives.

I take this opportunity to recall the commitments of the World Summit for Social Development, which will mark its 25^th anniversary next year, in 2020. The Social Summit recognized social progress as essential to increasing opportunities for the world¡¯s poor and unemployed, and to building solidarity and bridges for inclusion. It understood that deploying integrated policies, firmly rooted in the principles of social justice and inclusion, were essential to build a society for all. I hope that Member States will make good use of the 25^th anniversary of the World Social Summit to further promote social development for the benefit of achieving the 2030 Agenda.

Thus, your deliberations in this Committee could not be more critical to realizing the 2030 Agenda and its promise to leave no one behind.? Fulfilling this promise will also require strengthening multilateralism and our commitment to build a safer, more just world for future generations. Let us, together, deliver on the SDGs and make our shared commitment to the 2030 Agenda as strong as ever.

I thank you for your attention, and I look forward to the outcome of your deliberations.