Infrastructure investment is key to support economic growth, to improve the enabling environment for industrial investment and to make progress towards the sustainable development goals. Major investments are needed especially in sustainable infrastructure, including power grids and electrification to support the energy transition, low-emission connectivity and transport infrastructure, and more energy efficient means of production. Climate change adaptation will also require significant infrastructure investments. The investment needs for sustainable infrastructure development in developing countries are huge. UNCTAD estimates that more than $4 trillion is needed through 2030 to achieve the SDGs, much of it in infrastructure industries.
This high-level panel brings together infrastructure industry leaders, project developers and financiers, and government representatives at the cross-roads of infrastructure planning, investment promotion and public-private partnership development. They will debate the challenges and opportunities associated with sustainable infrastructure investment, with a particular focus on developing countries. They will seek to identify key policy priorities aimed at overcoming obstacles and boosting international finance and investment in sustainable infrastructure where it is needed most.
Session themes:
- What can policymakers do to ensure that more of the sustainable finance raised in global capital markets is channeled to infrastructure projects in developing countries, and especially the least developed countries?
- What are the biggest investment bottlenecks along the infrastructure value chain, and what can be done to alleviate them?
- How should development organizations and multilateral banks evolve to better respond to sustainable infrastructure investment demand?
Speaker(s)
