Rebeca Grynspan, Secretary-General of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), opened the organization’s quadrennial global conference on Monday, with a stark warning: uncertainty, rising debt, and falling investment are severely impacting the world’s most vulnerable countries.
Speaking at the opening of the 16th United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD16), Ms. Grynspan acknowledged that while major global shifts—from new trade patterns and resilient services to clean technologies and artificial intelligence—present historic opportunities, the critical issue is one of governance and equity.
“We’ve come here to shape the future, together, so that trade, investment and technology work for people, not the other way around,” Ms Grynspan said. She stressed that the key question is not whether change will happen, but “who will steer it and for whose benefit.”
Four Days to Forge a More Inclusive and Resilient Global Economy
The four-day conference, running from October 20-23, is UNCTAD’s highest decision-making body, bringing together 195 Member States, alongside ministers of trade and economy, international organization leaders, representatives from civil society, the private sector, and youth.
UNCTAD16 serves as a crucial platform to assess pressing trade and development issues, weigh policy options, and craft multilateral responses. Delegates will engage in over 40 high-level sessions and ministerial roundtables focused on delivering practical routes to key developmental challenges, including:
Resilient supply chains
Fairer finance and debt management
Productive investment
An inclusive digital economy
Discussions are set against a backdrop of wider reform efforts aimed at making the multilateral system better equipped to handle pressing challenges, ensuring sustainable growth that benefits everyone, everywhere.
