Inclusive and Resilient Recovery From Covid-19 for Sustainable Livelihoods, Well-Being and Dignity for All : Eradicating Poverty and Hunger in All Its Forms and Dimensions to Achieve the 2030 Agenda

E/RES/2022/7View PDF

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

A Resolution of the Economic and Social Council, under agenda item 19b Social development, published in 2022.

Who cites this mandate in the budget?

1 entity

Entity	(Sub-)Programme	Title	Total mandates cited	Expenditure
	Programme 18	Economic and social development in latin america and the caribbean	234

Historical expenditure covers the complete programme or subprogramme, not this mandate. For an overview of all UN entities and programmes, see UN entities and programmes.

Who cites this mandate in the budget?

1 entity

Entity	(Sub-)Programme	Title	Total mandates cited	Expenditure
	Programme 18	Economic and social development in latin america and the caribbean	234	—

Historical expenditure covers the complete programme or subprogramme, not this mandate. For an overview of all UN entities and programmes, see UN entities and programmes.

What subjects does this mandate have?

5 subjects

Covid-19 Economic Development Hunger Poverty Mitigation Social Development

What’s in this document?

48 operative paragraphs

Takes note of the report of the Secretary-General;⁸

⁸E/CN.5/2022/3.

Acknowledges the urgent need to accelerate action on all levels and by all stakeholders to fulfil the vision and Goals of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development,⁹ and emphasizes that the international community, through the outcome documents of the major United Nations conferences and summits adopted by the General Assembly, has reinforced, inter alia, the urgency of eradicating poverty in all its forms and dimensions, combating inequality within and among countries, protecting the environment, creating sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth and fostering social inclusion within the United Nations development agenda, including the outcomes of the World Summit for Social Development, the Addis Ababa Action Agenda of the Third International Conference on Financing for Development,¹⁰ the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030¹¹ and the New Urban Agenda;¹²

⁹General Assembly resolution 70/1.

¹⁰General Assembly resolution 69/313, annex.

¹¹General Assembly resolution 69/283, annex II.

¹²General Assembly resolution 71/256, annex.

Reaffirms the commitment to implementing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development for all by ensuring that no one would be left behind and reaching the furthest behind first, and by recognizing human rights and that the dignity of the human person is fundamental;

Calls upon Member States to ensure the promotion and protection of all human rights, in accordance with their obligations under international human rights law;

Reaffirms that eradicating poverty in all its forms and dimensions, including extreme poverty, for all people everywhere, is the greatest global challenge and an indispensable requirement for sustainable development, as well as an overarching objective of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, of which the Addis Ababa Action Agenda of the Third International Conference on Financing for Development is an integral part, supporting and complementing it;

Acknowledges that recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic gives additional opportunity to develop integrated long-term policy frameworks to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, and that such frameworks should aim to simultaneously eradicate poverty and hunger as well as malnutrition, combat inequalities, enhance people’s capabilities and well-being, promote acceleration actions at the national, regional and international levels and ensure sustainable livelihoods for all, and also recognizes that a multidimensional analysis of poverty and hunger should inform these recovery strategies;

Encourages Member States to promote affordable and equitable access to basic services, in particular quality formal and non-formal education, at all levels, including programmes that promote equality and inclusion through the affirmation of the fundamental dignity of the human person, and health-care services, including through the acceleration of the transition towards equitable access to universal health coverage, as well as access to affordable housing, nutrition and food, and access to employment and decent work, information and communications technology and infrastructure, through advancing gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls;

Encourages Governments to continue their efforts to develop strategies and programmes aimed at strengthening national capacities to address national priorities relating to family-oriented policies and to step up their efforts, in collaboration with relevant stakeholders, to implement those objectives, in particular in the areas of fighting poverty and hunger, to prevent the intergenerational transfer and feminization of poverty and ensure the well-being of all at all ages in order to achieve the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development;

Stresses the importance of developing policies to expand work opportunities and productivity in both rural and urban sectors by achieving and recovering economic growth, investing in human resource development, promoting technologies that generate productive employment, and encouraging self-employment, entrepreneurship and small and medium-sized enterprises;

Invites Member States to consider adopting labour market policies that strengthen institutions and provide adequate labour protection to all workers, including through social dialogue, especially the most disadvantaged, including through minimum wage policies, while taking into account the role of workers’ and employers’ organizations, as applicable, as part of policies to boost income growth for the vast majority of workers, taking into consideration the specific circumstances of each country;

Stresses the need to address challenges faced by those working in informal or vulnerable jobs, by investing in the creation of more decent work opportunities, including providing access to decent jobs in the formal sector;

Encourages Member States to implement policies that ensure women’s economic empowerment by supporting the full and productive participation of women in the labour market, including women with disabilities, and those living in poverty and female heads of household, and to promote equal pay for equal work or work of equal value, the equal sharing of responsibilities between parents, access to childcare facilities, work-family balance, including, inter alia, while caring for children, older persons, persons with disabilities, and by promoting their meaningful participation in the economy and in decision-making processes at all levels;

Highlights the importance of developing and implementing policies and programmes to support entrepreneurship, especially for women and youth, and emphasizes that the role of entrepreneurship, including social entrepreneurship, and micro-, small and medium-sized enterprises in social and economic development is more critical than ever in the post-COVID-19 recovery and beyond;

Encourages Member States to respect, promote and realize the right to work and to prevent and eliminate violence, abuse and sexual harassment, while recognizing that violence and harassment is a threat to equal opportunities, is unacceptable and incompatible with decent work and it may prevent women from accessing, remaining and advancing in the labour market;

Acknowledges that the exacerbation of poverty during the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in an increase in child labour, and urges Member States to take immediate and effective measures to secure the prohibition and ensure the elimination of child labour in all its forms, by 2025 at the latest;

Recognizes that nationally appropriate social protection systems for all address multiple, often interrelated and complex causes of poverty and inequality by easing the burden of certain expenditure during periods of unemployment, contributing to health-related goals, gender equality and decent work, and facilitating the full inclusion of persons with disabilities;

Also recognizes that nationally appropriate social protection systems make a critical contribution to the realization of human rights for all, in particular for those who are trapped in poverty and hunger, and that promoting universal access to social services and providing nationally appropriate social protection floors can contribute to reducing inequality and poverty, addressing social exclusion and promoting inclusive economic growth, and in this regard takes note of the Social Protection Floors Recommendation, 2012 (No. 202), of the International Labour Organization;

Encourages Member States, when designing, implementing, monitoring and evaluating social protection programmes for social development, to ensure gender mainstreaming throughout this process;

Recognizes the important role that families can play in combating social exclusion, and highlights the importance of investing in inclusive and responsive family-oriented policies and programmes in areas such as education, training, decent work, work-family balance, health-care services, social services, intergenerational relationships and solidarity and targeted cash transfers for vulnerable families, in order to reduce inequality and promote the well-being of all persons of all ages, as well as to contribute to better outcomes for children and other vulnerable family members in vulnerable situations and help to break the intergenerational transfer of poverty;

Acknowledges the vital role that sustainable social protection systems play in the COVID-19 pandemic response, and encourages Member States to ensure that recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic provides a policy window for the countries concerned to address their significant gaps in social protection coverage by making progress towards universal, adequate, comprehensive and sustainable social protection systems, by including, in accordance with their national legislations, basic income, child benefits, maternity benefits, sickness benefits, disability benefits, unemployment benefits and old-age pension, and that these social protection systems should identify and close coverage gaps, especially for those who are in vulnerable situations, including informal workers, migrants and unpaid carers;

Encourages Member States to provide universal age-, disability-, gender-responsive and family-oriented social protection systems, which are key to ensuring poverty reduction, including, as appropriate, targeted cash transfers for people and families in vulnerable situations, such as when headed by a single parent, in particular those headed by women, and which are most effective in reducing poverty when accompanied by other measures, such as providing access to essential services, high-quality education and health-care services;

Stresses the need to better coordinate social protection policies and measures with poverty reduction programmes and other social policies to avoid excluding people in informal or precarious jobs, and recognizes the need to promote transitions towards the formal economy, expanding and upgrading existing social assistance programmes by increasing benefit level and coverage to informal workers, including seasonal and casual labourers in rural areas;

Encourages Member States to develop long-term, risk-informed, inclusive and prevention-oriented social development recovery plans that will improve people’s capacities and well-being, through investing in social services and quality, reliable, sustainable and resilient infrastructure, including basic school infrastructure, and health-care services, safe drinking water and sanitation, affordable housing, ensuring decent employment, adequate social protection coverage and affordable and reliable digital technology and Internet access;

Expresses deep concern for the gap in vaccination rates, particularly between developed and developing countries, especially African countries, and notes with great concern the severe negative impact on human health, safety and well-being caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the severe disruption to societies and economies and the devastating impact on lives and livelihoods, and that the poorest and most vulnerable are the hardest hit by the pandemic, reaffirms the ambition to get back on track to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals by designing and implementing sustainable and inclusive recovery strategies to accelerate progress towards the full implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and to help to reduce the risk of and build resilience to future shocks, crises and pandemics, including by strengthening health systems and achieving universal health coverage, and recognizes that equitable and timely access for all to safe, quality, effective and affordable COVID-19 vaccines, therapeutics and diagnostics are an essential part of a global response based on unity, solidarity, renewed multilateral cooperation and the principle of leaving no one behind;

Encourages Member States to facilitate the meaningful participation and empowerment of those in vulnerable situations, including those living in poverty, in the design, implementation and monitoring of COVID-19 recovery plans;

Urges Member States to address multiple causes of poverty, hunger and inequality, by creating decent work; increasing resilience; improving coherence between social protection, food security and nutrition policies; providing targeted cash transfers; promoting digital and financial literacy and inclusion; ensuring equal opportunities and access to healthy diets from sustainable food systems, quality education and lifelong learning; combating all forms of discrimination; empowering all people and facilitating the social inclusion and participation of those who face multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination; and prioritizing investment in early childhood education, nutrition and care to break intergenerational poverty;

Emphasizes that sustainable agricultural production, food security, food safety and nutrition are key elements for the eradication of poverty in all its forms and dimensions, and calls for greater efforts to sustainably enhance the agricultural production capacities, productivity and food security of developing countries;

Notes the need to further examine various concepts, such as “food sovereignty”, and their relation to food security and the right to food, bearing in mind the need to avoid any negative impact on the enjoyment of the right to food for all people at all times;

Encourages Member States to strengthen food systems, including through a holistic food systems approach, so that they become more efficient, inclusive, resilient and sustainable, by delivering healthy diets to end hunger and improve food security and nutrition; investing in science, technology and innovation, including digital innovation, to increase agricultural productivity, resilience and sustainability and reduce disaster risk; and strengthening policy coherence and coordination among government agencies and institutions responsible for social protection, agriculture, food security and nutrition;

Reaffirms that climate change is one of the greatest challenges of our time, remains deeply concerned that all countries, particularly developing countries, are vulnerable to the adverse impacts of climate change and are already experiencing an increase in such impacts, including persistent drought and extreme weather events, biodiversity loss, land degradation, desertification, sea level rise, coastal erosion, ocean acidification and the retreat of mountain glaciers, further threatening food security, water availability and livelihoods, recognizes the substantial risks posed by climate change to health, and underlines the need to address the economic, social and environmental impacts of climate change, and emphasizes the need for action at all levels, including through mitigation and adaptation efforts, to build resilience that can contribute to eradicating poverty in all its forms and dimensions and ending hunger;

Recognizes the efforts at all levels to establish and strengthen social protection measures and programmes, including national safety nets and protection programmes for the needy and vulnerable, such as food and cash-for-work, cash transfer and voucher programmes, school feeding programmes and mother-and-child nutrition programmes, and in this regard underlines the importance of increasing investment, capacity-building and systems development;

Emphasizes the importance of empowering people and creating an enabling environment for making informed choices about food products for healthy dietary practices through improved health and nutrition information and education;

Encourages Member States to address the impacts of COVID-19 by tackling the long-term structural challenges faced by rural populations, and to establish social protection systems that are adapted to rural populations, address the multiple dimensions of food insecurity in rural areas, invest in sustainable agricultural development and enhance multisectoral policies and national action plans to strengthen the resilience and adaptability of small-scale producers and family farmers;

Urges Member States to achieve gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls by guaranteeing equal access to opportunities and social protection for all, in particular for those in vulnerable situations, including by mainstreaming a gender perspective in food security programmes, especially for women and girls who experience multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination and violence, considering that the empowerment of women and girls in diverse situations and conditions will make a crucial contribution to progress across all the Goals and targets of the 2030 Agenda;

Calls upon Member States to adopt measures to recognize, reduce and redistribute women’s and girls’ disproportionate share of unpaid care and domestic work and the feminization of poverty, which is exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, including through poverty eradication measures, labour policies, public services and gender-responsive social protection programmes;

Encourages Member States to facilitate the digital and financial literacy and inclusion of women and their equal access to formal financial services, including timely and affordable credit, loans, savings, insurance and remittance transfer schemes; integrate a gender perspective into finance sector policy and regulations, in accordance with national priorities and legislation, encourage financial institutions, such as commercial banks, development banks, agricultural banks, microfinance institutions, mobile network operators, agent networks, cooperatives, postal banks and savings banks, to provide access to financial products, services and information to women and encourage the use of innovative tools and platforms, including online and mobile banking;

Calls upon Member States to prevent the harmful effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on children by mitigating the damaging socioeconomic impacts, including by ensuring the continuity of child-centred services and policies on an equal and attainable access basis, upholding the right of the child to quality education on the basis of equal opportunity and non-discrimination and supporting education that is inclusive, equitable and accessible by implementing appropriate measures to ensure supporting families in the return of children, particularly girls and children in vulnerable situations, to school, when it is safe to do so, and access to opportunities to catch up on lost learning and while in confinement, to support school systems, teachers and families in ensuring a reliable source of daily nutrition and using accessible and inclusive distance-learning solutions to close the digital divides, while protecting children from violence, abuse and exploitation, online and offline, and recalling that no child shall be subjected to arbitrary or unlawful interference with his or her privacy and family;

Calls upon all Member States and, where appropriate, relevant international organizations to implement policies and programmes to reduce and eliminate preventable mortality and morbidity, as a result of malnutrition, of children under 5 years of age, and in this regard urges Member States to disseminate the technical guidance prepared by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, in collaboration with the World Health Organization,¹³ and to apply it, as appropriate, in the design, implementation, evaluation and monitoring of laws, policies, programmes, budgets and mechanisms for remedy and redress aimed at eliminating preventable mortality and morbidity of children under 5 years of age;

¹³A/HRC/27/31; see also Human Rights Council resolution 33/11 (see Official Records of the General Assembly, Seventy-first Session, Supplement No. 53A and corrigendum (A/71/53/Add.1 and A/71/53/Add.1/Corr.1), chap. II).

Recognizes that domestic resources mobilization, underscored by the principle of national ownership and supplemented by international assistance, as appropriate, will be critical to realizing sustainable development and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals;

Reaffirms the Addis Ababa Action Agenda, and recognizes the need to take steps to significantly increase investment to close resource gaps, including through the mobilization of financial resources from all sources, including public, private, domestic and international resource mobilization and allocation;

Also reaffirms that international cooperation has an essential role in assisting developing countries, including highly indebted poor countries, least developed countries, landlocked developing countries, small island developing Member States and middle-income countries, in strengthening their human, institutional and technological capacity;

Encourages developed countries to implement their official development assistance commitments, including the commitment by many developed countries to achieve the target of 0.7 per cent of gross national income for official development assistance to developing countries and 0.15 to 0.20 per cent of gross national income for official development assistance to the least developed countries;

Welcomes the contributions of South-South cooperation to poverty eradication and sustainable development, and reaffirms that South-South cooperation is an important element of international cooperation for development as a complement to, not a substitute for, North-South cooperation, and commits itself to strengthening South-South and triangular cooperation as a means of bringing relevant experience and expertise to bear in development cooperation;

Stresses the essential role that official development assistance plays in complementing, leveraging and sustaining financing for development efforts in developing countries and in facilitating the achievement of development objectives, including the internationally agreed development goals, in particular the Sustainable Development Goals, and welcomes steps to improve the effectiveness and quality of aid based on the fundamental principles of national ownership, alignment, harmonization, managing for results and mutual accountability;

Encourages the international community to intensify development cooperation, including through South-South, North-South and triangular cooperation, as well as multi-stakeholder partnerships, to support countries, especially developing countries, upon their request, in building their national capacity for science, technology and innovation for social development, as well as to support research networks that reach across borders, institutions and disciplines;

Calls upon the international community to strengthen multilateral cooperation, by mobilizing resources for an inclusive recovery and making use of special drawing rights and its voluntary channelling allocation to countries most in need, and recognizes the role of the United Nations and of the international financial institutions, in accordance with their respective mandates, and encourages them to continue to support global efforts towards sustained and inclusive growth, sustainable development and the external debt sustainability of developing countries;

Invites all relevant stakeholders, including the United Nations system and civil society organizations, to continue to promote the exchange of information and good practices on programmes, policies and measures that successfully reduce inequality in all its dimensions;

Invites the United Nations system to continue to support Member States, upon their request, in their pursuit of inclusive and resilient recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic for sustainable livelihoods, well-being and dignity for all, and facilitate international cooperation to end hunger and eradicate poverty in all its forms and dimensions, with the aim of achieving the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development for the common future of present and coming generations.

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

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