Building the Foundations for Human Dignity, with Jorge Moreira da Silva - Executive Director of UNOPS, the United Nations Office for Project Services

Why is infrastructure so important, especially for the United Nations?

We have some statistics from our research, for instance, with the Oxford University, that it's pretty compelling.

92% of the sustainable development goals, 92% depends on infrastructure.

80% of all greenhouse gas emissions are related with infrastructure.

So if we don't get it right, we won't succeed on the SDGs and on climate action.

So infrastructure is really a, a game changer for humanitarian development and peace, for social development, and for climate action.

And i- if we go to a country like Yemen, would the private sector be ready to go to Yemen or to Mali or to Somalia or to Sudan or to Gaza or to Myanmar? No.

So unless the UN is ready to be there and to partner with a country, with a population, with the partners, uh, and put in place the infrastructure, you wouldn't have the private sector going to those places.

And the tragic thing, as you know very well from your experience because you have been, if there is someone that has been on the ground, it's you.

You know from your, uh, many years at UN, in some of these countries, they are disproportionately affected by all types of crisis.

When I go to Myanmar, they got hit by the massive earthquake, earthquake in Mandalay.

A few months before, they got a, a very strong cyclone.

They have been on war, uh, and conflict for, uh, several years.

So it's the kind of country where everything happens.

You go to Mozambique, it's the same.

Now affected by floods, the Idai cyclone some years ago.

So you have some countries that are disproportionately affected by all types of crisis, and those countries are very often the lowest on the hierarchy of, uh, funding.

And that's why we, uh, are very committed in supporting everyone in the world, but particularly those that face somehow a market failure, that the private sector wouldn't go there unless there is someone de-risking the investment and de-risking the implementation.