BAKU, Azerbaijan, February 13. Investing in
development is essential to preventing global instability, European
Commissioner for International Partnerships Jozef Síkela said
during remarks at the Munich Security Conference, Trend reports.


The commissioner warned that development budgets are shrinking
while the financing gap to achieve the Sustainable Development
Goals stands at $4 trillion. He noted that total global development
funding amounts to roughly $200 billion, with Europe contributing
about 43%, or more than $90 billion.


Síkela highlighted the structural economic vulnerabilities,
especially in Africa, where the manufacturing index lingers below
2%. In contrast, Asia boasts around 30%, while Europe and the
United States range between 15–17% and 15–16%, respectively.


"Only in Africa, we will welcome 50 up to 60 million newcomers
to the labor market in the next five years. Globally, in the
developing countries, we will see a need for jobs for the young
generation entering the work or productive age, 1.2 billion people.
If we follow the current trajectory of job creation, we are able to
create only 400 million jobs within the next 10-15 years. So only
one third of the jobs are needed," he said.


To address the shortfall, Síkela called for a shift in focus
toward practical measures that generate employment and value
locally.


"We need to focus more on things that are really working, like
job creation and value-added creation on the soil of the
countries," he said.







He also emphasized the need to mobilize private capital.


"The second thing is basically to catalyze private investments
because there will never ever be enough public money. So we can
simply help by blending the products, by making the countries more
investment-friendly, and by de-risking with proper financial tools
for more private investments in the developing countries," he
said.


Finally, Síkela underlined the importance of strengthening
domestic revenue systems in developing nations.


"The third one is to help them to mobilize their own income
generation. To help them produce more money with their own economy
by tax reforms, which will help to create like a very basic like
social nest," he concluded.


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