For many years now, there has been widespread recognition that attracting more private capital to developing and emerging economies will be crucial in order to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030. At the heart of the call to move from "billions" to "trillions" in development finance is the need to refine the role that multilateral development institutions play on the one hand, while enhancing the involvement of private investors and business on the other. To date however, most concessional finance being provided to blend with private money has gone to middle-income rather than low-income countries. Annual blended finance volumes moreover stagnated between 2015 and 2019, before dropping significantly in 2020 in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. In this panel we will examine the current state of play, the challenges and the newest opportunities for multilateral institutions, governments and the private sector to work together in rethinking the promise of "billions to trillions" and turning the SDGs into reality across Latin America, Asia and Africa.

Moderator

Joan Larrea
CEO, Convergence

Speakers

Chinelo Anohu
Senior Director, Africa Investment Forum

John Gandolfo
Vice President and Treasurer, Treasury and Syndications, International Finance Corporation

Hiromichi Mizuno
Special Envoy of U.N. Secretary-General on Innovative Finance and Sustainable Investments; Special Advisor, Milken Institute

Bart Turtelboom
Co-Chair, Delphos