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On November 11-12, the first global summit of all public development banks was held, bringing together some 450 development banks from around the world.

The so-called "Finance in Common summit" was initiated by Mr Rioux, CEO of the French Development Agency (AFD), as Chair of the International Development Finance Club (IDFC), of which JICA is a co-chair. It was co-organized by IDFC, the World Federation of Development Finance Institutions (WFDFI), and the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB).

At the summit, French President Emmanuel Macron, UN Secretary-General António Guterres, IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva, OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurria, and others made video speeches, sharing the important roles of the development banks in the recovery from the pandemic, as well as the transformation to a more equitable and sustainable society.

Professor Joseph Stiglitz of Columbia University delivered a keynote speech at the conference of academic researchers. Referring to the "East Asian Miracle", he said "Development banks, through their catalytic role as intermediaries between long-term savings and investment to correct market failures due to information asymmetries and to meet long-term development needs, can play an important role in the recovery from the pandemic and in dealing with climate change."

Through attending to the summit executive committee and various IDFC meetings in the lead-up to the summit, JICA has advocated for the importance of more efforts in health sector in the recovery from the pandemic, which includes promoting universal health coverage (UHC) and strengthening health systems to achieve human security.

President Kitaoka participated in two high-level events of the summit: "Sport and Development" and "Human Security in Fragile Situations".

For the "Sport and Development" special event, President Kitaoka delivered a video message and pointed out the importance of coordinated efforts on "Sport and Development", as sport plays important roles in promoting peace and reconciliation through mutual understanding and in achieving human security.

For the high-level event on "Human Security in Fragile Situations", President Kitaoka shared concerns over women, children, refugees and others as they are most severely affected by the pandemic and introduced JICA's works to achieve human security through its holistic approach to strengthen health systems by combination of prevention-precaution-treatment as well as human resource development and mobilization of private finance.

Through these events, JICA introduced its unique and outstanding activities and discussed the possibilities of opening up the role of development banks to new areas for financial institutions.

JICA will continue to contribute to the international discussions on the role of development banks in new fields such as health, and on the role of development finance towards the achievement of the SDGs.

• See also https://financeincommon.org/ (external site)