When they met in Abuja last year, the CLGF Board gave in-depth consideration to the current UN negotiations on the post- 2015 development agenda and the new Sustainable Development Goals, the SDGs, which will replace the Millennium Development Goals, the MDGs in 2015.

One of the key issues identified was that as well ‘localising’ the SDGs, it was essential to ‘localise the resources’, so that local government has the necessary financial and other capacity to implement the development goals. This, and the wider issue of financing for development, to be discussed at the high level UN Conference in Addis Ababa in July (which CLGF will be attending as part of the Commonwealth delegation), will also  feature high on the agenda of the CLGF Biennial Conference in Gaborone in June.

It is encouraging that UNDP, the EU and other development partners recognise that in order to be effective, the SDGs need to be implemented bottom-up, not top down. Local government, in particular, needs to have a key role in the implementation of the goals and the accompanying targets and in their monitoring, in partnership with central government, as highlighted by the 2013 CLGF Kampala Conference and subsequently endorsed by Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Colombo.

Since January, the Global Task Force of Regional and Local Governments has been engaged in UN consultations on financing for development, especially preparations for the forthcoming Addis Conference.
The recent UN Chisinau outcomes statement, in particular, highlights the need for financing for development to ensure localising of resources alongside localising of the SDGs and for this to be taken up in Addis. This means, as the CLGF Board had recognised in 2014, better collection rates of local revenue, and provision of new sources of local revenue- from central-local transfers, from direct access to development partner finance and to new international funds and from international capital markets, for example through the issue of municipal bonds.

The enhanced role of local government in development and the ensuring financial requirements mean that local government needs to engage actively with the financial sector, notably the commercial and the development banks. CLGF is pleased that Barclays Africa is looking at a long-term partnership with CLGF to explore these issues, including being our main partner at the 2015 CLGF Gaborone Conference. Likewise, CLGF is seeking to strengthen links with key development banks such as the AfDB, the ADB and the DBSA in order to ensure that CLGF members can benefit from essential financial know-how and access to vital development funds.

Current global income inequalities- between countries and within countries- will not be met simply by UN or Commonwealth resolutions. Yet, as Helen Clark, head of UNDP, a keynote speaker at the forthcoming CLGF Gaborone Conference, said in her recent  2015 Commonwealth Lecture , the new SDGs offer a ‘once in a generation opportunity’ to address global inequality and development. To be effective, the post-2015 development agenda however must be implemented locally; it also has to be endowed with the necessary financial resources- including locally- to be taken forward effectively. This is a matter which the Addis Conference has to address squarely and reach clear agreement on.