UN Secretary General addresses message to Investment Forum

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon emphasized the importance of the Entrepreneurship and Investment Forum for inclusive and sustainable industrial development hosted in Bahrain January 20-22 with participation of representatives from around the world.
Held under the auspices of the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UIDO), the forum will boost the exchange of expertise and best practices, forging partnerships and identification of investment opportunities.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon addressed a message to the forum which kick-started in Bahrain on Tuesday. The forum comes as the United Nations shapes the post-2015 development agenda and the agreement on climate change, he added.
The statement welcomed the participants of the forum aimed to achieve comprehensive sustainable industrial development.
Ban Ki-moon said that the global economic and financial crunch felt over the past few years was a crisis of employment, and it left its negative impacts on countries and regions as well as all categories of the society and particularly on the aspirations of young people. The crisis was clearly felt in the Middle East and North Africa region, he said, alluding to latest developments and transformations in the region.
He added that there is increasing awareness of the need for comprehensive sustainable industrial development in order to create more jobs, increase income and productivity and create further economic change as catalyst for development and growth, focusing on the significance of the role of a dynamic private sector in order to yield aspired fruits from industrialization.
He said that the world countries need to boost capabilities and competitiveness of SMEs which he described as the prime source of economic activities, biggest source of employment in many countries, especially developing countries, and the main engines for empowerment of women and youth. He considered the boosting of enterprises, expanding of the circle of access to financial services as part of the central challenges facing developing nations in order to develop a private sector that will be more dynamic.
The UN Secretary-General concluded his message by saying that he counts on the conference participants leadership and support capabilities in pushing towards a new era of sustainable development and he said that UNIDO will remain a key partners in this important work undertaken by the forum.