Frameworks for global good

The Buenos Aires Summit will provide a valuable opportunity to forge a shared vision and take effective action on the most relevant global issues of our time. This year, 2018, marks the 10th anniversary of the first G20 summit, which was held in Washington DC. At that time, the G20’s concerted action proved to be successful in responding to the worst financial crisis in decades and increasing the resilience of the global financial system.

Ten years after, we continue to be confronted with a number of global challenges that require shared solutions. In Buenos Aires we will be called again to renew our commitment to take responsibility and cooperate to move the global agenda forward. In today’s interconnected and globalised world, no country can go it alone. Italy believes that fair and truly effective multilateralism is indeed the most appropriate way to protect the interests of the whole international community in many sectors. It is also the right answer to our citizens’ request for more prosperous, equal and fair societies.

As the “premier forum for international economic cooperation”, gathering the world’s largest economies, the G20 provides an ideal framework to work on solutions to spur global growth. The world economy continues to show momentum, accompanied by satisfactory labour market outcomes in several countries where unemployment is at historic lows. At the international level, cooperation and fair competition must remain cornerstones of our action, notably in the areas of trade, taxation and financial regulation.

As globalisation has triggered widespread economic growth, it has caused some drawbacks as well, such as the growing inequalities in our societies that have provoked sentiments of fear and dissatisfaction. The disruptive change brought about by the technological innovation has created a worrisome mismatch between the demands of the labour market and the skills offered by jobseekers.

One of our main tasks is, therefore, to level out this damaging gap, by investing in the future of work. This means that we have to invest in education, so that the next generations are well prepared and have the competencies needed by the labour markets of today and of the future. We need to further our current commitment and invest more resources and tackle inequality and the gender gap in the labour market. As G20 leaders, we have the responsibility to be longsighted and coordinated among ourselves, and strive to extend our policies’ lifespans to future generations. In this perspective, Italy fully supports the efforts carried out by the G20 to tackle the changes triggered by the Next Production Revolution.

Free trade has been an extraordinary engine of growth. Our citizens now have access to a wider and less expensive choice of goods and services. Our companies have reached foreign markets and boosted jobs at home. Ideas and cultures have flown across the borders. We cannot let our economies prosper through unilateral measures and protectionism. Italy supports free and fair trade and the rules-based international trading system with the World Trade Organization at its core. We have to work together to modernise this system, to make it more adequate to new standards and parameters of international commerce.

The summit in Buenos Aires will also offer the opportunity to discuss one of the most pressing issues we are facing: the fight against climate change. We have to act in synergy and lead the international community towards the adoption of commitments that are adequate to the scale and urgency of this devastating challenge. Implementing the Paris Agreement is key to reversing the deadly health trend of our environment. Saving our planet is one of the highest priorities of my country, as it should be for any nation.

Among the Italian government’s priorities, migration flows play a central role. The migration phenomena we are facing require a structured, multilevel, and short-medium and long-term response from the international community as a whole. On this basis, we support the United Nations Global Compact on migration and refugees. Human mobility is a challenge that can and must be met through a ‘shared responsibility’ approach, in a logical partnership among the countries of origin, transit and destination. Within this approach our priorities should be both the protection of individual human dignity and the firm determination to fight those who trample on this dignity and on life itself through human trafficking.

Global challenges require global responses. International forums are the natural frameworks to work together to find effective solutions to common problems. The Buenos Aires Summit gives us the opportunity to discuss these critical issues in a constructive and cooperative manner and Italy will do its part.