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GLOBAL ALLIANCE AGAINST HUNGER AND POVERTY—INCEPTION DOCUMENT

United against Hunger and Poverty

1. Taking stock of pressing challenges and insufficient progress towards eliminating hunger and poverty

  1. Given the persistently high levels of global hunger and poverty, we, representatives of G20 members and invited countries met in Rio de Janeiro, on 24 July 2024, for the Ministerial Meeting of the Task Force for the establishment of a Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty. Building on the legacy of previous G20 presidencies and relevant G20 workstreams, including the G20 Finance and Sherpa tracks, as well as on various recent, related international efforts in promoting sustainable development,1 we reaffirm the imperative to end hunger and poverty and are committed to further accelerating the full and effective implementation of the 2030 Agenda and achievement of its Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), as the only globally accepted roadmap on the matter.
  2. We recognize that the world has experienced significant setbacks in achieving SDGs 1 (no poverty) and 2 (zero hunger), among other SDGs, due to challenges intensified by climate change, biodiversity loss, the COVID-19 pandemic, economic slowdowns and downturns, supply chain disruption, conflicts, and other facets of the multidimensional global crisis. We note with alarm the first increase in extreme poverty and inequality in more than two decades. Approximately 712 million people were living in extreme poverty in 2022, 23 million more than in 2019, with higher rates affecting the poorest countries, and children disproportionately affected, being twice as likely as adults to be living in extreme poverty. Wealth and income inequality within many countries have been growing for decades, and income distribution between countries has started to grow more unequal since the pandemic. This increase in global poverty is the largest observed since 1990 and likely the largest rise since World War II. Though global poverty levels have declined since 2020, they remain significantly higher than they would have been according to pre-pandemic trendlines.
  3. We express deep concern for the state of food insecurity and malnutrition across the world. According to the 2024 report on the State of World Food Insecurity (SOFI), released in Rio today, around 733 million people were facing hunger in 2023, with more than 2.8 billion people in the world—or more than one third of the world population—unable to afford a healthy diet. Over 152 million more people faced hunger in 2023 than in 2019, before the pandemic. 26.7% of women worldwide were food insecure, compared to 25.4% of men, showing a gender gap worldwide. 148 million children under five were affected by stunting and 37 million were overweight. 28.9% of the world population was facing moderate or severe food insecurity and 282 million people in 59 food crisis countries/territories face high levels of acute food insecurity.
  4. We recognize that hunger and malnutrition are perverse manifestations of structural and multidimensional poverty and inequality. Despite ongoing national and international efforts to alleviate poverty and hunger, the absence or insufficiency of effective national and international policies and social protection, coupled with limited capacity of domestic and international resources to address and alleviate poverty, exacerbates hunger and the triple burden of malnutrition, depriving persons living in poverty and in vulnerable situations of means to produce or access sufficient and adequate food and healthy diets. We are concerned that social protection coverage remains extremely low in many countries and for people living in vulnerable situations. While poverty in childhood is felt most immediately and brutally by children themselves, child poverty has broader impacts on societies and economies. Hunger and malnutrition, including their short and long-term impacts on health and social and cognitive development, in turn, reinforce and perpetuate poverty and inequality over generations.
  5. We recognize that the fight against hunger, poverty, malnutrition, and inequalities can be accelerated with progress in achieving gender equality and empowering women and girls, in line with SDG5. Women and girls in diverse situations and conditions2 are disproportionally affected by hunger and malnutrition due to various socioeconomic factors, including gender stereotypes and biases, norms, attitudes and behaviours that perpetuate gender inequality, disrupted access to livelihoods and care responsibilities, among other factors. The division of labour in most societies assigns most of the unpaid care work, including childcare, long term care, preparation of meals, subsistence farming and purchase of food to women and girls. Women are actively engaged across agriculture and food systems3 as producers and entrepreneurs. The persistence of discrimination against women in access to land, finance, the labour market, social protection and to decision making power, including in politics, constitute fundamental barriers to achieving a world free of hunger, malnutrition and poverty.
  6. We acknowledge that the consequences of poverty, hunger, and malnutrition are also a critical economic concern, generating significant costs to households, health systems and economies, especially for developing countries. The vicious cycle of hunger and poverty reduces economic productivity and the potential for sustainable and inclusive growth, undermining human development, social mobility, cohesion, and stability, and reinforcing intersecting inequalities to the detriment of the persons living in the poorest and most vulnerable situations. The allocation of national and international resources to fight this challenge, including through social protection, is a critical imperative to protect those populations and an investment that can contribute to strong, sustainable, balanced and inclusive growth, generating spillovers and broader positive economic impacts.
  7. We underscore the increasing gaps towards financing the achievement of the SDGs, including for SDGs 1 and 2, and the need to address challenges to fully deliver on the framework and commitments of the 2015 Addis Ababa Action Agenda. We recognize both the scale of the challenge and the need for urgent, increased action to mobilize additional domestic and international resources from all sources to meet that challenge, while at the same time increasing their effectiveness. Several developing countries are facing challenges in their domestic budgets and international financing capabilities, a situation that has been exacerbated by the general rise in interest rates around the world, with some countries in high risk of debt distress, while some are regaining access to financial markets. Faced with an alarming increase in humanitarian needs and the insufficiency of financing to address these needs amidst multiple crises, rising fragility and emergency levels of acute food insecurity and malnutrition, we underscore the critical importance of investing in resilience as well as better and more impactful crisis prevention, preparedness, and response. We look forward to the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development (FfD) to take place in 2025 in Spain as a critical opportunity to identify priority actions to help close the resource gap needed to end poverty and hunger by 2030.
  8. We acknowledge the significant multiplication of donor channels in international development cooperation in recent years, including through several trust funds. In the previous twenty years, official financial aid flows to the global fight against hunger and poverty have been increasingly destined to smaller-scale, pilot, and local projects, and less towards national scale, government-led policies, and programs. Those official financial aid flows are also increasingly being complemented by other sources of finance, which are in some cases implemented by non-governmental organizations, the private sector, and philanthropy. Fragmentation can pose aid coordination challenges such as increased transaction costs, unsustained and sometimes conflicting policies, and could stretch recipient countries’ capacity to manage diverse requirements and implement coordinated policies. This makes it vital to promote recipient countries ownership and leadership by creating an enabling environment and a long-term framework for international financial flows, which will help streamline aid mechanisms. It will also facilitate coordination and continuity amongst diverse forms of development cooperation to ensure they are harmonized and maximize their contribution to long-term national development priorities and country-owned policy and program implementation for effective and efficient poverty and hunger alleviation efforts.

2. Enabling a Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty through political action, knowledge and finance

  1. These unprecedented challenges call for greater and more effective commitment, financing, and actions at all levels, since existing efforts seem insufficient to bring the world back on the path to zero hunger and poverty eradication. We therefore endorse the creation and look forward to the launch at the G20 Leaders’ Summit in November 2024 of a Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty to support and accelerate efforts to eradicate hunger and poverty (SDGs 1 and 2) while reducing inequalities (SDG 10), contributing to revitalize global partnerships for sustainable development (SDG 17) and to the achievement of other interlinked SDGs, and championing sustainable, inclusive and just transition pathways.
  2. The Alliance aims to a) provide sustained political drive at the highest level by the Group of 20 and other Global Alliance Members, galvanizing collective action and building upon synergies with other existing efforts to eliminate hunger and poverty across the world; and b) to facilitate mobilization and improved alignment of domestic and international support, including public and private financial resources and knowledge, to enable large-scale country-owned and country-led implementation of evidence-based programs and policy instruments, especially by countries most affected by hunger and extreme poverty and focusing on persons in vulnerable situations and those most likely to be left behind. The Global Alliance is designed to leverage existing mechanisms and initiatives while avoiding duplication.
  3. The foundational elements of the Global Alliance are presented in the attachment. They include a template for the Statements of Commitment to be issued by joining members, a structured Terms of Reference and Governance Framework to steer the Alliance’s collective efforts, and a set of criteria to guide the evolving development of the Alliance’s reference basket of programs and policy instruments. We call on the relevant actors, including those in the broader UN system and the International Financial Institutions, to collaborate within their respective mandates to support those foundational elements as necessary. Recalling the open and voluntary nature of the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty, we also invite all willing UN member and observer states, development partners and knowledge institutions to consider joining the Alliance as founding members before its official launch. We also take note of the five reports prepared under responsibility of FAO, SPIAC-B, ODI, UNICEF, WFP and the World Bank as inputs to our work on establishing the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty as well as the additional technical inputs and presentations provided by ECLAC, IDB, IMF, OECD, ILO and others, and thank those institutions for their contributions.

Country-level policy action

  1. We reaffirm that eradicating poverty in all its forms and dimensions, including extreme poverty, is the greatest global challenge and an indispensable requirement for sustainable development. We reaffirm everyone should have access to safe, nutritious, affordable, and sufficient food and healthy diets, consistent with the progressive realization of the right to adequate food in the context of national food security. Achieving food security and nutrition through healthy diets reduces strain on public healthcare and pension systems. Increasing access to adequate, diversified and healthy diets can also create incentives for the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity and adaptation to and mitigation of climate change, contributing to the swift, full and effective implementation of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework and the realization of 2050 Vision of “Living in harmony with Nature”.
  2. We also call on all governments to honor their commitments to nationally appropriate social protection and social protection floors, in progressive realization of the right of everyone to social security, and in alignment with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG 1.3). Universal Social Protection significantly contributes to reducing poverty, hunger and inequality and is essential to promoting sustained inclusive economic and social development and advance progress on all the other SDGs, such as the promotion of decent work, and improvements to health and education outcomes.
  3. We commit to enhancing programs and policies, including through either domestic implementation of or through policy cooperation and support of the national implementation of the programs and policy instruments in the Global Alliance’s reference basket, as adapted to national circumstances and realities, focusing on social protection, food security and nutrition, socioeconomic inclusion, resilience building, and access to quality and inclusive education and health, with a focus on those most affected by poverty, hunger and malnutrition and persons in vulnerable situations (including all women and girls in diverse conditions and situations, children and youth, older persons, Indigenous Peoples, local communities, refugees, migrants and persons with disabilities) Those programs and policy instruments may include, but are not limited to, food assistance and social protection schemes such as cash and in-kind transfer programs, including those linked to social services and promotion of livelihoods; adaptive social protection; school feeding programs, including those using sustainably produced and locally procured food from family farmers and smallholder farmers; stimulation of local markets and value chains; maternal, child and early childhood nutrition and support programs; food banks; aquatic food programs; programs to promote adequate and healthy diets and prevention of all forms of malnutrition; skills development; decent work policies and employment services; health (including evidence-based traditional and complementary medicine) and care services (including accessible care and support services for childcare, persons with disabilities and older persons); promotion of smallholder and family farmers’ access to finance, extension services, knowledge, research and/or agricultural inputs; and policy reforms towards more effective practices which benefit the poorest, with positive impacts on climate and nature, among others. Those practices may also include, among others, targeted, effective and efficient programs and policy instruments that use market-driven and market-oriented approaches where appropriate in combatting hunger and poverty, under country-led policies. We acknowledge the Global Alliance’s policy basket approach as a concrete guide to country-led action which does not imply collective endorsement of specific policy instruments or programs included therein.
  4. We encourage all countries to make efforts to design, implement and mobilize funding for such policies, including for capacity development, as appropriate and adapted to their respective realities and contexts, while maintaining effective governance, leaving no one behind, strengthening domestic resource mobilization, seeking and sharing lessons and experiences, and providing for gender responsiveness, adequate targeting of population groups, appropriate monitoring and evaluation, local stakeholder engagement, adequate management of policy synergies and trade-offs, while avoiding negative impacts on SDGs and respecting international obligations and commitments as well as domestic legislation.
  5. Food insecurity, malnutrition and poverty are often driven or aggravated by conflicts and environmental, climate and economic shocks. The recurrent, protracted, and complex nature of an increased number of crises and disasters underlines the need for more coherent and fit for purpose coordination between humanitarian assistance and development programmes, including to enhance preparedness and responses to future crises. Humanitarian and development partners should, under the request of recipient governments, provide support to create the conditions for government-led development without undermining traditional coping systems, humanitarian principles or national legislation. Such efforts contribute to addressing food insecurity and poverty but also to increase the resilience of persons in vulnerable situations to shocks while building national capacities to manage social protection needs in the longer term. Such approaches should be supported by increased coordination and flexibility between financing modalities from diverse funding sources to ensure that adequate resources are in the right place at the right time.
  6. Beyond the direct transformative impact of programs and policy instruments targeted at those most affected by poverty, to be supported by the Global Alliance and its members, we aim to reinforce action on all appropriate fronts to tackle hunger and poverty by addressing other enabling factors and root causes. We are committed to promoting sustainable and inclusive development and growth and jobs, including through investments in education, industrialization, infrastructure and digitalization. We also highlight the importance of G20 Principles on Harnessing Data for Development (D4D) in accelerating the 2030 Agenda. In this context, we also recognize that sustainable production and consumption (SDG 12), including by embracing Lifestyles for Sustainable Development (LiFE), can support international and national efforts towards meeting the basic needs of all people, especially of persons in poverty and people living in vulnerable situations. Building resilient, sustainable and inclusive agriculture and food systems is essential for sustainable and inclusive economic growth and breaking the cycle of hunger, poverty and malnutrition. In pursuit of this objective, we will work towards promoting formalization and decent work for agri-food sector workers, both waged and self-employed, who are disproportionately affected by poverty and food insecurity. We aim also to work towards increasing access to, availability, and efficient use of fertilizer and agricultural inputs, including through strengthening local fertilizer production and improving soil health, and towards reducing food loss and waste, and supporting a circular bioeconomy. At the same time, we underscore the importance of the rules-based, non-discriminatory, fair, open, inclusive, equitable, sustainable and transparent multilateral trading system, with WTO at its core, to foster access to inputs, goods and services to support the production as well as access to safe, nutritious and affordable food.

Knowledge sharing and cooperation

  1. In scaling up implementation of policies against hunger and poverty, the significance of knowledge sharing, and cooperation cannot be overstated.
    All countries and local, national, regional, and global institutions and knowledge holders may offer valuable lessons and insights to conform the Alliance’s reference basket of policy instruments. Our efforts should acknowledge the inherent value of national knowledge institutions and development partners and embrace all forms of collaboration, including North-South, South-South and trilateral, as well as other forms. We therefore invite all national, regional, and global institutions that manage, guide, or contribute to the development of knowledge resources to join the Global Alliance. Under the Alliance’s Knowledge Pillar, knowledge entities will have the opportunity to offer technical assistance and facilitate the exchange of lessons among members, with a focus on addressing the unique policy implementation challenges faced at the country level, with full respect to relevant intellectual property rights.
  2. Drawing on past G20 and other collective efforts, we encourage existing information, financial and knowledge platforms relevant to the fight against hunger and poverty to improve integration, coordination or cooperation with the Global Alliance and its Support Mechanism. We thank socialprotection.org for hosting the online consultations for the reference basket of policies and call on its continued refinement at the center of a broader knowledge platform for the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty.
  3. We will strive to secure adequate and responsible long-term investments in capacity building for hunger and poverty alleviation, agricultural R&D and education by all sources, and to promote agricultural science, innovations and technology, cooperation and exchange among countries on voluntary and mutually agreed terms, targeting these efforts and investments at the root causes of hunger and poverty and contemporary sustainability challenges faced by agriculture, and food systems, rural areas; preventing food loss and waste, and strengthening the capacity of farmers, in particular smallholders and family farmers, including fisherfolk and pastoralists, to access and integrate existing and new knowledge. These investments could contemplate extension services, farmers and advisory training and education services, and also rely on cost-effective digital solutions, such as open and interoperable soil health data platforms and agroecological and other innovative approaches. We also call on global, regional and national research institutions and initiatives, including the global network of CGIAR research centers, to mobilize responsible investments to support those efforts, as well as to incorporate traditional and Indigenous knowledges ((having regard to national and international law addressing Intellectual Property, genetic resources and traditional knowledges), local preferences and local production (including millets, quinoa, sorghum and other traditional crops, such as rice, wheat and maize) in favor of more diverse, nutritious and healthy diets and more sustainable, productive, resilient and less wasteful agriculture and food systems that are also more inclusive, deliver decent work and livelihoods, and foster both rural and urban development and revitalization.
  4. We also underscore the importance of continuous social research and learning, so that well-conducted research and data collection can be applied to inform science and evidence-based decision-making and monitor the impact of social protection interventions on food security and nutrition and multidimensional poverty alleviation. While also stressing the role of education in alleviating poverty and hunger, we encourage qualifying research institutions to work with the Global Alliance to form partnerships with implementing countries to assess policy implementation experiences and promote continuous learning.

Financial support and cooperation

  1. We invite all national, regional, and global financial institutions to join the Global Alliance. Recognizing the existing challenges of development finance for global hunger, malnutrition and poverty eradication, which is highly fragmented as well as resource constrained, we recognize the need for further work to analyze the tradeoffs and bottlenecks in the current development finance landscape and we invite relevant stakeholders to voluntarily identify and apply ways to mobilize, coordinate, align, pool and/or combine resources, where appropriate, in an impact oriented and cost-effective way, in favor of country-owned implementation of policies and programs in the Global Alliance’s policy basket, in line with national circumstances, capabilities and contexts, including through various strategies and innovative financing approaches such as blended financing, concessional co-financing, partnerships and linking vertical and horizontal donor platforms, as well as leveraging country platforms and/or Integrated National Financing Frameworks (INFFs). We invite all Alliance members to collaborate and present ideas for harnessing financial resources and coordinating funds in support of key policies within the Alliance policy basket, globally and/or at country level, while respecting international obligations and commitments.
  2. We aim to scale up and optimize financing for sustainable development from all sources considering fiscal constraints, including channels that provide the highest leverage. We reaffirm our commitment towards the mobilisation of affordable, adequate and accessible financing from all sources to support developing countries in their domestic efforts to address bottlenecks for implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the Addis Ababa Action Agenda. We call upon developed countries to fully deliver on their respective ODA commitments that complements and encourages development financing from all other sources, including public and private, domestic and international, in a timely manner, and contribute to addressing the financing needs of developing countries. We welcome efforts made by countries to amplify aid and other Official Development Finance flows to meet existing donor commitments and expand the donor base, to combat food insecurity and malnutrition and to support poverty reduction programs, especially in countries afflicted with high levels of poverty, hunger and malnutrition, and aggravated food security challenges.
  3. We support measures to increase MDBs’ financial capacity. In particular, we underscore the importance of the International Development Association (IDA) as the single largest source of leveraged international finance in fighting poverty and hunger and malnutrition and look forward to having these priorities as an important component of a successful IDA 21 replenishment in 2024. We recognize the successful outcome of IFAD13 and AsDF 14 replenishment negotiations and encourage further pledges from those that have not yet made them, and we look forward to a successful replenishment of the African Development Fund next year. We also welcome the upcoming replenishment of the Global Finance Facility and redoubled efforts to mobilize new resources through GAFSP. We aim to align part of these additional resources with the objectives of the Alliance, while respecting the independent governance and decision-making processes at the MDBs, IDA and other international financial institutions. The Global Alliance will continue to support ongoing efforts by MDBs to encourage private and domestic resource mobilization and provide technical cooperation. We look forward to coordinating the work of the Global Alliance with the ongoing reform agenda across the MDB ecosystem and the ongoing work on a G20 Roadmap for better, bigger, and more effective MDBs, so that synergies can be leveraged.
  4. Sustainable economic prosperity can be a key enabler of the fight against hunger and poverty. We are committed to continue to promote strong, sustainable, balanced, and inclusive growth focused on leaving no one behind. Adherence to sustainable fiscal policies and fostering a global dialogue on fair and progressive tax systems can also support the allocation of more domestic resources, among other sound fiscal measures to avoid debt distress. We also plan to focus on mainstreaming the fight against hunger, poverty, malnutrition and inequality as key policy concerns; enhancing the representation and voice of developing countries in decision-making in global economic and financial institutions, while respecting their individual governance frameworks, in order to deliver more effective, credible, and accountable institutions; and promoting sustainable flows of concessional resources, with clear allocation frameworks to support low- and middle-income countries most in need. We welcome pledges made to channel Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) to support countries most in need and encourage their swift delivery. Voluntary rechanneling of Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) through MDBs is an option that can be explored by willing members, while respecting relevant legal frameworks and the need to preserve the reserve asset character and status of SDRs. This could strengthen MDB’s capacity to support the fight against hunger and poverty, including through the Global Alliance. We also look forward to continuing exploring how additional infrastructure financing policies can further contribute to fighting hunger and poverty while paving the way for overcoming intergenerational inequalities.
  5. Enhancing debt transparency and encouraging a responsible behaviour in addressing global debt vulnerabilities in an effective, comprehensive and systematic manner is also a priority. In this regard we commend the efforts to step-up the implementation of the Common Framework for Debt Treatment beyond the Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI) in a predictable, timely, orderly and coordinated manner. We recognize that progress on addressing debt vulnerabilities in low- and middle-income countries is critical to reduce risk of future debt distress, which bears high economic costs, and to support allocation of more resources to the fight against hunger and poverty and open fiscal space for national policies for achieving the SDGs.
  6. We recognize that biodiversity loss, drought, and the adverse effects of climate change, including more frequent and extreme weather events, are among the key factors contributing to a reversal in the long-term progress in fighting global hunger, making the prospect of ending hunger, poverty and all forms of malnutrition by 2030 more difficult. Thus, we have to increase our efforts in implementing the Paris Agreement and the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. We also acknowledge that investing in the expansion of sustainable, climate-resilient and inclusive food systems is indispensable to address the multiple and widespread impacts of climate change and biodiversity loss, while providing support and creating economic incentives for smallholders and family farmers and diversifying the supply necessary to improve food security and nutrition.
  7. Climate and disaster-risk financing instruments, when linked with adaptive social protection systems, can enable resilience and adaptation to climate change as well as faster, more cost-effective, and predictable responses to climate and disaster related shocks. As we promote a G20 review of the operations of multilateral climate and environmental funds, in view of their key role in supporting sustainable, inclusive and just transition pathways, we invite climate funds, facilities, and financial mechanisms for climate adaptation, disaster risk reduction and for responding to loss and damage, to consider within their existing mandates and objectives increasing their support to dedicated to nationally owned adaptive social protection mechanisms. Further, we encourage countries to enhance the role of these mechanisms in their national climate, disaster risk reduction and biodiversity plans. These adaptive social protection programs can encompass scalable initiatives to support poor populations and groups most vulnerable to climate change, including all women and girls in diverse conditions and situations, smallholder and family farmers and people with disabilities. We also emphasize the importance of adaptation financing directed to the AFOLU (Agriculture, Forestry, and Other Land Uses) sector, the one most directly linked to poor households and livelihoods and enhancing access to adaptation financing for smallholder and family farmers, with a particular focus on small-scale farmers who are underrepresented in climate finance investment. We look forward to upcoming sessions of the Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC and the Meetings of the Parties to the Paris Agreement as occasions to further address the interlinkages between climate, hunger, and eradication of poverty.

3. Global mobilization and synergies with existing initiatives and fora

  1. We commit to strengthening our collective efforts for a global mobilization to fight hunger and poverty, leveraging existing initiatives and international processes. We put forward a flexible, action-oriented Global Alliance between countries and other partners, focused on bringing structured support and shared learning to country-led, program-level implementation. As the Alliance’s approach allows for synergies with various existing initiatives and funding channels, including, but not limited to, the International Development Association (IDA), the UN Food Systems Hub, the Global Partnership for Universal Social Protection (USP2030), the UN Global Accelerator for Jobs and Social Protection, the Global Coalition for Social Justice, the G20 Rural Youth Employment Initiative, the Global Agriculture and Food Security Program and Dashboard, the Joint SDG Fund, the G20 initiative on supporting industrialization in Africa and LDCs, the Comprehensive African Agricultural Development Program (CAADP), the G20 Compact with Africa, the School Meals Coalition, and the efforts to deliver on the COP28 UAE Declaration on Sustainable Agriculture, Resilient Food Systems and Climate Action, we call on these and other initiatives to consider implementing appropriate partnerships that leverage each other’s roles and strengths, in a manner that actively addresses the interlinkages between SDG 1 and SDG 2, together with other interrelated SDGs, consistent with the objectives of the Global Alliance. We take note of the 2025 Paris Nutrition for Growth Summit and hope that its outcomes can support the implementation of nutrition-sensitive policies, including those under the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty.
  2. The Global Alliance will not establish additional fora or working groups for multilateral policy debate or convergence, recognizing the legitimacy of existing multilateral mechanisms. In this sense, we reaffirm the central role of the United Nations and its specialized Agencies and Programs, including the Rome-Based Agencies, in promoting this debate and convergence. We take note of the key role of the Committee on World Food Security (CFS) as an inclusive intergovernmental platform for a broad range of stakeholders to work together to ensure food security and nutrition for all and look forward to the national implementation of programs and policy instruments through the support of the Global Alliance as an additional avenue to implement actions recommended under the CFS voluntary guidelines, the UN Decade of Action on Nutrition, and other guidelines and policy products from CFS and other related international initiatives and fora.
  3. We also reaffirm the relevance of the UN Commission for Social Development (CSocD) under ECOSOC as a key forum for convergence on many aspects related to the fight against poverty, and the implementation of the Copenhagen Declaration on Social Development. We look forward to the Second World Summit for Social Development in 2025, to address gaps, recommit to the principles outlined in the 1995 Copenhagen Declaration and provide additional momentum towards the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. We advance the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty as a key initiative to contribute to those goals.
  4. Mindful of the G20’s responsibility in reinforcing and complementing international economic cooperation and partnership, we hereby reassert our shared commitment to implementing this global call for enhanced policy action and resource mobilization from all sources towards the fight against hunger, poverty, malnutrition, and inequality. Our collective will is for the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty to become a catalyst for tangible progress towards a world free of hunger and poverty, with sustainable and inclusive prosperity for all.

Notes

1. The G20 has delivered a broad range of global initiatives in collaboration with IOs and other relevant stakeholders. These initiatives include the Agricultural Market Information System (AMIS), the Social Protection Inter-Agency Cooperation Board (SPIAC-B), the knowledge sharing and capacity strengthening platform socialprotection.org, the Inter-Agency Social Protection Assessments (ISPA) tools, the G20 Food Security and Nutrition Framework and Action Plan, the G20 Policy Principles to ensure access to adequate social protection for all in a changing world of work, the Global Agriculture and Food Security Program (GAFSP), the G20 Action Plan on Food Security and Sustainable Food Systems, the G20 Matera Declaration on Food Security, Nutrition and Food Systems and the G20 Deccan High Level Principles on Food Security and Nutrition. In addition, various other efforts outside of the G20 have also been observed, including the USP2030 – Universal Social protection initiative and the UN Global Accelerator for Jobs and Social protection.

2. Throughout this document “women and girls” may be read in conjunction with “irrespective of age, disability, race, ethnicity, origin, religion or economic or other status.”

3. Agriculture is defined as the broad sector encompassing crop cultivation, livestock rearing, forestry, and fisheries, aimed at producing food, fiber, and other goods. It includes crop production, livestock breeding, forest management, and aquaculture.

Foundational Documents

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GLOBAL ALLIANCE AGAINST HUNGER AND POVERTY—INCEPTION DOCUMENT

United against Hunger and Poverty

1. Taking stock of pressing challenges and insufficient progress towards eliminating hunger and poverty

  1. Given the persistently high levels of global hunger and poverty, we, representatives of G20 members and invited countries met in Rio de Janeiro, on 24 July 2024, for the Ministerial Meeting of the Task Force for the establishment of a Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty. Building on the legacy of previous G20 presidencies and relevant G20 workstreams, including the G20 Finance and Sherpa tracks, as well as on various recent, related international efforts in promoting sustainable development,1 we reaffirm the imperative to end hunger and poverty and are committed to further accelerating the full and effective implementation of the 2030 Agenda and achievement of its Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), as the only globally accepted roadmap on the matter.
  2. We recognize that the world has experienced significant setbacks in achieving SDGs 1 (no poverty) and 2 (zero hunger), among other SDGs, due to challenges intensified by climate change, biodiversity loss, the COVID-19 pandemic, economic slowdowns and downturns, supply chain disruption, conflicts, and other facets of the multidimensional global crisis. We note with alarm the first increase in extreme poverty and inequality in more than two decades. Approximately 712 million people were living in extreme poverty in 2022, 23 million more than in 2019, with higher rates affecting the poorest countries, and children disproportionately affected, being twice as likely as adults to be living in extreme poverty. Wealth and income inequality within many countries have been growing for decades, and income distribution between countries has started to grow more unequal since the pandemic. This increase in global poverty is the largest observed since 1990 and likely the largest rise since World War II. Though global poverty levels have declined since 2020, they remain significantly higher than they would have been according to pre-pandemic trendlines.
  3. We express deep concern for the state of food insecurity and malnutrition across the world. According to the 2024 report on the State of World Food Insecurity (SOFI), released in Rio today, around 733 million people were facing hunger in 2023, with more than 2.8 billion people in the world—or more than one third of the world population—unable to afford a healthy diet. Over 152 million more people faced hunger in 2023 than in 2019, before the pandemic. 26.7% of women worldwide were food insecure, compared to 25.4% of men, showing a gender gap worldwide. 148 million children under five were affected by stunting and 37 million were overweight. 28.9% of the world population was facing moderate or severe food insecurity and 282 million people in 59 food crisis countries/territories face high levels of acute food insecurity.
  4. We recognize that hunger and malnutrition are perverse manifestations of structural and multidimensional poverty and inequality. Despite ongoing national and international efforts to alleviate poverty and hunger, the absence or insufficiency of effective national and international policies and social protection, coupled with limited capacity of domestic and international resources to address and alleviate poverty, exacerbates hunger and the triple burden of malnutrition, depriving persons living in poverty and in vulnerable situations of means to produce or access sufficient and adequate food and healthy diets. We are concerned that social protection coverage remains extremely low in many countries and for people living in vulnerable situations. While poverty in childhood is felt most immediately and brutally by children themselves, child poverty has broader impacts on societies and economies. Hunger and malnutrition, including their short and long-term impacts on health and social and cognitive development, in turn, reinforce and perpetuate poverty and inequality over generations.
  5. We recognize that the fight against hunger, poverty, malnutrition, and inequalities can be accelerated with progress in achieving gender equality and empowering women and girls, in line with SDG5. Women and girls in diverse situations and conditions2 are disproportionally affected by hunger and malnutrition due to various socioeconomic factors, including gender stereotypes and biases, norms, attitudes and behaviours that perpetuate gender inequality, disrupted access to livelihoods and care responsibilities, among other factors. The division of labour in most societies assigns most of the unpaid care work, including childcare, long term care, preparation of meals, subsistence farming and purchase of food to women and girls. Women are actively engaged across agriculture and food systems3 as producers and entrepreneurs. The persistence of discrimination against women in access to land, finance, the labour market, social protection and to decision making power, including in politics, constitute fundamental barriers to achieving a world free of hunger, malnutrition and poverty.
  6. We acknowledge that the consequences of poverty, hunger, and malnutrition are also a critical economic concern, generating significant costs to households, health systems and economies, especially for developing countries. The vicious cycle of hunger and poverty reduces economic productivity and the potential for sustainable and inclusive growth, undermining human development, social mobility, cohesion, and stability, and reinforcing intersecting inequalities to the detriment of the persons living in the poorest and most vulnerable situations. The allocation of national and international resources to fight this challenge, including through social protection, is a critical imperative to protect those populations and an investment that can contribute to strong, sustainable, balanced and inclusive growth, generating spillovers and broader positive economic impacts.
  7. We underscore the increasing gaps towards financing the achievement of the SDGs, including for SDGs 1 and 2, and the need to address challenges to fully deliver on the framework and commitments of the 2015 Addis Ababa Action Agenda. We recognize both the scale of the challenge and the need for urgent, increased action to mobilize additional domestic and international resources from all sources to meet that challenge, while at the same time increasing their effectiveness. Several developing countries are facing challenges in their domestic budgets and international financing capabilities, a situation that has been exacerbated by the general rise in interest rates around the world, with some countries in high risk of debt distress, while some are regaining access to financial markets. Faced with an alarming increase in humanitarian needs and the insufficiency of financing to address these needs amidst multiple crises, rising fragility and emergency levels of acute food insecurity and malnutrition, we underscore the critical importance of investing in resilience as well as better and more impactful crisis prevention, preparedness, and response. We look forward to the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development (FfD) to take place in 2025 in Spain as a critical opportunity to identify priority actions to help close the resource gap needed to end poverty and hunger by 2030.
  8. We acknowledge the significant multiplication of donor channels in international development cooperation in recent years, including through several trust funds. In the previous twenty years, official financial aid flows to the global fight against hunger and poverty have been increasingly destined to smaller-scale, pilot, and local projects, and less towards national scale, government-led policies, and programs. Those official financial aid flows are also increasingly being complemented by other sources of finance, which are in some cases implemented by non-governmental organizations, the private sector, and philanthropy. Fragmentation can pose aid coordination challenges such as increased transaction costs, unsustained and sometimes conflicting policies, and could stretch recipient countries’ capacity to manage diverse requirements and implement coordinated policies. This makes it vital to promote recipient countries ownership and leadership by creating an enabling environment and a long-term framework for international financial flows, which will help streamline aid mechanisms. It will also facilitate coordination and continuity amongst diverse forms of development cooperation to ensure they are harmonized and maximize their contribution to long-term national development priorities and country-owned policy and program implementation for effective and efficient poverty and hunger alleviation efforts.

2. Enabling a Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty through political action, knowledge and finance

  1. These unprecedented challenges call for greater and more effective commitment, financing, and actions at all levels, since existing efforts seem insufficient to bring the world back on the path to zero hunger and poverty eradication. We therefore endorse the creation and look forward to the launch at the G20 Leaders’ Summit in November 2024 of a Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty to support and accelerate efforts to eradicate hunger and poverty (SDGs 1 and 2) while reducing inequalities (SDG 10), contributing to revitalize global partnerships for sustainable development (SDG 17) and to the achievement of other interlinked SDGs, and championing sustainable, inclusive and just transition pathways.
  2. The Alliance aims to a) provide sustained political drive at the highest level by the Group of 20 and other Global Alliance Members, galvanizing collective action and building upon synergies with other existing efforts to eliminate hunger and poverty across the world; and b) to facilitate mobilization and improved alignment of domestic and international support, including public and private financial resources and knowledge, to enable large-scale country-owned and country-led implementation of evidence-based programs and policy instruments, especially by countries most affected by hunger and extreme poverty and focusing on persons in vulnerable situations and those most likely to be left behind. The Global Alliance is designed to leverage existing mechanisms and initiatives while avoiding duplication.
  3. The foundational elements of the Global Alliance are presented in the attachment. They include a template for the Statements of Commitment to be issued by joining members, a structured Terms of Reference and Governance Framework to steer the Alliance’s collective efforts, and a set of criteria to guide the evolving development of the Alliance’s reference basket of programs and policy instruments. We call on the relevant actors, including those in the broader UN system and the International Financial Institutions, to collaborate within their respective mandates to support those foundational elements as necessary. Recalling the open and voluntary nature of the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty, we also invite all willing UN member and observer states, development partners and knowledge institutions to consider joining the Alliance as founding members before its official launch. We also take note of the five reports prepared under responsibility of FAO, SPIAC-B, ODI, UNICEF, WFP and the World Bank as inputs to our work on establishing the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty as well as the additional technical inputs and presentations provided by ECLAC, IDB, IMF, OECD, ILO and others, and thank those institutions for their contributions.

Country-level policy action

  1. We reaffirm that eradicating poverty in all its forms and dimensions, including extreme poverty, is the greatest global challenge and an indispensable requirement for sustainable development. We reaffirm everyone should have access to safe, nutritious, affordable, and sufficient food and healthy diets, consistent with the progressive realization of the right to adequate food in the context of national food security. Achieving food security and nutrition through healthy diets reduces strain on public healthcare and pension systems. Increasing access to adequate, diversified and healthy diets can also create incentives for the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity and adaptation to and mitigation of climate change, contributing to the swift, full and effective implementation of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework and the realization of 2050 Vision of “Living in harmony with Nature”.
  2. We also call on all governments to honor their commitments to nationally appropriate social protection and social protection floors, in progressive realization of the right of everyone to social security, and in alignment with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG 1.3). Universal Social Protection significantly contributes to reducing poverty, hunger and inequality and is essential to promoting sustained inclusive economic and social development and advance progress on all the other SDGs, such as the promotion of decent work, and improvements to health and education outcomes.
  3. We commit to enhancing programs and policies, including through either domestic implementation of or through policy cooperation and support of the national implementation of the programs and policy instruments in the Global Alliance’s reference basket, as adapted to national circumstances and realities, focusing on social protection, food security and nutrition, socioeconomic inclusion, resilience building, and access to quality and inclusive education and health, with a focus on those most affected by poverty, hunger and malnutrition and persons in vulnerable situations (including all women and girls in diverse conditions and situations, children and youth, older persons, Indigenous Peoples, local communities, refugees, migrants and persons with disabilities) Those programs and policy instruments may include, but are not limited to, food assistance and social protection schemes such as cash and in-kind transfer programs, including those linked to social services and promotion of livelihoods; adaptive social protection; school feeding programs, including those using sustainably produced and locally procured food from family farmers and smallholder farmers; stimulation of local markets and value chains; maternal, child and early childhood nutrition and support programs; food banks; aquatic food programs; programs to promote adequate and healthy diets and prevention of all forms of malnutrition; skills development; decent work policies and employment services; health (including evidence-based traditional and complementary medicine) and care services (including accessible care and support services for childcare, persons with disabilities and older persons); promotion of smallholder and family farmers’ access to finance, extension services, knowledge, research and/or agricultural inputs; and policy reforms towards more effective practices which benefit the poorest, with positive impacts on climate and nature, among others. Those practices may also include, among others, targeted, effective and efficient programs and policy instruments that use market-driven and market-oriented approaches where appropriate in combatting hunger and poverty, under country-led policies. We acknowledge the Global Alliance’s policy basket approach as a concrete guide to country-led action which does not imply collective endorsement of specific policy instruments or programs included therein.
  4. We encourage all countries to make efforts to design, implement and mobilize funding for such policies, including for capacity development, as appropriate and adapted to their respective realities and contexts, while maintaining effective governance, leaving no one behind, strengthening domestic resource mobilization, seeking and sharing lessons and experiences, and providing for gender responsiveness, adequate targeting of population groups, appropriate monitoring and evaluation, local stakeholder engagement, adequate management of policy synergies and trade-offs, while avoiding negative impacts on SDGs and respecting international obligations and commitments as well as domestic legislation.
  5. Food insecurity, malnutrition and poverty are often driven or aggravated by conflicts and environmental, climate and economic shocks. The recurrent, protracted, and complex nature of an increased number of crises and disasters underlines the need for more coherent and fit for purpose coordination between humanitarian assistance and development programmes, including to enhance preparedness and responses to future crises. Humanitarian and development partners should, under the request of recipient governments, provide support to create the conditions for government-led development without undermining traditional coping systems, humanitarian principles or national legislation. Such efforts contribute to addressing food insecurity and poverty but also to increase the resilience of persons in vulnerable situations to shocks while building national capacities to manage social protection needs in the longer term. Such approaches should be supported by increased coordination and flexibility between financing modalities from diverse funding sources to ensure that adequate resources are in the right place at the right time.
  6. Beyond the direct transformative impact of programs and policy instruments targeted at those most affected by poverty, to be supported by the Global Alliance and its members, we aim to reinforce action on all appropriate fronts to tackle hunger and poverty by addressing other enabling factors and root causes. We are committed to promoting sustainable and inclusive development and growth and jobs, including through investments in education, industrialization, infrastructure and digitalization. We also highlight the importance of G20 Principles on Harnessing Data for Development (D4D) in accelerating the 2030 Agenda. In this context, we also recognize that sustainable production and consumption (SDG 12), including by embracing Lifestyles for Sustainable Development (LiFE), can support international and national efforts towards meeting the basic needs of all people, especially of persons in poverty and people living in vulnerable situations. Building resilient, sustainable and inclusive agriculture and food systems is essential for sustainable and inclusive economic growth and breaking the cycle of hunger, poverty and malnutrition. In pursuit of this objective, we will work towards promoting formalization and decent work for agri-food sector workers, both waged and self-employed, who are disproportionately affected by poverty and food insecurity. We aim also to work towards increasing access to, availability, and efficient use of fertilizer and agricultural inputs, including through strengthening local fertilizer production and improving soil health, and towards reducing food loss and waste, and supporting a circular bioeconomy. At the same time, we underscore the importance of the rules-based, non-discriminatory, fair, open, inclusive, equitable, sustainable and transparent multilateral trading system, with WTO at its core, to foster access to inputs, goods and services to support the production as well as access to safe, nutritious and affordable food.

Knowledge sharing and cooperation

  1. In scaling up implementation of policies against hunger and poverty, the significance of knowledge sharing, and cooperation cannot be overstated.
    All countries and local, national, regional, and global institutions and knowledge holders may offer valuable lessons and insights to conform the Alliance’s reference basket of policy instruments. Our efforts should acknowledge the inherent value of national knowledge institutions and development partners and embrace all forms of collaboration, including North-South, South-South and trilateral, as well as other forms. We therefore invite all national, regional, and global institutions that manage, guide, or contribute to the development of knowledge resources to join the Global Alliance. Under the Alliance’s Knowledge Pillar, knowledge entities will have the opportunity to offer technical assistance and facilitate the exchange of lessons among members, with a focus on addressing the unique policy implementation challenges faced at the country level, with full respect to relevant intellectual property rights.
  2. Drawing on past G20 and other collective efforts, we encourage existing information, financial and knowledge platforms relevant to the fight against hunger and poverty to improve integration, coordination or cooperation with the Global Alliance and its Support Mechanism. We thank socialprotection.org for hosting the online consultations for the reference basket of policies and call on its continued refinement at the center of a broader knowledge platform for the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty.
  3. We will strive to secure adequate and responsible long-term investments in capacity building for hunger and poverty alleviation, agricultural R&D and education by all sources, and to promote agricultural science, innovations and technology, cooperation and exchange among countries on voluntary and mutually agreed terms, targeting these efforts and investments at the root causes of hunger and poverty and contemporary sustainability challenges faced by agriculture, and food systems, rural areas; preventing food loss and waste, and strengthening the capacity of farmers, in particular smallholders and family farmers, including fisherfolk and pastoralists, to access and integrate existing and new knowledge. These investments could contemplate extension services, farmers and advisory training and education services, and also rely on cost-effective digital solutions, such as open and interoperable soil health data platforms and agroecological and other innovative approaches. We also call on global, regional and national research institutions and initiatives, including the global network of CGIAR research centers, to mobilize responsible investments to support those efforts, as well as to incorporate traditional and Indigenous knowledges ((having regard to national and international law addressing Intellectual Property, genetic resources and traditional knowledges), local preferences and local production (including millets, quinoa, sorghum and other traditional crops, such as rice, wheat and maize) in favor of more diverse, nutritious and healthy diets and more sustainable, productive, resilient and less wasteful agriculture and food systems that are also more inclusive, deliver decent work and livelihoods, and foster both rural and urban development and revitalization.
  4. We also underscore the importance of continuous social research and learning, so that well-conducted research and data collection can be applied to inform science and evidence-based decision-making and monitor the impact of social protection interventions on food security and nutrition and multidimensional poverty alleviation. While also stressing the role of education in alleviating poverty and hunger, we encourage qualifying research institutions to work with the Global Alliance to form partnerships with implementing countries to assess policy implementation experiences and promote continuous learning.

Financial support and cooperation

  1. We invite all national, regional, and global financial institutions to join the Global Alliance. Recognizing the existing challenges of development finance for global hunger, malnutrition and poverty eradication, which is highly fragmented as well as resource constrained, we recognize the need for further work to analyze the tradeoffs and bottlenecks in the current development finance landscape and we invite relevant stakeholders to voluntarily identify and apply ways to mobilize, coordinate, align, pool and/or combine resources, where appropriate, in an impact oriented and cost-effective way, in favor of country-owned implementation of policies and programs in the Global Alliance’s policy basket, in line with national circumstances, capabilities and contexts, including through various strategies and innovative financing approaches such as blended financing, concessional co-financing, partnerships and linking vertical and horizontal donor platforms, as well as leveraging country platforms and/or Integrated National Financing Frameworks (INFFs). We invite all Alliance members to collaborate and present ideas for harnessing financial resources and coordinating funds in support of key policies within the Alliance policy basket, globally and/or at country level, while respecting international obligations and commitments.
  2. We aim to scale up and optimize financing for sustainable development from all sources considering fiscal constraints, including channels that provide the highest leverage. We reaffirm our commitment towards the mobilisation of affordable, adequate and accessible financing from all sources to support developing countries in their domestic efforts to address bottlenecks for implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the Addis Ababa Action Agenda. We call upon developed countries to fully deliver on their respective ODA commitments that complements and encourages development financing from all other sources, including public and private, domestic and international, in a timely manner, and contribute to addressing the financing needs of developing countries. We welcome efforts made by countries to amplify aid and other Official Development Finance flows to meet existing donor commitments and expand the donor base, to combat food insecurity and malnutrition and to support poverty reduction programs, especially in countries afflicted with high levels of poverty, hunger and malnutrition, and aggravated food security challenges.
  3. We support measures to increase MDBs’ financial capacity. In particular, we underscore the importance of the International Development Association (IDA) as the single largest source of leveraged international finance in fighting poverty and hunger and malnutrition and look forward to having these priorities as an important component of a successful IDA 21 replenishment in 2024. We recognize the successful outcome of IFAD13 and AsDF 14 replenishment negotiations and encourage further pledges from those that have not yet made them, and we look forward to a successful replenishment of the African Development Fund next year. We also welcome the upcoming replenishment of the Global Finance Facility and redoubled efforts to mobilize new resources through GAFSP. We aim to align part of these additional resources with the objectives of the Alliance, while respecting the independent governance and decision-making processes at the MDBs, IDA and other international financial institutions. The Global Alliance will continue to support ongoing efforts by MDBs to encourage private and domestic resource mobilization and provide technical cooperation. We look forward to coordinating the work of the Global Alliance with the ongoing reform agenda across the MDB ecosystem and the ongoing work on a G20 Roadmap for better, bigger, and more effective MDBs, so that synergies can be leveraged.
  4. Sustainable economic prosperity can be a key enabler of the fight against hunger and poverty. We are committed to continue to promote strong, sustainable, balanced, and inclusive growth focused on leaving no one behind. Adherence to sustainable fiscal policies and fostering a global dialogue on fair and progressive tax systems can also support the allocation of more domestic resources, among other sound fiscal measures to avoid debt distress. We also plan to focus on mainstreaming the fight against hunger, poverty, malnutrition and inequality as key policy concerns; enhancing the representation and voice of developing countries in decision-making in global economic and financial institutions, while respecting their individual governance frameworks, in order to deliver more effective, credible, and accountable institutions; and promoting sustainable flows of concessional resources, with clear allocation frameworks to support low- and middle-income countries most in need. We welcome pledges made to channel Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) to support countries most in need and encourage their swift delivery. Voluntary rechanneling of Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) through MDBs is an option that can be explored by willing members, while respecting relevant legal frameworks and the need to preserve the reserve asset character and status of SDRs. This could strengthen MDB’s capacity to support the fight against hunger and poverty, including through the Global Alliance. We also look forward to continuing exploring how additional infrastructure financing policies can further contribute to fighting hunger and poverty while paving the way for overcoming intergenerational inequalities.
  5. Enhancing debt transparency and encouraging a responsible behaviour in addressing global debt vulnerabilities in an effective, comprehensive and systematic manner is also a priority. In this regard we commend the efforts to step-up the implementation of the Common Framework for Debt Treatment beyond the Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI) in a predictable, timely, orderly and coordinated manner. We recognize that progress on addressing debt vulnerabilities in low- and middle-income countries is critical to reduce risk of future debt distress, which bears high economic costs, and to support allocation of more resources to the fight against hunger and poverty and open fiscal space for national policies for achieving the SDGs.
  6. We recognize that biodiversity loss, drought, and the adverse effects of climate change, including more frequent and extreme weather events, are among the key factors contributing to a reversal in the long-term progress in fighting global hunger, making the prospect of ending hunger, poverty and all forms of malnutrition by 2030 more difficult. Thus, we have to increase our efforts in implementing the Paris Agreement and the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. We also acknowledge that investing in the expansion of sustainable, climate-resilient and inclusive food systems is indispensable to address the multiple and widespread impacts of climate change and biodiversity loss, while providing support and creating economic incentives for smallholders and family farmers and diversifying the supply necessary to improve food security and nutrition.
  7. Climate and disaster-risk financing instruments, when linked with adaptive social protection systems, can enable resilience and adaptation to climate change as well as faster, more cost-effective, and predictable responses to climate and disaster related shocks. As we promote a G20 review of the operations of multilateral climate and environmental funds, in view of their key role in supporting sustainable, inclusive and just transition pathways, we invite climate funds, facilities, and financial mechanisms for climate adaptation, disaster risk reduction and for responding to loss and damage, to consider within their existing mandates and objectives increasing their support to dedicated to nationally owned adaptive social protection mechanisms. Further, we encourage countries to enhance the role of these mechanisms in their national climate, disaster risk reduction and biodiversity plans. These adaptive social protection programs can encompass scalable initiatives to support poor populations and groups most vulnerable to climate change, including all women and girls in diverse conditions and situations, smallholder and family farmers and people with disabilities. We also emphasize the importance of adaptation financing directed to the AFOLU (Agriculture, Forestry, and Other Land Uses) sector, the one most directly linked to poor households and livelihoods and enhancing access to adaptation financing for smallholder and family farmers, with a particular focus on small-scale farmers who are underrepresented in climate finance investment. We look forward to upcoming sessions of the Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC and the Meetings of the Parties to the Paris Agreement as occasions to further address the interlinkages between climate, hunger, and eradication of poverty.

3. Global mobilization and synergies with existing initiatives and fora

  1. We commit to strengthening our collective efforts for a global mobilization to fight hunger and poverty, leveraging existing initiatives and international processes. We put forward a flexible, action-oriented Global Alliance between countries and other partners, focused on bringing structured support and shared learning to country-led, program-level implementation. As the Alliance’s approach allows for synergies with various existing initiatives and funding channels, including, but not limited to, the International Development Association (IDA), the UN Food Systems Hub, the Global Partnership for Universal Social Protection (USP2030), the UN Global Accelerator for Jobs and Social Protection, the Global Coalition for Social Justice, the G20 Rural Youth Employment Initiative, the Global Agriculture and Food Security Program and Dashboard, the Joint SDG Fund, the G20 initiative on supporting industrialization in Africa and LDCs, the Comprehensive African Agricultural Development Program (CAADP), the G20 Compact with Africa, the School Meals Coalition, and the efforts to deliver on the COP28 UAE Declaration on Sustainable Agriculture, Resilient Food Systems and Climate Action, we call on these and other initiatives to consider implementing appropriate partnerships that leverage each other’s roles and strengths, in a manner that actively addresses the interlinkages between SDG 1 and SDG 2, together with other interrelated SDGs, consistent with the objectives of the Global Alliance. We take note of the 2025 Paris Nutrition for Growth Summit and hope that its outcomes can support the implementation of nutrition-sensitive policies, including those under the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty.
  2. The Global Alliance will not establish additional fora or working groups for multilateral policy debate or convergence, recognizing the legitimacy of existing multilateral mechanisms. In this sense, we reaffirm the central role of the United Nations and its specialized Agencies and Programs, including the Rome-Based Agencies, in promoting this debate and convergence. We take note of the key role of the Committee on World Food Security (CFS) as an inclusive intergovernmental platform for a broad range of stakeholders to work together to ensure food security and nutrition for all and look forward to the national implementation of programs and policy instruments through the support of the Global Alliance as an additional avenue to implement actions recommended under the CFS voluntary guidelines, the UN Decade of Action on Nutrition, and other guidelines and policy products from CFS and other related international initiatives and fora.
  3. We also reaffirm the relevance of the UN Commission for Social Development (CSocD) under ECOSOC as a key forum for convergence on many aspects related to the fight against poverty, and the implementation of the Copenhagen Declaration on Social Development. We look forward to the Second World Summit for Social Development in 2025, to address gaps, recommit to the principles outlined in the 1995 Copenhagen Declaration and provide additional momentum towards the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. We advance the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty as a key initiative to contribute to those goals.
  4. Mindful of the G20’s responsibility in reinforcing and complementing international economic cooperation and partnership, we hereby reassert our shared commitment to implementing this global call for enhanced policy action and resource mobilization from all sources towards the fight against hunger, poverty, malnutrition, and inequality. Our collective will is for the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty to become a catalyst for tangible progress towards a world free of hunger and poverty, with sustainable and inclusive prosperity for all.

Notes

1. The G20 has delivered a broad range of global initiatives in collaboration with IOs and other relevant stakeholders. These initiatives include the Agricultural Market Information System (AMIS), the Social Protection Inter-Agency Cooperation Board (SPIAC-B), the knowledge sharing and capacity strengthening platform socialprotection.org, the Inter-Agency Social Protection Assessments (ISPA) tools, the G20 Food Security and Nutrition Framework and Action Plan, the G20 Policy Principles to ensure access to adequate social protection for all in a changing world of work, the Global Agriculture and Food Security Program (GAFSP), the G20 Action Plan on Food Security and Sustainable Food Systems, the G20 Matera Declaration on Food Security, Nutrition and Food Systems and the G20 Deccan High Level Principles on Food Security and Nutrition. In addition, various other efforts outside of the G20 have also been observed, including the USP2030 – Universal Social protection initiative and the UN Global Accelerator for Jobs and Social protection.

2. Throughout this document “women and girls” may be read in conjunction with “irrespective of age, disability, race, ethnicity, origin, religion or economic or other status.”

3. Agriculture is defined as the broad sector encompassing crop cultivation, livestock rearing, forestry, and fisheries, aimed at producing food, fiber, and other goods. It includes crop production, livestock breeding, forest management, and aquaculture.