EU STATE OF THE UNION SPEECH When European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen 's speech wasn't overtly Ukraine-themed, it was mostly driven by the issues Russia's war in Ukraine forces onto the political agenda — like a proposed tax on energy companies' windfall profits. The European Commission president didn't, however, pay much attention to the global hunger crisis. More from POLITICO's live blog. China side notes: Von der Leyen called Chinese efforts to influence European universities and research " toxic for our democracies." In parallel, the EC delayed publication of a plan to eliminate forced labor. There was even a State of the EU speech board game — and we played it. INTERVIEW — MARK SUZMAN, CEO GATES FOUNDATION As the U.N. General Assembly officially gets underway (most leaders are not in New York until next week; official speeches begin Sept. 20), the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation on Tuesday published its annual report tracking progress toward the United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. Global Insider spoke to Suzman ahead of the report's publication. The interview has been edited for length and clarity. Time-wise we're halfway through the 2015-2030 window to meet the SDGs, but we're not halfway towards meeting them. The first two decades of the 21st century were the best two decades in human history, for hundreds of millions of people around the world — they saw really dramatic progress driven by the Millennium Development Goals, and then from 2015 the SDGs. In the last couple of years we've seen massive external shocks. Progress has stalled and in some cases reversed, and put us seriously off track for the vast majority of the SDGs. Rich countries are distracted. There's not a lot of focus. [But] it's only a couple of years of setbacks coming from many years of progress. Dollar for dollar, what are the best investments for getting back on track to meet the SDGs? We would like to double the agricultural research budget at the Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research, from $1 billion to $2 billion a year. That billion dollars should be a rounding error in our post-Covid world. The AIDS crisis shows that when enough resources are mobilized, there's very little that human ingenuity can't solve. Does that apply to the SDGs? The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria has … along with Gavi , saved 50 million lives … innovation helped drive down costs, accelerate access [to treatment], and what you have is these dramatic results. So that's exactly the kind of model that we want to learn from. We are not getting closer to gender equality. What's your reaction? If you can give women access to digital tools, particularly something as simple as a digital bank account, or a cash transfer, that actually can be a leaping off point for multiple sets of reasonable access to credit to access other sources to improve savings, those increased financial resources actually provide more as to invest in children. That helps with other SDGs, because you get better nutrition, they're more likely to send their kids to school. You have poverty reduction. Unless you target women, you simply cannot meet either our agricultural productivity or our poverty reduction goals, or provide food security. Speaking of food security: Where do you see Africa in its efforts to be self-sufficient? I look at Africa's population growth, and I don't see how aid can effectively support that. That is an absolutely factual statement, that you, we cannot resolve the broader challenges of development on the continent of Africa unless you dramatically increase your agricultural productivity and food self-sufficiency. Some of that will be large commercial farms, but the critical baseline is smallholder productivity improvements. We've seen it in countries like China. We hope that the coming COP27 climate conference, which is hosted in Africa [Egypt] will be much more focused on exactly these kinds of interventions. We certainly don't want to suggest food aid is unimportant — it's hugely important because these are communities in huge real-time distress, that need nutrition. But ideally, what you want is self-sufficiency which is possible even in Sub-Saharan Africa through targeted investments in better agricultural research. We use drought-resistant maize in Kenya, which results from some research that we supported, as an example. You've got to combine that with the targeted gender outreach and be very conscious of both objectives at the same time. What about Africa's vaccine production capacity? Clearly, the global distribution framework failed Africa dramatically, particularly in the first half of 2021. Now the world now has an excess of Covid vaccines that we're distributing. What we're trying to focus on is how do you actually build a 10, 20, 30-year framework. It's not something you do dramatically now. With vaccines, it's key to maintain the quality. And the regulatory framework is indispensable. It's important to be specific about the vaccine and the market and the area where you're investing in. We were very early investors in BioNTech six or seven years ago back when everyone thought mRNA would be the pipe dream. And we're now working with them around malaria and even HIV and TB vaccines. And they are also looking at partnerships in Senegal and Rwanda. Is it time to start thinking about what succeeds the 2030 global goals? Or do we need to keep them in place until they are reached? I don't want too much deep thinking happening now, because there are very achievable things we can still do by that 2030 deadline, even with the setbacks. This was a commitment made by every country on the planet, by the head of every government on the planet to its own citizens. You need to meet your commitments, and you should be held to account. NEW PANDEMIC FUND LAUNCHES: "The financial intermediary fund, or FIF, is housed at the World Bank and targets low- and middle-income countries facing critical gaps in their health systems," Devex reported. The fund will launch with $1.4 billion committed, though campaigners say $10.5 billion is needed. Priya Basu will head the fund's secretariat.
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