The countries of Latin America and the Caribbean will hold the Fourth Meeting of the Regional Conference on Population and Development during the first half of 2022 at the central headquarters of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) in Santiago, Chile, using a hybrid modality, meaning a mix of in-person and virtual participation. The decision was reached by the 14 member countries of the Conference’s Presiding Officers at a virtual meeting held on May 20.
Participating in the opening session of that meeting were Silvia Loli Espinoza, Minister for Women’s Affairs and Vulnerable Populations of Peru, the country that is currently serving as Chair of the Regional Conference on Population and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean; Raúl García-Buchaca, Deputy Executive Secretary for Management and Program Analysis of ECLAC; and Harold Robinson, Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA). Also participating were delegations from the member countries of the Conference’s Presiding Officers: Peru, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Costa Rica, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Mexico, Suriname, Uruguay and Venezuela.
In his opening remarks, Raúl García-Buchaca emphasized the crucial relevance that the multilateral instruments conceived of for reducing inequality gaps in our societies – such as Latin America and the Caribbean’s Montevideo Consensus on Population and Development and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development – have acquired in the context of the dire panorama posed by the health crisis.
He also highlighted that the Regional Conference is an insuperable platform for taking the 2030 Agenda to people: children, adolescents, women, older persons, migrants, people with disabilities, indigenous and Afro-descendent peoples – in other words, to everyone, leaving no one behind.
During the meeting, among other mandates, the Presiding Officers requested that ECLAC, in its capacity as technical secretariat of the Conference, prepare a document in collaboration with UNFPA on the sociodemographic impacts of the pandemic in the region, with recommendations for recovery and rebuilding in the framework of the Montevideo Consensus, to be presented during the Fourth Meeting of the Conference.
The Regional Conference on Population and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean is a subsidiary body of ECLAC. It meets every two years and its Presiding Officers, currently chaired by Peru, meets at least once between the Conference’s ordinary sessions.
