As conflict, debt pressures, and shrinking development finance reshape the global economy, governments are being asked to do more with less.  

The war and wider crisis in the Middle East continue to reverberate through the global economy, disproportionately affecting countries with the least fiscal space to absorb rising energy and food prices. Fragile economies are facing mounting pressure on debt sustainability, domestic financing, and public service delivery. At the same time, declining ODA and other sources of financing for development conditions are limiting countries’ ability to respond

Against this backdrop, UN Member States and stakeholders gathered in New York for the 2026 ECOSOC Financing for Development Forum (FfD Forum), nine months after the landmark Sevilla Agreement on Financing for Development. The meeting highlighted a central challenge facing the international community: how to advance long-term structural reforms in a moment increasingly dominated by immediate crises.  

A few weeks ago, against this backdrop, UN Member States and stakeholders gathered in New York for the 2026 ECOSOC Financing for Development Forum (FfD Forum), nine months after the landmark Sevilla Agreement on Financing for Development. The Sevilla agreement was an important milestone for the multilateral system and the broadest agreement on governance reform in a long time. The follow up meeting highlighted a central challenge facing the international community: how to advance long-term structural reforms in a moment increasingly dominated by immediate crises.   

The UNDP Global Policy Centre for Governance (GPCG) has recently approved a new programme for 2026 - 2029 with two specific an inter-related priority issues: Financial Integrity and Data Systems in countries. Both workstreams aim at supporting countries to navigate the policy space under the current conditions but also capturing the experiences of developing countries and feeding into global policy spaces. 

Balancing Immediate and Long-Term Investments 

The Financing for Development agenda addresses government capacities, systemic challenges, and the full spectrum of financing flows. It remains one of the broadest multilateral frameworks for governance reform, focused on how resources are mobilised, managed, and redistributed in ways that support sustainable development.  

But structural reform moves slowly, while crises escalate quickly.

This tension defined many of the discussions at the Forum. Countries are under growing pressure to respond to immediate economic shocks and worsening fiscal constraints, even as the need for long-term institutional reform becomes increasingly clear.

The challenge is not simply mobilizing more finance but strengthening the systems that determine whether resources are collected effectively, protected from leakages, and allocated transparently and accountably.

In this context, UNDP’s GPCG focused on two structural governance challenges firmly anchored in the Sevilla commitments and with the potential to contribute to strengthening governance and rebuilding trust: 

• regulating professional service providers who facilitate and enable illicit financial flows; and
• advancing data sharing and interoperability to strengthen domestic resource mobilization. 

Implementing Commitments on the Role of Professional Service Providers in Tackling Illicit Financial Flows 

A dedicated discussion on advancing implementation of the Sevilla Commitments on Professional Service Providers (PSPs) and their role in addressing illicit financial flows highlighted how lawyers, accountants, and other professional service providers form a critical part of the financial integrity ecosystem. Professional Service Providers have the potential either to strengthen transparency and accountability or to enable tax abuse, money laundering, corruption, organised crime, and terrorist financing.

Delegates explored concrete national and international actions that governments, industry, civil society, and international organisations can take to accelerate progress in this area. Discussions also reinforced the importance of viewing financial integrity as a systemic challenge, requiring coordinated action across anti-corruption, anti-money laundering, taxation, and governance frameworks rather than siloed responses.

The event contributes to broader ongoing discussions on financial integrity within the Financing for Development process and ahead of next year’s ECOSOC Special Meeting on Financial Integrity. 

How Data Sharing Can Boost Domestic Resource Mobilization

GPCG also convened a side event focused on the critical relationship between domestic resource mobilization (DRM) and strong national data and statistical systems.

As declining aid flows increase pressure on governments to mobilize domestic resources more effectively, the discussion examined how weak interoperability and fragmented data-sharing mechanisms across institutions undermine revenue collection, reduce efficiency, weaken public trust, and create space for corruption and illicit financial flows.

Participants emphasised how interoperability and data sharing are fundamental governance and financing challenges, not merely technical issues. Effective DRM depends on long-term investments in digital infrastructure, institutional coordination, legislation, technical capacity, and trust between citizens and the state.

The event also highlighted how the Sevilla Platform for Action positions data systems and statistics as foundational pillars of financing for sustainable development. Stronger interoperability and data sharing can improve countries’ ability to mobilize and allocate resources effectively while strengthening accountability and institutional resilience. 

Structural Reform in an Era of Uncertainty

The discussions at the Forum reinforced a broader point: periods of crisis do not reduce the importance of governance reform, they expose the costs of weak systems more clearly.  As UNDP Administrator Alexander de Croo has stated, “War is development in reverse,” and the current geopolitical landscape is rapidly reshaping development trajectories worldwide.

Against this backdrop, the two discussions convened by GPCG pointed toward a common conclusion. Stronger financial integrity frameworks and more integrated public data systems are not technical add-ons to development policy. They are foundational investments in state capacity, resilience, and public trust.  

By reducing losses linked to corruption and illicit financial flows, while improving governments’ ability to mobilize domestic resources effectively, these reforms can help countries better withstand future shocks whether they are climate, health, or conflict related.

At a time of shrinking fiscal space and growing global uncertainty, strengthening financial integrity and governance systems are not separate from development policy — it is central to it.