South-South and triangular cooperation in Latin America

Briefing 26-03-2019

Over the past few decades, South-South and triangular cooperation (TrC) among developing countries has been acquiring increasing importance as a necessary complement to traditional North-South development cooperation. The United Nations (UN) High Level Conference on Technical Cooperation among Developing Countries held in Argentina in 1978 set the basic framework for this form of cooperation with its Buenos Aires Plan of Action (BAPA). The model was recently modified by the UN 2030 Agenda for Development and its 17 sustainable development goals, together with the Addis Ababa Action Agenda for financing development cooperation. The Latin American region has been a pioneer of South-South cooperation (SSC), both bilateral and regional, as well as of TrC and SSC with other developing regions. Its various regional and sub-regional integration mechanisms, including the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), and the Ibero-American Conference, have established their own cooperation bodies. Moreover, since 2006, this cooperation has been described in detail in an annual report on South-South cooperation in Ibero-America. The 2019 UN High Level Conference on South-South Cooperation, held in Buenos Aires from 20 to 22 March 2019, 40 years after the Buenos Aires Action Plan (BAPA +40), presented a unique opportunity to tailor SSC and TrC more closely to the 2030 Agenda and its sustainable development goals. The EU took part in the conference and contributed to the outcome document. The EU promotes this type of cooperation as part of its European Consensus for Development, and has launched a regional facility to this effect.