From 30 June to 3 July, representatives from governments across the world met in Seville, Spain, for the Fourth Financing for Development (FfD4) summit. This UN event, last held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, a decade ago, is designed to be a forum for securing capital to fund global development.

The Sevilla Commitment, adopted at the summit’s closure, covered a broad range of issues relating to development finance, including continued reform of the international financial architecture, the importance of South-South development cooperation as a “complement to” traditional North-South cooperation, and steps towards enhancing debt sustainability.

The summit shone a spotlight on the inadequate and unhealthy state of the world’s financial architecture. Nearly half of African nations spend more on debt servicing than on health. Five spend more on interest payments than investment. Meanwhile, all of the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals for the world, set to be achieved by 2030, are off track.

FfD4 also demonstrated how much global development finance has changed in the decade since the last conference in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Not least is how China has emerged as a major finance and investment partner for much of the Global South – a phenomenon that is here to stay and evolving fast.

Although policy disagreements prompted the US to withdraw, the Sevilla Commitment still received strong backing from the other 192 UN member states. However, prominent voices from the Global South have expressed serious reservations about it.

Criticisms of the agreement include that it falls short of addressing the urgent and profound nature of the debt crisis, particularly in Africa, and fails to provide any clear next steps. With that in mind, it is important to look to the next multilateral moments that could help establish more concrete measures to tackle the world’s development finance problems. The discussions on climate finance at COP30 in Brazil this November will be one such moment.

Dialogue Earth spoke with various experts in development finance and debt sustainability about what the Seville summit means for the world. Their responses have been edited for length and clarity.

Jason Rosario Braganza

Executive director, African Forum and Network on Debt and Development (Afrodad)

Image courtesy of Jason Rosario Braganza

This conference focused on policy reforms and interventions that, over time, could improve access to finance for developing countries to support their national agendas. From an African perspective, the link between debt and climate was underwhelming. The Sevilla Commitment pushes debt swaps and climate-related bonds as key tools, but this is deeply problematic. Issuing new debt to respond to a climate crisis when over half of the African continent is already in a debt crisis is contradictory and unwise.

Debt swaps, in particular, are a false solution. Evidence shows they haven’t led to meaningful climate action, debt relief, or economic transformation. But despite a lack of proof that they work, finance ministers are being encouraged to pursue these instruments.

On addressing Africa’s specific adaptation and development needs, there was little of substance in the Sevilla Commitment. However, it was encouraging to see efforts to align climate finance and development finance. This helps Africa take a more coordinated and coherent approach to how we generate and allocate resources, and how that connects to our broader development goals.

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There is also some useful language in the debt section (paragraphs 46-51), particularly around improving debt sustainability analysis. However, much of this work remains dominated by the International Monetary Fund, whose assumptions don’t always reflect Africa’s realities. African governments, civil society and academia should use this as a springboard to push for an African-led DSA [debt sustainability assessment] framework through the African Union.

The call for an intergovernmental process to reform the global debt architecture is a major step forward, especially as current frameworks like the G20 Common Framework have failed Africa. It’s also encouraging to see African and small island states leading in pushing progressive reforms, while traditional powers stall. The recognition of national legislative roles in debt and climate governance is another positive. Domestic reforms must now align with global efforts to ensure real change.

Lastly, we must see Seville as part of a longer process. It is the fourth conference, preceded by Monterrey, Doha and Addis Ababa. From a debt perspective, when you’re looking at how that conversation has evolved from Monterrey [the inaugural summit in 2002] all the way to Seville, I think we can be happy with the kind of language that we have.

Ameenah Gurib-Fakim

Former President of the Republic of Mauritius and a professor of biodiversity

Image courtesy of Ameenah Gurib-Fakim

Reforming the debt sustainability analysis framework can no longer be considered as a standalone item. It requires incorporating other risk factors, including climate risks, alongside the critical investment needed for achieving the UN’s development and climate targets.

Why does it matter for a country in the Global South and a Small Island Developing State like Mauritius? Why should creditors and multilateral institutions care about a distant part of the world, where it is acknowledged that the climate crisis is an existential threat? It is because the Global South, including the Small Island Developing States, provide ecosystem services that keep us all alive and well in our interconnected world. It has been estimated that nature provides humanity with over USD 100 trillion dollars’ worth of ecosystem services for free, including the air we breathe, the food we eat and the medicine we take. Failing to protect our ecosystems is like cutting the branch on which we are all sitting.

Thus, integrating climate risks to the natural world must remain a high priority when addressing debt relief. A tried and tested approach for Small Island Developing States has been debt swaps, which are built upon commitments to protect natural habitats and associated ecosystems.

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The African continent is home to many highly indebted countries: several low- and middle-income countries are being crippled with high borrowing costs, compounded by the fact that capital is exceptionally costly for African countries. Rating agencies are generally not kind to African economies, even though they do not default.

Rather, African economies struggle locally, whether it be on health or education, because their meagre resources are funnelled into repaying debt. The paradox is that Africa is also home to some of the fastest growing economies in the world, where many economic reforms have and are being undertaken. The continent is also home to around 30% of global mineral resources, the youngest population (by 2050, one in four working-age adults is going to be African) and 60% of arable lands – a boon to becoming the food basket of the world. All of these combined assets will ensure the continent underwrites global advances.

Yet, surprisingly, African leaders are not at the forefront, despite all their assets. With such treasures, they should be shaping the rules, not just reacting to them.

Africa should not be waiting to be included but must be empowered, because her stability will be a force for good in the world. It is through this lens that she must be viewed going forward.

Sandra Guzmán

Founder, Climate Finance Group for Latin America and the Caribbean (GFLAC)

Image courtesy of Sandra Guzmán

Seville was an important milestone in advancing financial system reform, setting the tone for the next 10 years. It will help us echo our discussions in other forums on reforming the financial institutions that have increased the debt of vulnerable countries. Seville was a call to action, recognising that without financial institutions, it will be very difficult to achieve development goals.

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However, there were two challenges regarding the outcome. First, it was a very comprehensive agenda, integrating many elements and better presenting the integrity of the financial system. But because there are so many elements, the Sevilla Commitment is also very general, and the text is very broad and does not clearly set out the next steps to be taken. That’s why we must now show how Seville connects with other processes, such as the Baku-Belém route [the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change conference process].

Second, we have the problem that the United States withdrew from the process and did not send a delegation. There is uncertainty over how negatively this will affect progress. However, there’s an opportunity to rebuild new alliances, such as small, bi-regional ones.

Lin Zhu

Programme manager, Global China Initiative, Boston University Global Development Policy Center (GCI)

Image courtesy of Lin Zhu

Discussions at FfD4 highlighted three themes in China’s evolving approach to development finance.

First, China is already a major development finance actor. According to our database, the China Development Bank and the Export-Import Bank of China (the country’s two development finance institutions) have committed USD 472 billion in public and publicly guaranteed finance between 2008 and 2024 – that amounts to 56% of the World Bank’s own development financing commitments over the same period. However, Chinese development finance is smaller now than a decade ago, and China has taken a firm position that, as a developing country, it cannot fill the substantial financing gap alone. In his remarks at FfD4, the Chinese Minister of Finance Lan Fo’an underscored this, urging developed countries to “fully honour their commitments to overseas development assistance and climate finance, prioritising North-South cooperation as the main channel while treating South-South cooperation as an important complement”.

Second, China’s global development role is increasingly shifting towards green energy. Chinese development finance remained fossil fuel intensive prior to President Xi’s 2021 no-coal pledge, and still poses significantly higher risks to biodiversity compared to the World Bank projects. However, Chinese development finance has been trending green since 2021, and China is uniquely positioned to step up renewable energy financing and investment as the leading country in green and low-carbon technology development and deployment. Countries in the Global South could capitalise on the comparatively low interest rates for loans denominated in RMB [than USD or EUR], and ensure technology transfer is built into green cooperation to enable structural transformation.

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Third, China is supporting multilateral cooperation through legacy institutions, while aspiring to expand southern countries’ roles in reforming the international financial architecture. In an increasingly fragmented global economy, China continues to support the role of institutions like the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, while pushing for a shift in emphasis more aligned with Global South priorities. For example, a commitment to comprehensive creditor participation and burden sharing in debt restructuring, and China’s greater distinctions between productive and unproductive debt. More importantly, China is simultaneously attempting to provide alternatives through southern-led multilateralism, such as regional financial arrangements and southern-led multilateral development banks.

Brenda Chongo Chanda

Head of economic management and governance, African Center for Economic Transformation (Acet)

Image courtesy of Brenda Chongo Chanda

Africa finds itself at the intersection of debt distress and climate vulnerability. The Sevilla Commitment offers a tentative glimmer of hope, recognising that sovereign debt frameworks must be aligned with development initiatives and climate resilience efforts.

However, hope alone is inadequate.

There are encouraging signs. The commitment acknowledges the fragmented creditor landscape that has historically impeded debt restructuring efforts in nations such as Zambia and Ghana. It facilitates the development of climate-responsive instruments, including debt-for-climate swaps and climate-resilient clauses, which may generate opportunities for funding adaptation initiatives. Its endorsement of inclusive debt sustainability assessments and the establishment of a global debt registry signals a promising step towards greater transparency and equity in the global debt system, paving the way for much-needed reforms.

However, the commitment is voluntary and lacks enforceable mechanisms. It offers no new climate finance or guarantees of relief. Without binding provisions, creditor cooperation, or meaningful inclusion of African institutions such as the African Union or the African Development Bank, implementation risks being slow, uneven and externally driven, leaving Africa’s USD 100 billion climate finance gap unaddressed. The absence of key global actors, including the United States and influential leaders like Barbadian Prime Minister Mia Mottley and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, also weakens the consensus necessary for substantial reform.

The effectiveness of the commitment also hinges not just on technical design, but on navigating the political economy that governs global finance: fragmented creditors, fiscal pressures, global governance asymmetries and local capacity constraints.

Africa must not remain a policy-taker. The continent needs to co-create the frameworks that shape its future. That involves strengthening African institutions, ensuring national ownership and aligning ambition with action. The Sevilla Commitment establishes a foundation, but to truly deliver for Africa, it must develop into a binding framework that connects debt relief with climate action and development outcomes.