1. The Foreign Ministry, together with the Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA), will host in Seoul on September 13 the eleventh Seoul Official Development Assistance (ODA) International Conference themed “the future of international development cooperation: the role of ODA in the era of sustainable development goals (SDGs).”

2. In the forthcoming meeting, the participants will discuss the new role that ODA should play in the efforts to achieve the wide range of ambitious SDGs, and will share with one another exemplary international cases.

3. The event will bring together some 600 people, including Chairman Shim Jae-kwon of the Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee of the National Assembly, Vice Foreign Minister Cho Hyun, Assistant Secretary-General for Policy Coordination and Inter-Agency Affairs Thomas Gass of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, and those from academic circles at home and abroad, foreign assistance agencies, businesses and civil society as well as college students.

4. Vice Foreign Minister Cho Hyun will deliver a keynote speech, in which he will put forward ways for “the systematic, integrated and efficient implementation of the development assistance policy,” one of the policy tasks of the new government of the Republic of Korea; and will stress the need to conduct “open-type ODA projects” participated by highly creative Korean nationals and people of recipient countries.


* unofficial translation