Strengthening the Resilience of Small States to achieve Sustainable Development The Project will build on the foundation and results of the Commonwealth’s long standing small states work programme to help small states strengthen their resilience and achieve their SDGs through the following initiatives:

Mobilise research, partnerships and resources to recognise the vulnerability of small states, improve their access to development finance, and support their achievement of the SDGs.

Many small states have graduated from low income status and are ineligible to access concessional finance but still face inherent vulnerabilities, and without recourse to concessional finance for their development needs, will find it even more difficult to finance the achievement of the SDGs.  Under this initiative, the Secretariat will develop a universal economic vulnerability index.  The index will be the basis for advocacy efforts to influence IFIs, and to offer targeted resilience building support.  This initiative is in line with the 2015 CHOGM mandate (para 21 and 22).  

The Secretariat has led the field in the area of vulnerability metrics from its seminal work in the 1990s and its work has been acknowledged widely, including by the World Bank.  ‘Inclusion of Vulnerability as a Criterion for Concessional Financing’ is one of the seven priority areas agreed at the 2016 World Bank Small States Forum and captured in the World Bank’s Roadmap for Engagement with Small States.  In late 2016, the Secretariat (Small States team) was subsequently invited by the World Bank to participate in an Inter-Agency Technical Working Group on Vulnerability. Where appropriate, the Secretariat will continue to work with partners to develop the universal economic vulnerability index and to draft an advocacy strategy on the vulnerability of small states.

2.	Conduct targeted policy research and global advocacy on small states issues and challenges to influence national, regional or international decision making, as well as support small states’ capacity building, particularly through knowledge exchange. 

Given their small size, small states generally lack the capacity for comprehensive policy and research, which can result in poorly designed programmes, policies and wastage of limited resources.  This initiative will focus on targeted policy research on small states issues and challenges to influence or assist decision making at the national, regional or international level.  It includes the small states’ dedicated publication series, which will capitalise on the knowledge products produced under Initiative 1 and 2, as well as cross-divisional policy research.  

The second component of this initiative relates to the advocacy of policy recommendations, which is consistent with the 2015 CHOGM mandates (para21) and 2018 CHOGM mandates (para 20-23 and 27)).  The Secretariat has produced policy research on small states issues that has contributed to tangible outcomes for member countries, such as technical assistance to St Lucia following a resilience profiling study, among others.    The Secretariat is also the only institution that has a dedicated publication series focussed on policy research on small states.