TMCD Director Professor Xiaolan Fu, recently spoke at a joint meeting of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and the second committee of the United Nations General Assembly alongside the Chair of the second committee of the UNGA, H.E Ambassador Amrit Bahadur Rai; President of ECOSOC, H.E Ambassador Munir Akram and the Secretary-General of  the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), Dr. Mukhisa Kituyi on the topic 'Developing Sustainable Infrastructure and Utilizing Science and Technology in Response to COVID-19'. The meeting was held on Wednesday, 14th October, 2020.

In her remarks, Prof Fu noted that multi-disciplinary and multi-stakeholder global collaboration is crucial for maximizing the impact of the  Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) response to COVID-19 and the  acceleration of SDG progress. She argued for the need for governments to see SDG implementation as an opportunity and create SDG-driven windows of opportunity for their countries rather than viewing it as a burden. According to her, institutional change and policy are important drivers of such SDG-driven windows of opportunity.