Caritas backs initiative to help indebted nations

Finance ministers and representatives from 30 low- and middle-income countries have launched a new forum for countries to work together on overcoming unsustainable foreign debts that are preventing millions from accessing basic public services. 

The forum, described as a “Borrowers’ Platform”, was announced on April 15 during the World Bank and International Monetary Fund Spring Meetings in Washington, DC. The platform will provide a formal space for nations facing unsustainable debt to share technical expertise, advice and coordinate strategies. 

Groups campaigning to reform the global debt system hope the new platform will give governments in countries with high levels of sovereign debt better information for their negotiations with foreign creditors.

Ms Antonio, who is also vice president of Caritas Internationalis, welcomed the platform and pointed out that the consequences of the debt crisis are especially severe for small island nations.  

“We in Oceania welcome this sign of solidarity between nations that bear the brunt of an unjust global economic system,” Ms Antonio said. 

“More than three quarters of the Pacific’s sovereign independent nations are at high or moderate risk of debt distress. Some spend more on paying their debts than on health or education.”  

Ms Antonio said those risks were intensifying due to climate change, extreme weather and global shocks such as the “current war-induced energy crisis”. 

“Small nations in our Ocean of Peace are being made to pay the price of evils inflicted half a world away,” she said.

“Countries of the South need to support each other, and rich countries and those who control our economic system need to change the rules to ensure the global economy works for the good of all.”

The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), which will serve as secretariat for the Borrowers’ Platform, said the forum will “fill a gap” in the architecture governing global finance and debts owed by countries.

This will help countries contending with unsustainable debt levels to “amplify their collective voice” and “engage more effectively” in global financial and debt discussions. 

Alfonso Apicella, senior officer for global advocacy and campaigns at Caritas Internationalis, said the platform could be an important first step to ensuring countries in debt distress are in a stronger position to reduce what Pope Francis referred to as “unjust and unpayable debts” when they enter negotiations with private creditors. 

Lower-income countries spent more than 18 per cent of government revenue on servicing public debts in 2024, UNCTAD reported.  A total of 46 countries spent more on interest payments than on health or education in 2025. 

FULL STORY

New ‘borrowers’ platform’ could help countries cooperate in resolving debt crisis (Caritas Aotearoa New Zealand)