Access to finance, markets, convenience, skills and information are necessary to achieve sustainable development goals (SDGs) within 2030, said businessmen and policymakers yesterday.

Macroeconomic stability and political calmness are also very crucial in attaining the SDGs, they added.

The views came at a session titled "Inclusive financing for SDGs in Asia and the Pacific" on the second day of a three-day Asia-Pacific Conference on financing for inclusive and sustainable development at InterContinental Dhaka.

The International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) Bangladesh is organising the summit in collaboration with the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UN-ESCAP), Asian Development Bank's Trade Finance Programme and the London Institute of Banking and Finance.

"SDGs are people-centric development goals...To achieve that goals a platform is needed where at least five accesses must be ensured for all," said Ajith Nivard Cabraal, senior economic advisor to the Sri Lankan prime minister.

People need to have access to finance because it can develop entrepreneurship and create jobs, said Cabraal, who is also a former governor of the Sri Lankan central bank.

He said access to markets were also necessary for helping producers sell their products from every corner of a country, so roads and infrastructure have to be ensured.

And they need access to convenience, for example, water, healthcare, electricity and all other government services and it will improve peoples' standard of living, he said.

Access to information, education and communication is imperative and access to skills is also important, he said, adding that after ensuring all these accesses, a country needs to ensure macroeconomic stability.

Syed Manzur Elahi, a leading business icon and former advisor to a caretaker government in Bangladesh, echoed the same.

All the developed countries like Japan and South Korea put emphasis on skill development because skilled people are assets, he pointed out.

Elahi, also chairman of Apex Footwear, questioned how SDGs could be achieved without connectivity and how industrialisation could be promoted without improvements in electricity supply.

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"Macroeconomic stability is also very essential, because, without it you cannot think of any project," he said while addressing as the session chair.

Mustafa K Mujeri, executive director of the Institute for Inclusive Finance and Development (InM), said financing was the backbone for achieving the SDGs.

Financial inclusion should be ensured so that marginalised people and women could get adequate finance for their enterprises, he said.

Digital financing has been contributing to the promotion of financial inclusion across the country and mobilising national savings and helping to boost the rural economy, he pointed out.

Riyaz Mansoor, deputy minister of National Planning and Infrastructure of the Maldives, said when people talked about SDGs, most do not refer to disaster resilience.

Disaster resilience should get more emphasis as it can profoundly impact an economy during natural disasters, he said.

In a special session titled "ICC's Role in Responding to Emerging Global

Challenges for Sustainable Growth , Mahbubur Rahman, president of ICC Bangladesh, said a government alone cannot attain the SDGs without support from the private sector.

"It has to be together," said Rahman. Prof Barbara Meynert, senior adviser of the Fung Group of Companies, said business is not much focused on achieving SDGs but on profit and value addition.

They have to come up with new thinking to make profit along with helping to achieve the SDGs, she said.

Nihad Kabir, president of the Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce of Industry, said Bangladesh needs an action plan to meet challenges of transforming the country to a developing one from a least developed one.

She recommend diversifying the export products, adopting technological advancements and updating trainings and skills.

The ICC should work on promoting trade and enhancing trade negotiation power of people and it can work towards forming public-private partnerships for achieving the SDGs, she added.

Salman F Rahman, the Bangladesh

prime minister's private industry and investment adviser, said new sets of skills and training were extremely important to meet the challenges of the upcoming 4th industrial revolution.

So, educational curriculums are going to be changed and a national skills institute has been formed, he said.

"We want to make coding, a computer language, compulsory from the primary school level as part of standardisation of curriculum," Rahman added.

"If we can turn secondary schoolgoing students into computer programmers then it will allow us to face the challenges of the 4th industrial revolution," he said.

Mir Nasir Hossain, former president of the Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry, said Bangladesh needs to put emphasis on two agendas -climate change and ensuring inclusive development.

He said Bangladesh was witnessing a good growth rate but those who were financially insolvent were not availing its full fruits.