This paper contributes to strengthening this evidence base providing better guidance to donors around how they can best facilitate private sector contributions to sustainable development outcomes, as envisaged in the Addis Ababa Action Agenda. It does this by illustrating firstly how donor support to the enabling environment for private sector development fits alongside, and underpins, other catalytic aid approaches. And secondly by highlighting how available data can (or, indeed, struggles to) inform decisions to maximise the impact of donors' catalytic interventions in different groups of developing countries.

Finance is a keystone to the successful implementation of the Agenda 2030 but significant barriers exist to securing adequate public and private financing to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. A broader strategy is needed to align the systemic features of finance and its relationship with the universally-embraced 2030 Agenda. The G20 has a central role in shaping the future direction of the global financial system, and given G20 Leaders commitment to further align the G20’s work with the 2030 Agenda, the policy brief considers ways in which the G20 could advance such a systemic strategy.

There is a growing recognition that progress on the SDGs and mobilising the capital to fund them is far too slow.