Doing more with less requires rewiring development systems

As G7 leaders met in Évian-les-Bains last week, the summit reflected the difficult balancing act facing governments as they navigate a period of mounting climate, economic and geopolitical pressure. Moreover, in a landscape of tighter public budgets, rising geopolitical strain and shrinking development assistance, leaders, from the G7 and beyond, are being pushed not only to decide what to prioritize, but to find ways to deliver meaningful impact with fewer resources.

Development assistance has often been structured around projects, pilots and targeted interventions. However, when these are executed in isolation, they rarely deliver lasting change due to short funding cycles or shifts in political attention. When funding is fragmented across disconnected initiatives, or sits outside national priorities, its capacity for long-term impact and value creation can be diminished.

The real test of development assistance should not be how many initiatives it funds, but whether it builds the foundations for countries to deliver on their own through more effective institutions, aligned stakeholders, and the capacity to sustain results.

We are in a period of profound economic transformation, marked by geopolitical instability, supply chain pressures, resource constraints and growing competition for critical materials. Because of this, building resilience is no longer optional, but a strategic imperative for economies as much as for businesses.

Circularity, sometimes framed narrowly as an environmental goal, is in fact part of that broader economic transition. Rather than linear, wasteful systems, we need to design and implement those that retain value, reduce exposure and make better use of finite resources.

In an increasingly volatile world, economies that depend on extracting, consuming and discarding resources are inherently exposed. Those that design systems to reuse, recover and regenerate are better positioned to withstand shocks, compete and thrive.

Delivering this at scale with system-level change is hard. It requires coordination across governments, businesses and civil society, which do not always move at the same speed or with the same targets or incentives. When one moves ahead without the others, progress stalls and businesses remain stuck in pilot phases without regulatory support, or policies are introduced that cannot be effectively implemented.

That is why multi-stakeholder partnerships are becoming increasingly important. Initiatives like the World Economic Forum’s Global Plastic Action Partnership bring together governments, the private sector and civil society around a shared national roadmap, aligning investment, policy and delivery mechanisms behind common goals. By embedding action within national systems, rather than layering projects on top, they help translate ambition into coordinated, sustained progress.

This model also reflects a broader shift in how development is understood. The language of a “mutually beneficial approach”, increasingly prominent in global fora, signals a move away from traditional donor-recipient dynamics toward collaboration grounded in shared economic interest. This approach can unlock more effective outcomes with fewer resources by reducing duplication, attracting private capital, catalytic actors and eventually ensuring that interventions reinforce, rather than bypass, national priorities.

Nevertheless, this can only be achieved if governments, funders and all actors in the ecosystem are willing to prioritize the less visible work of building systems. For example, aligning leadership, strengthening institutions, creating accountability and fostering trust between partners. This is why international fora should place delivery coordination and long-term systems change at the core of the development agenda.

It is clear that delivering impact in an era of constrained resources, requires to move beyond a focus on individual initiatives and toward supporting the systems that enable coordinated execution. That involves backing country-led approaches, improving visibility and collaboration across funding streams and ensuring that investments contribute to long-term national strategies.

It also involves recognizing that resilience, competitiveness and sustainability are not separate agendas, but different elements of the same overarching challenge: how to build economies that can thrive within planetary boundaries while delivering growth and opportunity.

Ultimately, doing more with less is not about lowering expectations, but raising the standard for what effective development looks like. In an increasingly uncertain world in which climate risk is rising and political consensus appears fragile, that shift in approach cannot come soon enough.