UN holds SDG summit!
The United Nations General Assembly is holding its Sustainable Development Goals Summit.
UN News reports the centrepiece of the summit which is holding in New York for two days is to put the world back on track towards a greener, cleaner, safer, fairer future for all.
The two-day summit aims to adopt a progressive declaration affirming commitment to the central, transformative promise of the 2030 Agenda to leave no one behind.
The international race to protect people and the planet started in 2015 with the adoption of the 2030 Agenda on Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Both represent a blueprint to speed up economic prosperity and social well-being while protecting people and the environment.
However, progress was stalled by the COVID-19 pandemic. The climate crisis has been deepening. Meanwhile, goals related to hunger, health, biodiversity, strong institutions, pollution and peaceful societies have all been derailed.
The summit aims to find ways to chart a new cause.
About half the SDG targets are off track. More than 30 per cent have either seen no movement or have regressed below the 2015 starting line.
On the current trajectory, it will take 286 years to close gender gaps in legal protection and remove discriminatory laws. The global reports on education are not in any way better. The result of many years of underinvestment and learning losses is that by 2030, some 84 million children will be out of school. #00 million children or young people who attend school will be unable to read and write.
While the lack of progress is global, it affects the developing countries and the world’s poorest and most vulnerable bear the failure more. Under current trends, 575 million people will still be living in extreme poverty in 2030 and only one-third of countries will meet the target of reducing national poverty levels by 50 per cent.
The SDG Summit aims to galvanize a drive towards progress. World leaders have agreed that it is time for nations and partners to act and make results rather than mere talking. It includes all countries and stakeholders, local authorities, the private sector, foundations, philanthropic organizations and civil society.
The end goal of the 2023 Summit is the adoption of a political declaration. The draft states that “The achievement of the SDGs is in great peril; at the midpoint of the 2030 Agenda, we are alarmed that only 12 per cent of the SDGs are on track and 30 per cent remain unchanged or below the 2015 baseline.”
Everyone is invited to accelerate change and progress.
