The 17 SDGs are our blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all. Follow the conversation with the hashtags: #DevInfoDay, #24October, #economicDevelopment, #globalgoals.
Six pathways to sustainable development
These include: (1) food systems; (2) energy access and affordability; (3) digital connectivity; (4) education; (5) jobs and social protection; and (6) climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution. Rooted in the 17 Goals, these transitions are not a new agenda.
I. The Indivisible Goals Demand Integrated Policy
The 2030 Agenda is the result of the most inclusive and expansive
deliberation in human history. Bold, sweeping and ambitious, the
17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were adopted by all
world leaders as essential facets of the sustainable future we want;
of a world transformed for the benefit of all humanity.
These goals are deeply intertwined – any action taken to achieve
one may advance some others. This means an integrated policy
approach is needed to achieve the SDGs – one that navigates the
synergies and trade-offs in taking a certain line of action. This is
akin to solving a Rubik’s cube, where a solution is impossible with
a focus only on one side at a time: all sides must be considered in
relation to each other if the puzzle is to be solved.
Yet, dominant development practice – and in large part, our
institutions, markets, investment incentives and policy processes
– favour siloed approaches. As a result, disparate and competing
strategies and processes proliferate, with planning, policy and
regulatory frameworks unevenly aligned with the Goals. Investment
schemes with limited focus on long-term sustainable patterns,
suboptimal budgets, low public capacities for integration, and
insufficient leveraging of technologies prevail, while increases in
risk factors and intersecting poly-crises impose limitations on the
ability to question “business-as-usual” solutions, entrenching the
status quo.
This disconnect between our 21st century ambitions and our
20th century legacy structures and processes means that SDG
achievement is currently a distant aspiration. Midpoint to 2030,
only about 15 per cent of targets are on track; close to half, though
showing progress, are moderately or severely off track; and some
30 per cent have either seen no movement or regressed below the
2015 baseline. At current rates, only 30 per cent of all countries will
achieve even SDG 1 on poverty by 2030. Hunger has increased and
is back at 2005 levels. Gender equality is some 300 years away.
Too much is at stake and transformation is a matter of utmost
urgency. The most pressing priority for policymakers is to ensure
the integrated approach goes viral so that economic models and
policy processes are revamped commensurate with ambitions, and
investments are galvanized at scale for SDG acceleration.
II. Transitions for Systemic Impact
Scholarship on the SDGs has converged on transformative entry
points - or key transitions - that can have catalytic and multiplier
effects across the SDGs and an outsized determinant impact for
achieving the Goals. These include: (1) food systems; (2) energy
access and affordability; (3) digital connectivity; (4) education; (5)
jobs and social protection; and (6) climate change, biodiversity loss
and pollution.
Rooted in the 17 Goals, these transitions are not a new agenda.
Rather, the transitions represent a useful organizing frame that can
spotlight investment pathways to accelerate SDG progress within
and across countries, with the prevailing country context
determining the priority level and action accorded to each area. This will help ensure a better convergence among the
most impactful entry points to spearhead SDG acceleration,
spurring donor engagement, and improving the alignment of
significant work and investments already undertaken across
these areas by countries, companies, civil society, cities and local
actors, with the support of development finance.
Each of these key transitions requires a consideration of
multiple policy levers spanning economic, social and
environmental dimensions, i.e., actions that recognise the
integrated nature of the SDGs and the 2030 Agenda. This helps
ensure that collectively, efforts are multiplicative and that all
policy actors amplify each other’s work. Moreover, since the
SDGs are interconnected, so too are these six transitions. For
instance, as significant contributors to greenhouse emissions,
both energy and food systems are inextricably linked with
climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution. As such,
achieving these transitions also calls for a transformation of
the dominant traditional, siloed economic models, markets,
incentives, and policies within and across countries.
Critically, the metrics of success for these transitions are
primarily in how they deliver for all persons in our
societies. These must be just and equitable transitions,
with human rights, gender equality and the principle of
Leaving No One Behind comprising their fundamental design
elements. For instance, food systems transition can only
take place if it fully and measurably redresses the
food insecurity that is disproportionately experienced
by women and people living in rural areas. Universal healthcoverage must be a hallmark of the transition on jobs and
social protection. Only when energy is routinely available to
the most disadvantaged groups can it be considered fully
accessible and affordable.
Transitions cannot be achieved without effective means
of implementation, including radical improvements in the
utilisation of science, technology, and innovation, bridging the
data gap, and strengthening SDG localization. It also implies
strengthening governance through transformed policy and
regulatory frameworks and through enhanced national public
sector capabilities to deliver and implement policy action, as
well as mobilize the required investments for market-ready
projects in pipelines. The latter calls for the final critical element
which is a transformation of financing. With an estimated gap of
some US$ 4.2 trillion per year, the SDGs require a quantum leap
in finance flows – from billions to trillions. The primary financing
source for countries remains the national budget, necessitating
a more systematic review and alignment of the budgeting
system to sustainable development financing needs through
Integrated National Financial Frameworks. But public funds
alone are not sufficient to deliver the goals. Additionally,
national budgets in developing countries are depleted after
the massive fiscal response in the last two years to offset the
negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, the war in
Ukraine and the climate emergency. Remaining gaps will need
to be covered by better leveraging all financing flows – public
and private, national and international – including from
international financial institutions, multilateral development
banks, private sector, official development assistance,
philanthropic foundations, remittances, and others;
restructuring debt and lifting trade barriers.
III. Engine Room Actions by the UN Development
System
The reforms of the UN development system have transformed its
ability to support countries with the implementation of the SDGs.
Under the leadership of the Resident Coordinators (RCs), UN
country teams (UNCTs) are now optimally positioned to act as
catalysts to propel progress on the six transitions, building on
the existing optimal entry points that stem from their respective
country-contexts.
The lens of the six transitions – and the critical mass of integrated
policy expertise behind each – will enable RCs and UNCTs deliver
better together to help countries unlock the rapid and deep
transformations needed to achieve the Goals by 2030. As neutral
and trusted arbiters, RCs can harness the expertise and networks
of the entire UN development system and convene governments
and all stakeholders in concerted partnership to accelerate
SDG progress. This means that UNCTs are now uniquely able
to connect the relevant entry points to national ambitions and
priorities, while ensuring that the UN’s collective and entity-specific
programming responses enable policy and financing partnerships
to make these a reality. Evidence-based and data-driven “CommonCountry Analyses” and “UN Sustainable Development CooperationFrameworks” already reflects this revitalisation, with a reinvigorated
ability to help countries address complex, interconnected SDG
challenges.
Within each area, UNCTs will enable and deliver four 'engine room'
actions at the country level, both building on and supporting
regional and global efforts. First, RCs and UNCTs will drive the
shifts across policy and regulatory frameworks, going beyond
the standard sectoral approaches. Second, RCs and UNCTs
will facilitate the identification and development of pipelines of
bankable and market-ready national projects with participation of
both public and private sectors, including by providing access to
world-class expertise. Third, RCs and UNCTs will convene all
relevant actors to attract the needed financing from all sources –
traditional donors, development banks, capital markets,
philanthropic foundations, and remittances, to help develop
the ‘deal room’ – a financing mix with innovative instruments –
for each of the transitions. Fourth, RCs and UNCTs will
commit to capacity-building at scale to support public
institutions and civil society in this process, ensuring a steady
increase in capacities over time to reinforce and sustain these
investments.
At the global level, the Joint SDG Fund has been transformed
to accompany these transitions, incubating and capitalizing
new windows of financing. Such catalytic support to UNCTs
will be critical for results at the country level. Additionally,
regional intergovernmental mechanisms and strengthened UN
coordination platforms are enabling multistakeholder policy
dialogues around these key areas, and collaborative and coherent
responses to country priorities and needs.
The 2023 SDG Summit – the half-way mark to 2030 – represents a
vital opportunity to put the SDGs back on track and secure the
breakthroughs and collective commitments needed to drive
SDG acceleration and help deliver the future we want. The UN
development system remains the world’s best asset to support
countries in this process and is committed to continuous
improvement to accelerate momentum.
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