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A Post Sdg Summit Review What Happened And What Next

Leo Migdal
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a post sdg summit review what happened and what next

As we approach 2030, the world is facing a critical moment: the expiration of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), a 15-year global agenda adopted in 2015 to end poverty, protect the planet,... While some progress has been made, such as improvements in child mortality and access to education, many targets remain out of reach. Only about 12% of the goals are currently on track, with setbacks driven by the COVID-19 pandemic, armed conflicts, economic instability and climate-related disasters. Global carbon emissions continue to rise, extreme poverty has increased in some regions, and over 70% of countries are off pace to achieve even half of the SDG targets. This shortfall has ignited urgent conversations among world leaders, academics, and civil society about what comes next. Looking beyond 2030, the post-SDG era will demand a bold rethinking of global development.

Rather than abandoning the mission, many experts are calling for a new, more integrated agenda, one that prioritizes climate action, digital equity and social justice. There’s growing momentum to shift from voluntary commitments to more accountable frameworks and to move beyond GDP as the sole measure of progress. Calls for a “Rescue Plan for People and Planet,” led by UN Secretary-General António Guterres, highlight the need for international cooperation and systems-level change. The future of sustainable development will likely center around resilience, inclusivity and intergenerational equity because while the SDGs may end in 2030, the work of building a sustainable world is far from finished. In this special post-SDG Summit edition of the SDG Lab Dispatch, we delve into the insightful events and discussions that transpired during and after the 2023 SDG Summit. We envision a response from the viewpoint of the SDG Summit itself.

Read on. “Dear SDG Summit participants…” a letter from the SDG Summit Now that the SDG Summit is one month behind us, we wanted a novel way to share our insights on the gathering. A general report back in narrative form is the standard go-to, but what about a different, perhaps more provocative format—hearing from the SDG Summit as if it were a person? Here we go: A letter to 2023 SDG Summit participants. On September 16, we convened the workshop “Manifesting New Sustainability Values: From aspirational envisioning to practical policymaking” as an official side-event of the 2023 SDG Summit's SDG Action Weekend in New York.

Held in partnership with Reos Partners and the Major Group for Children and Youth, the workshop provided an interactive space to envision a world that genuinely reflects the values and priorities of younger generations,... A full summary of the side event, published by the UN Secretariat, is available here. Opinion article by Stefanos Fotiou, Director of the Office of Sustainable Development Goals in the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). FAO Director-General Qu Dongyu delivering a statement during the launch event for the new High Impact Initiative on Food Systems Transformation: Transforming food systems for a world without hunger. 17 September 2023, United Nations, New York, USA The recent SDG Summit held in New York on September 18-19, 2023, has once again demonstrated the world's commitment to the 2030 Agenda and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Despite the challenges and setbacks over the last number of years, the adoption by consensus of the negotiated Political Declaration, which was subsequently endorsed by the UN General Assembly, reaffirms the SDGs as our... This dedication was vividly underscored by the strong presence of Heads of State and Government from around the world at the SDG Summit. Representatives from 145 different countries proved their accountability to the 2030 Agenda as they took the floor to report on their progress at this midpoint juncture, including 57 heads of state/vice presidents, 30 heads... One of the most encouraging aspects of the Summit was the substantial participation of leaders from the Global South who turned out in force to reaffirm their protagonist role on accelerating the SDGs. While we can celebrate this renewed commitment, the Summit also confronted the stark reality that the progress towards achieving the SDGs has been slow. Eight years into the agenda, only 15% of all SDG targets are on track to being achieving, with significant setbacks in crucial areas such as agriculture and food security.

A recent FAO report, Tracking Progress on food and agriculture SDG indicators 2023, launched on the eve of the SDG Summit, revealed that chronic hunger increased to 9.2% in 2022, up from 7.9% in... Tool / A practical tool for understanding how groups of policy areas and targets interact, using systems thinking. About Public policy and Sustainable Development Goals Tool / Una herramienta práctica para comprender cómo interactúan áreas y objetivos políticos, utilizando el pensamiento sistémico. About Public policy and Sustainable Development Goals Tool / Analyse and compare how climate actions correspond to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

On September 18 and 19, the SDG Summit 2023 took place as part of the 78th session of the United Nations General Assembly. There was a sense of urgency surrounding the Summit, given that it marked the halfway-point to the deadline for achieving the 2030 Agenda. It also took place amidst multiple crises, including the HIV/AIDS pandemic, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, massive population migrations, an economic crisis, natural disasters, and extreme weather events across the planet. According to the UN Secretary General, only 15% of the SDG targets are “on track,” and many others show significant setbacks compared to the baseline. As such, expectations for the summit were high, with hopes that this space for deliberation would mark a real turning point, resulting in course correction and accelerated actions on the path towards 2030. Some takeaways from this latest SDG Summit include a divisively adopted Political Declaration, the identification of the main gaps and accelerators of SDG implementation, and the UN Secretary General’s call for action in seven...

After several months of negotiations led by Ireland and Qatar, the Political Declaration was adopted without consensus. In fact, 11 countries (Belarus, Bolivia, Cuba, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Eritrea, Iran, Nicaragua, Russia, Syria, Venezuela, and Zimbabwe) reserved the right to further review its contents following the conclusions made during... The fact that the Declaration has not achieved consensus undermines its implementation and is a reflection of the existing divisions among member states—not only with regard to the 2030 Agenda, but also regarding the... Some topics are continuously repeated and increasingly echoed in international discussions and debates around development. One of the most relevant summit topics focuses on SDG financing and the urgent need for extensive reform of both the United Nations System and international financial institutions, which are being urged to mobilize... Other mentioned topics include access to unused Special Drawing Rights and debt swaps, such as the payment of debt for environmental services.

In 2015, member states of the United Nations, including Canada and the UK, adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which includes 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that seek to end poverty, protect the... The SDGs represented a major shift from the previous Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Where the MDGs were a development agenda for the Global South that focused on poverty alleviation, the SDGs apply to all countries and include an encompassing view on development. Moreover, the MDGs were driven primarily by the United Nations with little role for civil society. Yet at the halfway mark of the SDG period, it is now apparent that the SDGs also have limitations. One of the major critiques of the current agenda is their lack of appreciation or incorporation of Indigenous knowledges and explicit links to decolonization, both of which have important contributions to how development is...

Another widespread concern is that the SDGs have little explicit engagement with culture of any sort, missing out on important contributions of the arts, humanities and social science scholarship that could enhance individual-level engagements... These are areas where our universities have deep expertise and have much to bring to the conversation about future possibilities for the post-SDG agenda. Over the next few years, the global development community will be laying the groundwork for what comes after the SDGs. There is a need for higher education stakeholders from around the world to discuss what has been accomplished by universities working on higher education and the SDGs and the limitations with current approaches and... This is where the After2030 project comes in. The After2030 project is a two-year partnership initiative funded by the University of Toronto (UofT) and University College London (UCL) as part of their Strategic Challenges Fund.

The goal of the After2030 project is to help shape the post-SDG agenda by developing an informed understanding of the limitations of current practices and outlining recommendations for the future. We hope to produce a short synthesis for a public audience on the role of universities and comparative education scholars in contributing to both the SDG agenda and as thought-leaders for what comes next...

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