17 Aug, 2022
Learning from crisis: the SDGs
Sometimes the world needs crises but it is important that we turn the challenges presented into opportunities for change...
What happened to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)?
Crises have been a focal point of recent times that seem to add a growing level of surprise to the world on every occurrence. From environmental devastation to socio-economic instability, food insecurity, energy access, rising poverty and inequality, it can be easy to forget we have the 2030 Agenda to help us face these challenges, or at least remind us that they all still exist.
Simply knowing of the Global Goals is one thing but in order to understand the interdependencies between them, the priorities, the conflicts and how to implement changes that bring about the greatest impact is another task altogether. Secretary-General, UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), Rebeca Grynspan recently warned that the stalling progress in meeting the Global Goals has been driven by the effects of climate change, the covid-19 pandemic and the recent wars that have emerged globally (the 3C’s - COVID, conflicts and climate change).
“We are facing continued inequity in the number of people able to get a shot of COVID-19 vaccines, rising inflation, major supply-chain disruptions, and crippling geopolitical uncertainties,”
“We are on a dangerous path to harming future generations, if we do not act now. It is within our power to turn the tide.”
President Collen Vixen Kelapile, United Nations Economic and Social Council.
The Instituto Cidades Sustentáveis (ICS) and the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) recently released the Sustainable City Development Index – Brazil (IDSC-BR). By gathering data on over 100 indicators, the promising tool aims to help record progress made on the SDGs by Brazil’s 5,570 cities. The data is visualised, and cities are graded on their success in compliance with the SDGs. According to the SDSN, Brazil is the “first country in the world to monitor and evaluate the level of sustainability progress of all its cities”.
“We cannot change what we are not aware of, and once we are aware, we cannot help but change.” Innovations such as the index (IDSC-BR) are a huge step in the right direction and provide a strategic method for government to become more aware, analyse data on progress and implement changes on city and national scale however there is still a large inequality gap between cities and regions in all key dimensions of social, environmental and economic development, actively driving efforts in the opposite direction.
The world finds itself confronted and conflicted, not just in Brazil and the worlds booming developing nations but everywhere. Achieving the SDGs, or coming anywhere near close, lies heavily on our collective ability to ensure effective crises response. Sometimes the world needs crises but it is important that we turn the challenges presented into opportunities for change: to problem-solve and innovate, increase future resilience, bring about cooperation - even among rivals, and open the doors to systemic change.
