Compliance with the SDGs for the 2030 Agenda does not show sufficient progress worldwide, especially in developing countries. A situation that must change if we want a better and fairer world in the future…
Laydis Soler Milanés Exclusive 09/20/2023
Halfway to the meeting Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) of the 2030 Agenda, the global outlook is bleak. The various crises triggered by COVID-19 have caused much progress to be reverted, war conflicts to threaten global stability, the climate crisis to deepen, and insufficient consensus to support the development of the Global South.
According to him SDG progress reportAccording to the study published in 2023 by the United Nations (UN), more than half of the world is lagging behind in achieving these fundamental goals to ensure a better and fairer world for all people. Against this backdrop, the UN warns: “If we do not act now, Agenda 2030 could become the epitaph of the world that could have been.”
This is exactly what happens when no concrete measures are taken that go beyond empty promises from developed countries. For example, the recovery from COVID-19 is even leading to a reversal of positive global health outcomes. Childhood vaccinations saw the sharpest decline in three decades, and deaths from tuberculosis and malaria rose compared to pre-COVID-19 levels, the report said. Additionally, “COVID-19 has also had a devastating impact on teaching, causing learning loss in four out of five of the 104 countries surveyed.”
The response to the pandemic caused even greater debt and economic problems in developing countries, which already have high external debt and few real financing options within a global financial order based on domination and colonial principles.
While a few concentrate much of the wealth, poverty and hunger on the planet are worsening. “If current trends continue, 575 million people will continue to live in extreme poverty and only a third of countries will have halved their national poverty rate by 2030,” the UN report warns.
For this reason, the Organization urgently calls for multilateralism and reforms of world governments and international financial institutions so that they live up to their purpose and the future and give developing countries a voice and participation.
These were precisely some of the legitimate demands heard in Havana at the summit of leaders of the G77 countries and China.
Cuba is one of the few countries that has managed to achieve some of the SDGs, particularly in the areas of: Health and education sectors. Despite economic constraints and the strong blockade by the United States, it is in the process of updating its socialist model, whose agenda also includes achieving global goals for 2030. This remains expressed in its National Economic Development Plan and its Social Plan until 2030, in which the SDGs represent a key factor.
Now, as the UN Assembly’s high-level week continues, the voice of the South can once again be heard from the EU Cuban intervention as interim president of the G77 and China at the SDG summit last Monday, September 18th.
There he assured the readiness of the bloc, the second largest after the United Nations system, to work towards achieving the SDGs. “The group was involved in negotiating a political declaration to strengthen and accelerate the implementation of concrete, innovative, transformative and ambitious actions and measures that guarantee the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals,” he said President in his speech in Names of Cuba, the G77 and China.
“Developing countries’ efforts to implement the 2030 Agenda must also be supported by concrete measures in terms of technology transfer and workforce training, as well as North-South cooperation, to promote industrialization and investments in quality, reliability, sustainability and sustainability.” “A resilient Infrastructure,” he added, after referring to the bloc’s call to create, with the participation of the South, a new international financial order and a better global sovereign debt architecture that allows the application of fair, balanced and development-oriented treatment.
These approaches are in line with the statements made by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres during his speech at the UN Summit in Havana and subsequently at the SDG Summit in New York. “In our world of plenty, hunger is a terrible blight on humanity and an epic violation of human rights,” Guterres told UNGA.
“The SDGs, he said, embody the hopes, dreams, aspirations and expectations of people around the world, and he stressed that it is time to make them heard.”
Guterres reported that among the alternatives to accelerate compliance with the SDGs, he is establishing “a group of pioneer countries” in accordance with the SDGs to design a plan for designing concrete political and economic reforms that will contribute to the implementation of these goals. In addition, the United Nations has identified five priority areas for urgent action: promoting concrete, integrated and specific policies and measures to eradicate poverty; facilitate the further strengthening of the United Nations development system and increase the capacity of the multilateral system to address new challenges; and n Strengthen capacity, accountability and public institutions at national and subnational levels to accelerate progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals.
In addition, value is placed on it Responding to the climate crisiswhich has a major impact on the countries of the South that need financial and technological support.
The future and the world’s hope for a better life are at stake. Let us hope that the SDG Summit and this high-level week of the United Nations General Assembly in general will help accelerate the achievement of these social and climate justice goals.