Extreme poverty, access to clean water, inequalities between men and women… The goals the world has set itself to improve humanity’s lot are “under threat”, the UN warned on Monday, calling for a “rescue plan” . that no one is left behind.
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In 2015, the “Agenda 2030” adopted by the UN member states listed 17 goals for sustainable development (Sustainable Development Goals, SDGs), which are divided into 169 sub-goals and are intended to serve to create a better and more sustainable future at the end of this decade to create for everyone.
But “if we don’t act now, the 2030 Agenda could become the epitaph of the world that could have been,” warns UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in the preamble to the report assessing these SDGs, which will be the focus of a planned summit on 18. and 19 September.
While the principle was to leave no one behind, “halfway through that promise is in jeopardy,” the report judges, and “more than half the world” is left behind. The SDGs “disappear in the rear-view mirror, along with the hopes and rights of present and future generations”.
From health to the fight against climate change, from access to energy to inequalities: of the 140 or so “goals” assessed, more than 30% have recorded no progress or even a regression since 2015, and around half even a moderate or severe deviation from the expected trajectory.
For example, the Covid-19 pandemic has halted the downward trend in extreme poverty (less than $2.15 a day).
With the current situation, 575 million people will still live in these conditions in 2030, most of them in sub-Saharan Africa, a 30% decrease since 2015 and far from the hoped for eradication.
“Frighteningly, world famine has returned to levels not seen since 2005,” the report said. About one in three people (2.3 billion people) were moderately or severely food insecure in 2021, and child malnutrition is still a “global problem”.
And 1.1 billion people live in urban areas in slum-like conditions, a number that is expected to increase by 2 billion over the next 30 years.
“ruthless”
The pandemic, which has highlighted the fragility of many advances, has had a “devastating” impact on education in particular. Without new action, only one in six countries will reach the goal of universal access to further education by 2030 and 84 million children will be out of school.
With regard to gender equality, the report again points to progress being “too slow”, noting that at the current pace it would take 286 years to close the gap in terms of legal protections and the elimination of discriminatory laws, and 300 years to close the gap End child marriage.
And developing countries, “buried under a mountain of debt,” “are hardest hit by our collective failure to invest in the Sustainable Development Goals,” stresses Antonio Guterres, who constantly calls for reform of the international financial institutions.
“We cannot cling to a ruthless financial system and expect developing countries to achieve goals that developed countries have achieved with far fewer restrictions,” the report adds.
In this context, the UN calls for the adoption of a “rescue plan” for the SDGs at the September summit.
This would require a new strong political commitment in particular, but also support for Antonio Guterres’ proposal for a stimulus plan with an additional $500 billion per year until 2030 to finance this sustainable development.
Despite the bleak picture the report paints, the UN points to some signs of hope.
Child mortality fell by 12% between 2015 and 2021, and by 2030 nearly 150 countries are expected to meet their target in this area.
With 5.3 billion people connected in 2022, internet access has grown sharply while AIDS-related deaths have fallen by 52% since 2010.
Since 2015, the proportion of the population with access to clean drinking water or sanitation has also increased.
But as with many SDG goals, progress does not equal success: 2.2 billion people still lacked access to safe water in 2022 and 419 million had no choice but to open themselves to defecate.