Is SDGs Still Relevant?
By : Agung Sentosa
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are the blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all. They address the global challenges we face, including those related to poverty, inequality, climate change, environmental degradation, peace, and justice. The 17 Goals are all interconnected, and in order to leave no one behind, it is important that we achieve them all by 2030.
To achieve these goals, as a human we need to collaborate and move forward as one not only as an individual but also globally. While our sustainability challenges are complex, we have also grown a complexity of responses that will invite us to learn the art of leading collectively. Three sectors need to come together in order to achieve sustainable development. These are the economic, socio-political, and environmental sectors in their broadest sense.
During the implementation, SDGs have shown some progress. A 2018 study in the journal Nature found that while "nearly all African countries demonstrated improvements for children under 5 years old for stunting, wasting, and underweight”. This is great progress considering the goals to end malnutrition by 2030. In the education sector, the literacy rate among young adults (15 years and over) has increased to 94.2% in 2018, compared to 93.8% in 2017. And also the number of scholarships available is significantly increased.
As a global citizen, we can access the progress of SDGs on sdg-tracker.org. There we can see that in 2019 Health is in the first rank of SDG preferences, followed by Energy, Climate, Water, and Education. But the saddest finding is the last rank for maintaining our biodiversity on Land and below Water.
There must be something wrong about it. Some of its goals compete with each other. For example, seeking high levels of economics is not synchronized with ecological, inequality reduction, and sustainability objectives. Similarly, increasing employment and wages can work against reducing the cost of living. On the other hand, The Economist in 2015 argued that 169 targets for the SDGs are too many. Yet this world needs a solution for all those problems, SDGs try to solve all the problems at once instead of focusing on one the most urgent. As a whole, we can see SDG is aiming to achieve peace in this complex society. And the most fundamental part of peace is the public welfare, so the SDGs number 1 “no poverty” should be the top priority.
As mentioned before, to achieve these goals we need to act together as a whole world. In this case, SDG faces a new problem which not everyone understands and is willing to collaborate to achieve these goals. A simple example is we can just count the number of people around us who are aware of SDGs. A few! Or maybe less!. What will happen if people are not aware of SDGs? Of course, the goals won't be achieved. This is not the saddest part. They might not be aware of SDGs but they have to be aware of their daily life and their surroundings. The fact is? No! There are still people littering, bullying, not finishing their foods, and other bad habits. In an environmental way? It sucks. In reducing inequality? Far from expectation, people are still not accepting any other gender out of two major genders. Yet, some people are aware of those issues, their number is increasing day by day. But still, not enough, we need everyone in this world to achieve SDG.
As a youth, we need to act. Educate ourselves and the people around us about the importance of these goals. Try to focus on one issue that you are interested in solving. Take the action into our daily life, because the main findings of SDGs are the awareness of society which is people and its community. On the other hand, the SDGs need to be re-focused into feasible and inclusive life-saving actions that can be and are carried out for people everywhere.
References :
Stewarding, Petra Kuenkel. 2019. “Sustainability Transformations An Emerging Theory and Practice of SDG Implementation”. Switzerland : Springer Nature.
COUNTRIES STAND OECD. 2019. “Measuring Distance to the SDG Targets 2019: An Assessment of Where OECD Countries Stand”. Paris: OECD Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1787/a8caf3fa-en. Accessed On July 15, 2020.
Bertelsmann Stiftung and Sustainable Development Solutions Network. 2019. “Sustainable Development Report 2019”. https://s3.amazonaws.com/sustainabledevelopment.report/2019/2019_sustainable_development_report.pdf. Accessed On July 15, 2020.
Lockwood, Elizabeth & Bertha, Orsolya. 2020. “Will the SDGs Still be Relevant after the Pandemic? A Disability Rights Perspective”. https://sdg.iisd.org/commentary/guest-articles/will-the-sdgs-still-be-relevant-after-the-pandemic/. Accessed On July 15, 2020.
Oman News. 2020. “Second issue of Towards the Achievement of Sustainable Development Goals for 2030 highlights Quality Education”. https://omannews.gov.om/NewsDescription/ArtMID/392/ArticleID/14572/Second-issue-of-%E2%80%9CTowards-the-Achievement-of-Sustainable-Development-Goals-for-2030%E2%80%9D-highlights-Quality-Education. Accessed On July 15, 2020.
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