Cary Yan :
The UN’s 2030 Agenda highlights the strong commitment to ending poverty in all its forms and dimensions, including by eradicating extreme poverty by 2030. It also emphasizes the determination to end hunger and to achieve food security as a matter of priority and to end all forms of malnutrition.
Fifteen years of implementing the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) led to unprecedented progress in human development. Globally, the poverty target was achieved five years ahead of schedule. Over 700 million of the poorest were lifted from abject poverty and hunger, though progress in reducing hunger has been slower.
Strong economic growth in some large economies, in particular in China, contributed importantly to reaching the poverty goal, but in many parts of the world growth has been insufficiently rapid and insufficiently inclusive. Great progress was made in achieving universal primary education, for boys and girls. Child mortality was greatly reduced. Significant progress was made in reaching gender equality and women’s empowerment, as well as in combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other major diseases. Yet, much more remains to be done to end the scourge of extreme poverty, illiteracy, hunger and malnutrition, pandemics, gender inequality and conflict. The latest data contained in the report of the Secretary-General “Progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals” (E/2016/75) shows that about 1.6 billion people still live in multidimensional poverty and nearly 793 million people suffer from hunger and 155 million children are stunted. Maternal mortality and non-communicable diseases (responsible for nearly 70 per cent of deaths) are declining too slowly. Over 1 billion people are living without electricity, 663 million people lack access to clean water, 2.4 billion do not have adequate sanitation and more than half of the world’s population still remains offline.
Nearly 70 per cent of the world’s poor depend on natural resources for all or part of their livelihoods and many are suffering the consequences of depletion of natural capital and low prices on raw materials. The degradation of the productive assets of the poor, exacerbated by lack of access to modern infrastructure and digital economy, creates a poverty trap that reinforces the loop of further degradation and worsening poverty. Poverty, nationally defined, exists in all countries. While its extreme manifestations are in low income countries, developed countries also need to address problems of poverty and malnutrition. Reducing by half the number of poor people as nationally defined (target 1.2) and ending all forms of malnutrition (target 2.2) will require developed and developing countries to take focused actions, including addressing the structural causes of poverty, hunger and malnutrition.
The emerging consensus in the international community today is that eradication of extreme poverty and hunger is possible in our lifetimes. Moreover, future prosperity will require that economic growth will no longer degrade the environment, and will be inclusive by ensuring the participation of vulnerable and marginalized groups in public life, production and decision making, especially by providing women and men with the same access to productive resources.
Evidence from the past decades shows that economic growth is necessary but not sufficient, to accelerate the reduction in poverty and hunger which also requires strong political commitment, an innovative, purposeful and coherent approach to policy making across sectors and shareholders, dedicated resources and accountability
Social protection has proven to be a powerful tool to reduce poverty, food insecurity, and malnutrition, and empower people. It can also contribute to the achievement of various sustainable development outcomes, including in such areas as health, education, gender equality, reducing inequalities and inclusive growth. With the overarching aspiration of getting people and planet closer together and leave no one behind, the 2030 Agenda is a unique opportunity to inspire global action for development worldwide, through inclusive innovation and multi-stakeholder partnerships.
Inclusion is at the core of the 2030 Agenda. According to the 2016 Global Sustainable Development Report, the pledge to leave no one behind relates closely to three important dimensions of the 2030 Agenda: poverty, inclusiveness and inequality. Inclusiveness speaks to the notion of empowerment and the principle of non-discrimination. It is reflected in the vision of a “just, equitable, tolerant, open and socially inclusive world in which the needs of the most vulnerable are met” and “a world in which every country enjoys sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth and decent work for all” (paragraphs 8 and 9 of the 2030 Agenda). Making the inclusive world envisioned in the 2030 Agenda a reality will require innovation in policy-making and implementation. It will require rethinking economic development strategies and the manner, in which economic, social and environmental policies are conceived and delivered. Evidence from the past decades shows that economic growth is necessary but not sufficient, to accelerate the reduction in poverty and hunger which also requires strong political commitment, an innovative, purposeful and coherent approach to policy making across sectors and shareholders, dedicated resources and accountability. This requires new policies, coordination mechanisms, approaches and business models above all a new mindset of all global actors.
There is general recognition within the international community that neither actor on the international development arena – Governments, the private sector or civil society – can fully solve the root causes of poverty alone. Each actor is only one part of the complex ‘fabric’ which constitutes the sustainable development process. Therefore, for the whole ‘fabric’ to hold together all actors must learn to partner or collaborate more effectively with each other.
(Cary Yan is President of the World Organization of Governance & Competitiveness, an international organization for development cooperation, in consultative status with the UN’s Economic & Social Council 2030 Agenda)
