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Ⅰ. States Called for Actions to Accelerate SDGs Implementation
Ⅱ. Reform of Global Governance
Ⅲ. Solidarity and Partnership Based on Multilateralism
Ⅳ. Accelerating Development Finance Mobilization including ODA
The United Nations (hereafter, UN) organized the SDG Summit, I.e. high-level political forum on sustainable development, under the auspices of the 78th General Assembly on September 18-19, 2023 in New York. The SDG Summit is held every four years, making this the second summit since the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for 2016-2030 in September 2015. This event was notable considering that this year marked the halfway point in the SDGs implementation. The summit consisted of a plenary session along with six leaders’ dialogue on issues ranging from key transitions to accelerate SDG progress, resilience, STI (science, technology, and innovation), integrated policies and institutions, multilateral systems, to development finance.
The political declaration adopted at the SDG summit contains key commitments to accelerate the SDGs achievement in the remaining 7 years. This declaration calls for global solidarity and action, presents key actions per SDG, emphasizes the importance of mobilizing development finance including official development assistance (ODA), and reaffirms the importance of multilateralism to achieve the SDGs.
Within this context, representatives of states looked at the challenges standing in the way of achieving the SDGs and presented concrete actions that will guide the states’ way forward. The ROK’s Foreign Minister Park Jin participated in the leaders’ dialogue on ‘building resilience and leaving no one behind’ and stressed the Korean government’s contribution to the advancement of SDGs via increased ODA and support for digital transformation and better access to quality education.
Ⅰ. States Called for Actions to Accelerate SDGs Implementation
Adopted at the UN General Assembly in September 2015, the SDGs consist of 17 goals and 169 targets and apply to both developed and developing countries. The UN has published an annual progress report on the SDGs since 2016 and the special edition of the Secretary-General’s report on ‘Progress towards the SDGs’ in July 2023. However, the prospects for attaining the SDGs appear bleak. The poly-crisis, a cluster of related global risks including the pandemic, climate change, food security, and energy security, combined with weakening global solidarity has stalled progress towards SDGs and even reversed years of progress countries have made so far. As a result, only 15% of the SDGs targets are likely to be reached by 2030 WMO (2023). United in Science 2023. World Meteorological Organization.
In addition, the development finance needed to reach the SDGs increased from US$2.5 trillion pre-Covid-19 to US$4.2 trillion during Covid-19 OECD, UNDP (2021). Closing the SDG Financing Gap in the COVID-19 era: Scoping note for the G20 Development Working Group.
Recently, the gap to finance the SDGs further increased to US$5.4 - US$6.4 trillion per year UN News (2023). Annual cost for reaching the SDGs? More than $5 trillion.
Ⅱ. Reform of Global Governance
The need for overall global governance reform including international financial institutions, multilateral development banks, and multilateral trade systems was repeatedly underscored during the discussion. For instance, the political declaration mentions the need to improve the international financial architecture to make it more fit for purpose, equitable, and responsive to the financing needs of developing countries. Key speakers, including the UN Secretary-General António Guterres, the Prime Minister of Barbados, and the President of Dominica who spoke on behalf of the Caribbean Community, also called for such reform.
Ⅲ. Solidarity and Partnership Based on Multilateralism
Reflecting the worsening problem of inequality within and across countries and the persisting shock of the global pandemic that goes beyond the health sector, the political declaration called for global responses to achieve the SDGs while underscoring the need to strengthen international and multilateral cooperation for developing countries to overcome challenges and build resilience. That is, international cooperation and partnerships based on mutual trust and global solidarity will underlie global efforts for sustainable development.
Ⅳ. Accelerating Development Finance Mobilization including ODA
The political declaration laid out the need for developed countries to increase their ODA and reach aid-related targets as well as mobilization of public and private finance, scaling up debt swaps for SDGs, preventing and combatting illicit financial flows, and multilateral development bank’s mobilization and provision of additional financing, etc.
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