THE SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT WATCH

Feb 11, 2020

Recent studies explore numerous interconnections between implementing the 2030 Agenda, climate change politics, and green grabbing.  "Green grabbing" is a phenomenon that embraces practices of private appropriation of land, (genetic) resources and water, legitimized with the environmental protection ends, conservation objectives or achieving wider developmental goals such as food security, green or blue growth, etc. (Dell ‘Angelo, 2019; Barbesgaard, 2018) Such practices often take place through large scale transnational investments in land by financial sector and big agribusiness, or international public finance to facilitate international funding for climate change mitigation and combating the wider societal crisis in developing countries. In the latter case, the financialization of nature and the use of such financial instruments as “debt-for-nature” swaps (UNCTAD, 2019) allow private corporate interests, to largely take control of environmental conservation in developing countries. Some commentators conclude that global green agendas themselves became core drivers and facilitators of green grabs and the large-scale extractive activities both inland and in the ocean whether linked to promoting certain activities for environmental ends or offsetting the negative impacts of climate change. (Fairhead, Leach, 2019)

Nov 12, 2019

More than half of the countries in the world are commodity-dependent countries, meaning that at least 60% of their exports derive from commodities, primarily, from agriculture, fossils and extractive industries (carbon-intensive natural resources, minerals, ores, and metals). (UNCTAD, 2019, UN, 2019). Continued over-reliance on commodities in economic development of the CDDCs (commodity dependence), combined with poor governance of natural resources and commodity sectors put at risk the economic resilience of the CDDCs, their transition to climate-resilient economies, achieving multiple SDGs and targets (2a, 2b, 2c, 7.1 and 7.b, 9.b, Goals 12, 14 and 15) (UNCTAD, 2017). The economic model of the CDDCs has proven to be economically, socially and environmentally unsustainable. It needs rethinking and reforming. At the same time, there is a growing recognition of the unique character of the challenges faced by the CDDCs in their transition to sustainable, inclusive and climate-resilient economies, which need to be addressed through a specific policy measures and international assistance.  

Oct 06, 2019

In November 2018, the Commission presented the European strategic long-term vision for a prosperous, modern, competitive and climate-neutral economy by 2050 (COM (2018) 773). It implies a significant decrease in use of the fossil carbon resources (oil and liquid gas production) by about 60 % by 2050. In order to preserve the global competitiveness of the EU economy, ensure access to raw materials, there is a need to change the modes of using natural resources, producing and consuming energy, industrial products, consumer goods, and services. Transition to a circular bio-based economy that seeks to substitute fossil-based raw materials and more carbon-intensive products and production process methods with resource-efficient and climate-friendly ones has a potential to lead the implementation of the 2050 decarbonization agenda, produce multiple societal benefits and maintain the global competitiveness of the EU economy.

Sep 28, 2019

Last year, global flows of foreign direct investment fell by 13 percent, to $1.3 trillion, achieved the lowest level since the global financial crisis. A modest recovery of 10 percent is projected in 2019. (UNCTAD, 2019) In this context, competition for international investment is increasing worldwide and sparks a boom in the establishment of special economic zones (SEZs). According to UNCTAD, the global tally of zones has increased to nearly 5,400, and more than 500 new SEZs are in the pipeline. SEZ became a mainstream government practice, channeled through new industrial policies. More than 145 economies operate such zones today. Due to the concentration of capital and technologies, manufacturing and services, there is a potential and a need to support 2030 Agenda and climate policy goals by linking the regulatory frameworks of SEZs to 2030 Agenda and climate policy goals.

Sep 13, 2019

​Implementing the Paris Climate accord and transformative 2030 Agenda requires a series of fundamental socio-economic and technological transformations aimed at the transition to sustainable, people-centered and climate-resilient economies. Economic diversification is an important tool of such transformations. It is one component of economic resilience (i) against the impacts of climate change (increasing water scarcity, increasing frequency of extreme weather events, loss in biodiversity, etc.) and (ii) against response measures undertaken by developed countries to mitigate climate change, which produce adverse impacts on the economies of developing countries (art.4.8. UNFCCC, 2.3 and 3.14 of the Kyoto Protocol). Economic diversification is also a key component of sustainable development (UNDP, 2019). It is called to assist reducing poverty by achieving higher levels of productivity, diversified and higher-value-added activities (targets 8.2., 9.b.).  

Aug 23, 2019

Water is key to implementing the global 2030 Agenda, the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030, and the 2015 Paris Agreement. It plays a central role in securing human rights, supporting economic development, mitigating and adapting to the impacts of climate change (IPCC, 2008; IPCC, 2018), improving human well-being and health, achieving most of the SDGs (UNHLPF, 2018). Anthropogenic factors such as climate change, non-inclusive water management (UN, 2019), environmental degradation, increasing industrial and consumer demand, old infrastructure and poor finance, hinder the progress towards achieving most of the SDGs (UN, 2018). The common effort is needed to address increasing global and local water challenges and risks. Most of the studies and policy options focus on the quantitative side of the global water problem. Recent World Bank Report: "Quality unknown: The invisible water crisis" brings the laser focus to the qualitative dimension of the issue. The impacts of water quality on economies, societies, and environment may be equally, or more, important, - the study finds. 

Sustainable development assumes a fundamental transition to a new economic paradigm, built on an inclusive, holistic and a long-term view of the economic well-being that should be achieved through higher levels of economic production, inclusive and sustainable industrialization, economic diversification and technological upgrading. Such a fundamental transition requires a series of connected transformations of socio-technical and economic systems, requires an urgent redirection of finance, markets, and governance towards an inclusive and value-creating economy that leaves none behind. Innovation plays a key role in facilitating this transition and achieving many, if not all the SDGs. Yet its potential impact hasn't been fully internalized and operationalized neither at the international level, where more concerted efforts are needed to close the technology divide that persists between countries nor at the national level where very a  few countries have linked innovation and sustainable development strategies and policies. 

Estimates reveal that up to US$7trn a year is needed to achieve the SDGs by 2030. Public finance is not sufficient to meet this demand. There is a pressing need to attract private capital in order to close a larger part of the US$2.5 trillion annual gap in financing the SDGs (UNCTAD, 2015). If met, it could unlock the potential to facilitate an estimated US$12trn  in market opportunities and generate up to 380 million jobs globally by 2030. The greatest impact would be felt in food and agriculture; cities; energy and materials; and health and well-being (BSDC, 2017).Regulatory reform and new approaches in public and private finance, enabling innovative financing and a reorientation of capital markets are key to attracting private capital. Security market regulators play an important role in driving a regulatory change and financial innovation in capital markets. While most securities regulators do not have explicit mandates to promote sustainable development, sustainability issues and policy responses to these issues, are of direct relevance to their existing mandates. (SSE, 2019)

Consumption of natural resources and materials, driven by the growth in world population and the rise of living standards, happens at an unprecedented pace, projected to nearly double by 2060. It happens despite a shift from manufacturing to service industries, improvements in industrial efficiency and a global slowdown of the economic growth, led by China (OECD, 2019). In this context, the transition to a circular economy becomes a global imperative. The global transition to a circular economy is promising $4.5 trillion of new economic output by 2030 and a wide range of societal benefits. Despite these potential gains current world economy is only 9.1% circular (WEF, 2019). We need to close a large circularity gap, support the transition to a circular economy with effective policies on international, regional and national levels. The Paris Agreement, 2030 Agenda and the SDGs, built on the ideas of reducing and, in the long run, decoupling the use of natural resources from economic growth and development, provide a normative basis for harmonizing decentralized initiatives for the transition to a sustainable circular economy.

Para. 27 of Agenda 2030, states a commitment to “build strong economic foundations for all our countries (… and) strengthen the productive capacities of least developed countries in all sectors, including through structural transformation”. According to the Recept Report by the UNCTAD: "Selected sustainable development trends in the least developed countries – 2019", despite the positive growth, international trade and export performance, most LDCs show slow progress in transforming their economies and, however, continue to face a decline in FDI and a finance gap between donors’ pledges and actual development aid provided. However, another major challenge of LDCs is that their high population growth requires even higher growth rates of GDP to make progress in poverty reduction and more generally to achieve the SDGs. In order to substantially reduce poverty in LDCs and to reach target 1.1  “By 2030, eradicate extreme poverty for all people everywhere” much more progress is needed.

There is a direct link between the development challenges and the illicit financial flows (IFFs). Nearly US$1 trillion of unrecorded money leaves the emerging market and developing countries annually (OECD, 2018; GFI, 2019; UNODC). IFFs undermine the efforts of countries to mobilize finance for sustainable development and achieve the internationally-agreed SDGs by the target date of 2030. The Illicit Financial Flaws (IFFs) originate from (i) illegal activities (e.g. corruption, smuggling and trafficking in minerals, wildlife, drugs, and people, tax avoidance); (ii) the funds that stem from these illegal activities; and, (iii) the funds that are used for illegal purposes (e.g. organized crime). (UNDP, 2019) They tend to travel worldwide with the aim to infiltrate in the legal economy or to be hidden abroad. About 45% of illicit flows end up in offshore financial centers, and 55% in developed countries. (GFI, 2019) According to the OECD, between 2008-10, Africa alone had lost US$63.4 billion through trade mispricing and other illicit outflows.

The estimates suggest the existence of the investment gap in financing the 17 SDGs and 169 targets at least USD 2.5 trillion annually until 2030 (OECD, 2018). The scale, scope and the technological complexity of implementing the transformative 2030 Agenda far exceed the capacities of the public sector to deal with such a systemic and fundamental transformation alone. The Agenda 2030 calls for a change in approaching development processes as exclusive ‘government territory’ through regulation and taxation (Bruegel, 2018) and consider civil society and the private sector as the important development partners. The Addis Ababa Action Agenda promotes the use of innovative mechanisms and private sector partnerships to encourage greater international private financial participation in development, in support of 2030 Agenda. What are the practical opportunities, risks and benefits of private sector engagement through the development cooperation?  

Estimates reveal that up to US$7trn a year is needed to achieve the SDGs by 2030. Public finance is not sufficient to meet this demand. There is a pressing need to attract private capital in order to close a larger part of the US$2.5 trillion annual gap in financing the SDGs. (UNCTAD, 2015) If met, it could unlock the potential to facilitate an estimated US$12trn  in market opportunities and generate up to 380 million jobs globally by 2030. The greatest impact would be felt in food and agriculture; cities; energy and materials; and health and well-being (BSDC, 2017).Regulatory reform and new approaches in public and private finance, enabling innovative financing and a reorientation of capital markets are key to attracting private capital. Security market regulators play an important role in driving change and innovation in capital markets. While most securities regulators do not have explicit mandates to promote sustainable development, sustainability issues and policy responses to these issues, are of direct relevance to their existing mandates. (SSE, 2019)

Ecosystem services provide multiple societal benefits such as nutritious food and clean water, regulate disease and climate, support the pollination of crops and soil formation, and provide recreational, cultural and spiritual benefits. (UN, 2019) It has been widely recognized that despite an estimated value of $125 trillion (UN, 2019), the ecosystems services assets are not adequately priced and valued in economic and public policy. It results in underinvestment and poor protection and management of such assets, their degradation, and irreversible loss. The risks and stakes have never been so high as today.

The degradation of land and marine ecosystems undermines the well-being of 3.2 billion people. Ecosystem services and other non-marketed goods are estimated to make up between 50% and 90% of the total source of livelihoods among poor rural and forest-dwelling households – the so-called ‘GDP of the poor’ and costs about 10 percent of the annual global GDP in loss of species and ecosystems services. (UNEP, 2019) Current and further growing anthropogenic pressures on the world’s ecosystems call for urgent complex and holistically-oriented policy interventions on global, regional and national levels in order to restore ecosystems and protect the biodiversity that is in decline in all the regions of the world.

Chemicals play an important role in the contemporary economy, implementing the 2030 Agenda and achieving multiple SDGs. Whether the chemical industries will serve the public good and improve people's lives, reduce environmental harm and improve waste management, depends on the effective policy frameworks and laws, as well as the voluntary commitment of the industries to improve their process and production methods, introduce cleaner technologies, develop safer chemicals, improve waste management.  

Despite the commitments made at high-level UN Conferences and some action taken, scientists continue to express concerns regarding the lack of progress towards related SDG targets, improving the management of chemicals and waste at global, national, regional levels. For example, as of 2018, more than 120 countries had not implemented the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals (UNEP, 2019).

The illicit trade in drugs involving the cultivation, manufacture, distribution, and sale of substances which are subject to the drug prohibition laws  (UN, 2019) is estimated between 300 - 400bln a year or 7-8% of all international trade. The international cooperation efforts to reduce the size and the scale of the drug markets,  undertaken by the international community between 1998 and 2016 and led by the UN and other international intergovernmental task forces, have largely failed (the UNGA Resolution A/Res/66/183) The studies and reports demonstrated the increase in production and the use of drugs, new forms of facilitation of trade in drugs, high adaptability of international crime groups and networks to new context and law enforcement practices and investigation strategies. The drug policies focused on seizing the crops hit most vulnerable groups (subsistence farmers, children, women) and resulted in greater levels of poverty and crime in the regions of cultivation. The violent and armed conflicts between the government and organized crime groups locked the communities in "cross-fire", where the poorest and vulnerable were affected most. The international community has recognized the need to change the policy paradigm and focus on people and development, recognized illicit trade in drugs as a developmental issue, that has complex developmental causes and effects and needs to be addressed holistically and in line with 2030 Agenda and the SDGs. 

Key international organizations, national governments, leading policy think tanks and universities engage in the studies and discussions about the impact of digitalization (automation of work), new business models, demographic changes (population growth in developing countries and aging in developed ones), climate change and globalization on jobs, nature of work and ultimately, social sustainability in our societies. These megatrends contribute to growing disparities in income and concerns about increasing inequalities of the access to the opportunities, benefits and pay-offs of globalization and liberalization of the markets in goods, services and free movement of people. There is an urgent need for policy action to support equitable and just transformation, a more equal sharing of the costs of the structural adjustment and increase the responsiveness of the social and economic systems to a rapidly changing societal context.  

By 2050, the world is expected to generate 3.40 billion tons of waste annually, increasing drastically from today’s 2.01 billion tons, says the recent World Bank Report "What a Waste 2.0. A Global Snapshot of Solid Waste Management to 2050".

Inadequate and improper waste collection and disposal negatively impact environmental sustainability and public health at the local and regional levels and contributes to climate change and GHG emissions (mainly methane, that is times potent than CO2) globally. However, waste is the largest source of pollution in the oceans. In the middle and low-income countries improper waste management results in polluting water, air, and soil. There is a need to significantly improve waste and resource management at all levels, making the use of different policy and fiscal instruments, enhancing international cooperation, encouraging the investments in the sector and technologies, and building effective public-private partnerships. 

According to the recent estimates, half of the world’s population has no social protection and access to healthcare (ILO, 2019); 300 million workers in developing countries earn less than 1.9 US dollars a day; less than 60 percent of workers have formal contracts and 81 percent of all countries have violated the right to collective bargaining.

Official Development Assistance providers (ODA providers) and donors have started to recognize their role in advancing the implementation of the Decent Work Agenda  (DWA), developed by ILO in 1999 that is built around four pillars: employment creation, rights at work, social protection and social dialogue.

DWA became an integral component of the 2030 Agenda and SDG 8: Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all’,  includes targets related to labor rights, labor markets policies, occupational health and safety, policies on wages, climate justice

The recent IPCC special report argued that limiting warming to 1.5 °C is possible, but requires urgent and unprecedented transformation across all aspects of society - including energy, agricultural, urban and industrial systems. In order to support and accelerate this all-embracing and deep societal change, broader integral policies that would include climate action, issues of security, technology, and other issues are necessary to provide fast and fair solutions and support those who need it most. 

Against this background, the Global Conference on Strengthening Synergies between the Paris Agreement and the 2030 Agenda was held this month in Denmark. It was organized by the UN DESA and the UN FCCC and hosted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Energy, Utilities and Climate, aimed to align the climate and SDG processes, and stimulate action from stakeholders at the global, regional and country levels to maximize co-benefits.

 Cultural and creative industries are major drivers of economies by capitalising US $2,3 billion or 3 percent of the global GDP (UNESCO, 2013). Globalization, facilitated by technology accelerated the export of creative goods at about 12 percent per annum in the developing world in the past decades. (UNDP, 2019) Creative economy promotes human-centred growth, creates 29.5 million jobs globally and contributes to implementing of 2030 Agenda in a number of ways: (i) it stimulates innovation, ideas, technologies, and transformative change (UNESCO, 2013); (ii) empowers people and promotes local development/rural economy that is rich with untapped cultural uniqueness (diversity); (iii) empowers women; (iv) demonstrates resilience. Several studies argue that if well-nurtured, the creative economy can be a source of structural economic transformation, socio-economic progress, job creation and innovation while contributing to social inclusion and sustainable human development. (UNDP, 2019)

Between $5-7 trillion needed annually to achieve the SDGs (UNCTAD, 2017; WEF, 2018), including $4 trillion for Emerging Markets alone (WEF, 2018). In order to mobilize these essential financial resources for sustainable development, innovative models of development finance, public funding, private investments, need to evolve. The Addis Ababa Action Agenda (AAAA) encourages new forms and synergies in financing for sustainable development such as impact investing as a means to achieve the SDGs (paras. 37, 42). There is a need to develop enabling policy environment as well as new performance metrics for new types of investments (UNDESA, 2019) to ensure that financing is going where it is needed most. Today, despite the increase in a number of financial products claiming to be impact investments, there is no common ground on how to manage impact investments and clearly distinguish between impact investing, sustainable investing and other forms of responsible investing (World Bank, 2019).

195 countries and the bulk of their populations are coastal, tied to the health and productivity of marine ecosystems, which offer valuable assets to generate substantial economic and developmental gains, and play a key role in climate change mitigation. (UNCTAD, 2017) The rapid development of technologies, coupled with fast economic development and demographic growth in developing countries, open a new era in economic exploration and trade in marine-based products and services. There is a need in new policy and governance approaches to building sustainable supply chains. Blue BioTrade is an emerging concept in International Trade that refers to the activities of collection, production, transformation, and commercialization of goods and services derived from marine biodiversity in environmentally, socially and economically sustainable way. (UNCTAD, 2018) If well-designed and implemented "Blue BioTrade” can become a new effective tool to promote sustainability and equity.

Just within last few years, the world saw the destruction of Notre-Dame de Paris Cathedral, the Brazilian Museu Nacional in Rio de Janeiro, founded in 1818, which housed an invaluable collection of 20 million artifacts, the destruction of the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra by ISIS and the Buddhas of Bamiyan by Taliban. However, dozens of World Heritage objects are endangered with climate-related events such as flooding, erosion and other climate-related risks according to recent studies. Museums, archaeological sites, and historical buildings are rarely included in the policy agenda for climate change or sustainable development. Yet climate change is not selective, it affects everything: from local cultural practices to iconic sites of outstanding universal value (Daly et al., 2018).  Cultural sites play a significant role in the sustainable development of countries. Creative and cultural tourism is a leading generator of GDP for local and national coffers globally.

The World Economic Forum has estimated a $1 trillion economic potential in the Arctic. Melting ice offers an opportunity for Arctic states to develop and use new shipping routes of high commercial and military strategic importance and value, access economic resources and explore significant natural reserves of oil and gas. According to the scientific estimates, they comprise 30 percent of the world’s undiscovered natural gas and 15 percent of the world’s untapped oil. Emerging technologies accelerate the pace of economic exploration and economic competition for leadership in the region. Some studies project the emergence of the geopolitical tensions, first, between the Arctic states, if Arctic nations make claims on disputed resources.

For decades, The Arctic has been a conflict-free region. The changing environment and emerging economic opportunities raise questions about whether the current patterns of cooperation between nations would continue. Global warming is changing the balance of interests, raises new risks and geopolitical issues that require new approaches in law, policy, and governance. 

WHO Fair Pricing Forum, held on 11-13 April, sought to motivate an open discussion among a wide range of stakeholders including the public sector, civil society, and the pharmaceutical industry to find the ways and strategies to reduce medicine prices, make them more transparent and SDGs-responsive in order to expand access to medicines for all.  

Today, the pricing mechanisms developed by pharmaceutical companies on their own are not transparent. Ranges in prices of the same medicines in different markets allow us to conclude that companies price the medicines "as high as possible on that market".

According to 2017 WHO Report on "Estimated costs of production and potential prices for the WHO Essential Medicines List", medicines account for a quarter of all health expenditures globally and 100% of health expenditures for about half of households in low and middle-income countries. Their affordability raises a global concern.

"Good health is one of humanity’s most valued assets. It is key to advancing sustainable development - to end poverty, promote peaceful and inclusive societies and protect the environment. This puts the health goal (SDG 3) right at the centre of the entire 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development," - says the WHO in its Summary to the Global Action Plan for healthy lives and well-being for all (Global Action Plan), a commitment signed by 11 heads of the world’s leading health and development organizations last year.
New stakeholders join this partnership and, to date, twelve global leading health and development organizations (Gavi, GFF, Global Fund, UNAIDS, UNDP, UNFPA, UNICEF, Unitaid, UN Women, WFP, WHO, and the World Bank) are exploring new ways of working together to accelerate progress towards the health-related SDG targets. Further developments will be presented in September on High-Level Political Forum.

We have not seen the broad transformation that we need, to achieve the SDGs by 2030, - said Inga Rhonda King, President of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) at the opening of the Forum on Financing for Development, that is taking place from April 15 to April 18  at the UN's headquarters in New-York. 

The ECOSOC Forum on Financing for Development follow-up (FfD Forum) is an intergovernmental process with universal participation mandated to review the Addis Ababa Action Agenda (Addis Agenda) and other finance for development outcomes and the means of implementation of the SDGs. The ECOSOC Forum on Financing for Development (E/FFDF/2018/3) gathers together officials from ministries of finance, foreign affairs, and development cooperation, Executive Directors of the World Bank and IMF, as well as senior officials from the UN system, including the major institutional stakeholders, civil society, local authorities, and business sector.

A growing number of studies and reports reveal a complex relationship between the existing competition rules and sustainability,  arguing that Competition law as a product of neoliberalism, based on the assumptions of rational self-interested individual agents seeking profit maximization, has significantly shaped modern global supply chains and led to massive imbalance of power, that is now highly concentrated in hangs of a few large market players (mainly processing and retailing industries), encouraged creation of "cheap" products and led to narrow focus on the consumer wealth at the expense of environment, the well-being of primary producers and people’s livelihoods (through suppressed income), future generations and, ultimately, undermined social justice and ethical foundations of our society at large. Some scholars (Farah, Ötvös, 2019) admitted the contradiction between the principles and rationales underlying competition rules, and sustainability: the spirit of competition law assumes "stand-alone model" of market behavior or acting in one's own interest and pursuing profit maximization, whereas sustainability as a shared a societal collective goal for achieving common or public good requires a cooperative model of behavior, requires the actions that are contrary to the spirit of competition law. 

At the opening press conference of the IMF-World Bank Spring Meetings, IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde presented her vision of the Global Policy Agenda (policy paper), titled: "The Managing Director's Global Policy Agenda 2019: Joint Responsibility. Shared Rewards." This policy thinkpiece outlines the institution’s policy responses to tackle current societal challenges.

The paper is focused on the synthetic overview of the ways to upgrade global cooperation on a wide range of global challenges such as climate change, demographic shifts, and tensions caused by conflict and migration.  Lagarde underscores the importance of the coordinated effort in achieving the SDGs, particularly, in current "delicate" state of global economy, when "growth is slowing, reflecting trade and geopolitical tensions, policy uncertainty, and one-off factors".

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While not limited to agriculture, GIs play a crucial role in the agricultural sector. By way of example, in the European Union (EU), where farmers can continue to compete on international markets only relying on quality rather than price, the worldwide sale value of the GIs is estimated at € 54.3 billion (OriGIn, 2018)

The study by FAO-ERBD "Strengthening sustainable food systems through geographical indications. An analysis of economic impacts" finds the positive impact of the GIs on economic resilience, as well as territorial and rural development. The main objective of this study is to provide additional evidence regarding the economic impacts of GIs on value chains and producers. Although the positive impacts of the most famous GIs – such as Champagne or Parmigiano reggiano – have been well demonstrated, there has been relatively little research conducted on the economic sustainability of GIs in general, - says the Report. It takes nine cases from worldwide for the analysis of the economic and sustainability impacts of GIs: Colombian coffee, Darjeeling tea (India), Futog cabbage (Serbia), Kona coffee (United States), Manchego cheese (Spain), Penja pepper (Cameroon), Taliouine saffron (Morocco), Tête de Moine cheese (Switzerland) and Vale dos Vinhedos wine (Brazil)

The UN General Assembly in its resolution A/RES/65/271 of 7 April 2011, declared 12 April as the International Day of Human Space Flight “to celebrate each year at the international level the beginning of the space era for mankind, reaffirming the important contribution of space science and technology in achieving sustainable development goals and increasing the well-being of States and peoples, as well as ensuring the realization of their aspiration to maintain outer space for peaceful purposes.” 

 The role of space technologies in achieving the SDGs is multi-facet.  Art 76 of the UNGA resolution on Agenda 2030 specifically refers to space technologies and promotes public-private cooperation to exploit the contribution to be made by a wide range of data, including Earth observation and geospatial information. Earth Observations from space directly contribute to almost all SDGs. (UNOOSA, 2018)  

The research by the WBCSD explores the board’s role in creating long-term value and pays special attention to how environmental and social risks and opportunities affect the corporate governance process.

The Report addresses the common misconception that the duty of directors is to solely maximize shareholder value and how this ideology has led to short-termism. The paper outlines what aspects and practices of corporate governance promote the long-term sustainable success of a company as well as generate value for all stakeholders, including shareholders.

WBCSD highlights the state of corporate governance across twelve jurisdictions: Brazil, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, The Netherlands, Singapore, South Africa, Thailand, the United Kingdom, and the US. The research also focused on publicly available information from a sample of 56 companies across these 12 jurisdictions, with a focus on the food and agricultural sector.

Inequality will be under the laser focus of the HLPF this year. Many institutions will provide their view of how to tackle inequality. 

UNDP is preparing the Report, that is expected to to be released in the last quarter of the year, will provide a comprehensive picture of the many forms of inequality that are shaping the 21st Century. 

“While many believe inequality is critically important, there is much less agreement on why it matters and what to do about it. We need to sharpen measurement to better describe what inequality looks like and to have a deeper understanding of how inequality will change given the economic, social and environmental transformations that are unfolding worldwide. Only then can we design the policy options that could effectively tackle it.” – said Pedro Conceição, Director of the Human Development Report Office at UNDP.

If national and international financial systems don’t change, the Sustainable Development Goals will not be achieved, says a new 2019 UN Financing for Sustainable Development Report, prepared jointly with more than sixty international organizations, including the IMF, the World Bank Group and World Trade Organization. This report is the basis for discussions at the ECOSOC Forum on Financing for Development (15-18 April 2019), where the Member States agree on measures necessary to mobilize sustainable financing. 
The Report notes, that in response to the 2030 Agenda, many countries have revisited or introduced new sustainable development strategies. However, most strategies do not have concrete financing plans to fund their implementation.

In order to support the allocation of financial resources for sustainable development, there is a need to revisit and shape global financial architecture and develop relevant national financial frameworks that 

A shift towards a circular economy can address some of the challenges posed by the increasing scarcity and depletion of natural resources and bring about many societal benefits, improve social welfare, including by creating new jobs and businesses. 

Currently, the world lacks a shared vision of the circular economy, even though Agenda 2030 and the SDGs provide an effective benchmark for developing relevant supportive policy strategies and legal frameworks.  ​​

However, there are persisting policy obstacles across the countries that undermine the progress and a scale-up of the circular economy such as taxation and regulation concerning the use of secondary raw materials, poor waste management legislation, the lack of mandatory goals around circular targets, and public procurement law that largely link the selection proceedings and outcomes rather to financial criteria, than to the environmental or societal impact. 

According to the UN water, the 263 transboundary lake and river basins cover almost half the Earth’s surface. 145 States have territory in these basins, and 30 countries lie entirely within them. There are approximately 300 transboundary aquifers, helping to serve the 2 billion people who depend on groundwater. According to the UN, (2008) transboundary lake and river basins account for an estimated 60 percent of global freshwater flow and is home to 40 percent of the world’s population. 

Cooperation is essential, especially in areas vulnerable to the impacts of climate change and where water is already scarce. Wetlands around lakes and floodplains that straddle national boundaries provide essential ecosystem services to the surrounding populations, such as food provision, barriers against flooding and the natural processing of pollution. 

The recent White paper by the World Economic Forum "Globalization 4.0: Shaping a New Global Architecture in the Age of the Fourth Industrial Revolution" suggests that major shifts underway in technology, geopolitics, environment, and society give birth to a new phase of globalization – Globalization 4.0 – whose trajectory will depend on how multilevel governance frameworks  (governmental, corporate and international) adapt to these changes.

The current wave of technological disruption is combining with three other epochal transformations: the emergence of new ecological imperatives, particularly those concerning climate change; the advent of multipolar world order; and an explosion of social discontent, fueled largely by rising inequality. Taken together, these developments represent a new phase of globalization – Globalization 4.0 – the trajectory of which will depend on how we adapt political, corporate, and international governance models to changing realities.

Climate litigation is becoming one of the legal avenues, taken by the citizens, environmental groups, local governments (cities), shareholders and investors to hold the governments accountable and the companies liable for the impacts of climate change.

According to one of the leading international law firms White and Case, climate litigation is driven by the following rationales: (i) compensation for the costs of adaptation to climate change; (ii) challenging climate change-related legislation and policies, or their application; (iii) preventing future emissions and contributions to climate change; (iv) requiring governments or regulators to take action to meet national or international commitments; (v) raising awareness and exerting pressure on corporate actors, regulators or investors. Courts are adjudicating disputes over action or inaction related to climate change mitigation and adaptation efforts.

The meeting, held by WIPO on April 3, 2019, was a side event of the Intergovernmental Conference on an international legally binding instrument under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea on the conservation and sustainable use of marine biological diversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction (General Assembly resolution 72/249) and aimed at providing An Overview of the Marine Biological Diversity Negotiations so far, with Specific Reference to Intellectual Property Issues.

Last year countries launched negotiations of a new international legally binding instrument on marine genetic resources in the high seas to develop frameworks which regulate access to and benefit-sharing in genetic resources beyond national jurisdiction. This negotiation is taking place under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, 1982 (UNCLOS). The current level of the technological innovation allows the companies

Unprecedented levels of urbanization coupled with revolutions in transport, energy, and data technology offer new opportunities to reshape cities, - suggests the recent Report Supporting Smart Urban Development: Successful Investment in Density.     

The Report finds that dense development can bring about not only new risks, but also opportunities to improve the economic, social, and environmental performance of cities, create vibrant dynamic urban centres that are more competitive, inclusive, and resilient as well as cleaner, quieter, and safer, and have lower carbon emissions. 

The study underscores that urban development is highly impacted by the global context of the economic development that affects urban economic and employment structure, good density, and real estate investment. Urban areas now account for approximately 80 per cent of global economic output, and by 2050 two-thirds of the global population are expected to live in urban areas.

The conventional wisdom that carbon pricing slows down economic growth has been triggered in the recent research from the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate, that finds that bold climate action could deliver at least $26 trillion in economic benefits through 2030. However, evidence from the 70 national and subnational economies that have put a price on carbon or are about to show it does not slow economic growth but provides a clear and steady signal for the business, industry, and consumers to shift course.

According to the authors of the Report, the shift to a different model of growth is happening in most of the economies. The progress is visible.  Investment in sustainable infrastructure is now recognized as a central driver of growth and the delivery of the SDGs and the Paris Agreement. The G20 adopted “strong, sustainable, balanced, and inclusive growth” as its goal. Major development finance institutions (DFIs) are shifting their capital to sustainable investments.

The recent Report "Trade in environmentally sound technologies: implications for developing countries", prepared by the UNEP admits the significant potential of trade to contribute in implementing the Paris Agreement, the 2030 Agenda and achieving the SDGs.

Indeed, there is growing consensus that trade plays a crucial role in driving a shift towards climate-resilient and sustainable global economy, including by facilitating more efficient allocation of resources and bridging relative differences in resource endowments across countries. Specialization, competition, and innovation promoted by trade can drive down the costs of environmental goods and services and have positive effects on prosperity, jobs, and equality.

Trade can thereby contribute to economic development and diversification that increases living standards locally, can contribute to improving the environment. Furthermore, to the view of the authors of the report, trade can facilitate the creation and

Historically, water-related problems led rather to a greater level of international cooperation over water governance, than to conflicts. At the same time, the increasing frequency of the climate-related events, growing water demand due to the economic and demographic growth in developing countries creates a new dynamic and new scale water risks. Increasingly, different stakeholders call for enhancing and advancing international cooperation and governance of water, call for responses to the increasing water risks largely driven by these factors of climate change, economic and demographic growth.

Different studies and reports make projections with respect to the increase in risks of water conflicts worldwide.

The recent IPCC Report projects that 200 million more people will be exposed to increased water scarcity and more severe floods and droughts if the emissions continue to grow.

The G20 Summit is the “premier forum for international economic cooperation”, agreed by leaders at the Pittsburgh Summit in September 2009. It is formally known as the “Summit on Financial Markets and the World Economy”. It was launched to address the global financial crisis of 2008 and developed in one of the most important high-level political fora since then.

G20 represents more than 80% of the global GDP and seeks to achieve robust global economic growth and address a wide range of global issues which have an immense impact on the global economy, such as development, climate change, and energy, health, counter-terrorism, as well as migration and refugees with the overall aim to realize an inclusive and sustainable world through its contributions towards resolving these global issues.

In 2019 Japan has a presidency and hosts G20 Summit in Osaka on June 28-29th. In parallel, several ministerial meetings on agriculture, trade and the digital economy, tourism, finance, energy transition and sustainable growth will take place at eight different locations 

2019 presents a range of the opportunities to discuss the synergies between the climate and sustainable development agendas in the context of the incoming High-Level Political Forum (HLPF) in July and the HLPF Summit in September, the Climate Summit, the SAMOA Pathway Mid-Term Review, and the Mid-Term Review of the Vienna Program of Action for Landlocked Developing Countries. (UN, 2019) Another key event, High-Level Meeting on the Protection of the Global Climate for Present & Future Generations of Humankind in the Context of the Economic, Social and Environmental Dimensions of the 2030 Agenda, was held on March 28 in New Your, the UN Headquarters. It was mandated by the UNGA  Resolution A/RES/72/219  that invites the President of the General Assembly to convene a high-level meeting during the seventy-third session of the General Assembly

Developing countries are critical partners for achieving global environmental objectives, such as reducing GHG emissions and slowing biodiversity loss.

Strong economic and demographic growth in emerging markets (80% of the world population) over the past decade has helped to lift up of the poverty millions of people but has often led to environmental degradation and natural resources depletion that can undermine the well-being of future generations, expose the developing countries to greater climate risks, contributes to global climate change. Estimates of some economic costs demonstrate the need to make a shift from the typical economic model, based on natural resources exploration, often at the expense of environmental quality and society to a more sustainable and climate resilient economic growth and development.

Global growth in population, combined with complex climate change effects calls for a new generation of infrastructure projects, that would factor in increasing water stress, water security, disaster risk reduction, poverty alleviation, and resilience to climate change.

World Resources Institute suggests a new approach, based on integrating "grey" human-made infrastructure with "natural" green infrastructure to enhance system performance, boost resilience, lower costs, and better protect communities. Public utilities, hydropower companies can deliver more cost-effective and resilient services by integrating green infrastructure into their plans and operations.

.As the global population grows from 7 billion in 2010 to a projected 9.8 billion in 2050, coupled with growing purchasing power in developing countries, overall food demand is on course to increase by more than 50 percent, and demand for animal-based foods by nearly 70 percent. Creating a Sustainable Food Future, a multiyear partnership between World Resources Institute, the World Bank Group, UNEP, the UNDP, the Centre de coopération internationale en recherche agronomique pour le développement, and the Institut national de la recherche agronomique have published the synthesis report and propose a menu of options that could allow the world to achieve a sustainable food future through making essential changes in consumption patterns, land use and management, technological innovations in farming and cross-cutting sustainable development policies to manage intertwined challenges.

Nourishing a growing world population while nurturing our planet requires landscape approaches that protect and sustainably use vital ecosystem services, sustain livelihoods and tackle food security challenges, while adapting to the impacts of climate change.

The FAO's Report on State of the World’s Forests 2018 provides detailed analysis aimed at capturing the contribution of forests and trees to 28 targets relating to ten SDGs. Through thematic metrics bringing together available evidence from a wide range of sources, a clearer picture is emerging of the full impact that forests and trees have on many other crucial areas of development.

The objective of SOFO 2018 is to identify how forests' and trees' contribution to sustainable development can be strengthened to help achieve the 2030 Agenda with its ambitious, integrated goals. It will demand a fundamental shift in the way policies are developed and implemented.

The 2030 Agenda presents a great opportunity to address the interlinked challenges of poverty eradication and sustainable development. At the international level, all countries will need to enhance policy coherence as an important means to ensure that all policies support progress towards the agreed global goals.

Policy Coherence for Development constitutes a key pillar of the European Union’s efforts to enhance the positive impact of its policies on developing countries, promoting synergies between policies.

The concept of policy coherence for development was introduced in EU fundamental law in 1992 with the Treaty of Maastricht and was further reinforced in the Treaty of Lisbon in 2009 (Art.208 TFEU). was reaffirmed in the new European Consensus on Development (2017). This new European Consensus foresees that Policy Coherence for Development will be applied across all policies and all areas covered by Agenda 2030. 

The vast majority of people living in rural areas in developing countries rely on peasant food and seed systems. These systems  are essential to food security, preserving biodiversity and promoting sustainable development. Peasants produce 70 per cent of the world’s food, but remain to be vulnerable and exposed to the societal risks such as poverty, gender inequality and climate change. 

This month the UN has adopted a draft of the landmark Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas, which recognizes rights that are considered to be new in international human rights law, such as the right to seeds. 

For years small farmers have been campaigning for right to save, use, exchange and sell farm-saved seeds. The issue has been contentious because of its high relevance to intellectual property rights and the commercial interests of the seeds companies and plant breeders, which argued that "if peasants want to save and sell seeds that they harvest from improved protected seeds they bought from the companies, they would have to pay royalties".

The today's urgency to tackle the most pressing societal challenges such as climate change, environmental degradation, conflict and terrorism is coupled with the loss of credibility in international cooperation,  multilateralism and collective action. ​The Paris Peace Forum, initiated by French President Emmanuel Macron, aims to revive collective governance, strengthen international cooperation, norms and institutions at a time when global challenges have never been so pressing. It took place from November 11 till November 13.

The PPF focuses is on the inter linkages between peace and global governance. The PPF is driven by the conviction that peace is made up of all the governance solutions that help minimize international tensions and work for common benefit: cooperation to tackle climate change, natural resource depletion and scarcity, administering global public goods, justice to assuage grievances and frustration, regulation to address inequalities, etc.

Inclusive and sustainable industrialization is essential to achieve sustainable development. None should be left behind in benefiting from industrial development. The gains it generates should be shared inclusively and pro-environmentally. increasing welfare of the poorest,  - says the UNIDO Industrial Development Report 2018 "Demand for Manufacturing: Inclusive and sustainable industrial development".

The Report highlights the role of industrial development in driving sustainable and inclusive development by creating shared prosperity (offering equal opportunities and an equitable distribution of benefits to all), advancing economic competitiveness and safeguarding the environment (decoupling economic growth from the excessive use of natural resources). The Lima Declaration, adopted by UNIDO’s Member States on 2 December 2013, set the foundation for this vision.

There is a strong evidence that the today's problem of hunger is not related to quantity and production, but can be sourced to limited access to food, inefficient distributional policies and other factors contributing to the rise of hunger such as: (i) economic downturns, (ii) unsustainable use of the natural stocks and resources such as illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing (iii) depletion of forest resources, which serve as a direct source of food and income for over 1 billion poor people globally; (iv) conflicts and population displacement; (v) natural disasters; (vi) lack of social protections and safety nets; (vii) food waste.

Eliminating hunger and malnutrition requires policies, strategies and laws to guide the action in a holistic, cross-sectoral and systemic way through "the framework laws" which insure the policy coherence. The term “framework law” refers to a legislative mechanism used to address multisectoral issues (FAO, 2018).

According to the OECD estimates, the global economy is on course to quadruple by 2060. It will be accompanied by the increase in global population, demand for producing goods and services, consequently the demand in primer materials.  A preview of the OECD's The Global Material Resources Outlook to 2060 released this week sees global materials use rising to 167 Gigatonnes in 2060 from 90 Gigatonnes today as the world population soars to 10 billion people and average global income per capita rises to converge with the current OECD level of USD 40,000. Such an increase in materials extraction, processing and waste, is likely to increase the pressure on the resource bases of global economy and hinder the progress towards achieving the goals of the Paris Climate Accord, SDGs and targets, particularly, SDG 8.4. on decoupling of materials use and environmental degradation from GDP growth. 

The New York state has tried a different strategy to attack the fossils giant, Exxon Mobil Corporation,  through the enforcement of the anti-fraud law. After three years of investigation, Barbara D. Underwood, the New York attorney general, brought the lawsuit before the Supreme Court of the State of New York under the Martin Securities Fraud Act (New York General Business Law article 23-A, sections 352–353). Unlike the previous recent cases, the suit does not charge Exxon with playing any significant role in contributing to climate change. Instead, it is presented to the court as one of the classic shareholder fraud suits, which proven to be successfully prosecuted under Martin act, the toughest anti-fraud statute in the US. The Martin act gives the attorney general significant investigative powers to prosecute securities fraud. The lawsuit says the company engaged in a “longstanding fraudulent scheme” to deceive investors, analysts and underwriters “concerning the company’s management of the risks posed to its business by climate change regulation.”

Globally, the level of hunger and malnutrition is still “serious”, - says the Global Hunger Index 2018 (GHI). If the fight for “Zero hunger” is not accelerated, about 50 countries will not reach the objectives by 2030.

The 2018 GHI Report also focused on the correlation between hunger and forced migration, analysed by Laura Hammond, a Senior lecturer in development studies at SOAS University, London. According to the latter, especially during conflicts and political disorders, the two phenomena may be at the same time one the cause of the other. Indeed, during conflicts people often can neither provide for their food nor have access to markets, due to economical reasons. As a consequence of the lack of food and other basic social amenities, they are forced to move. “In many cases, the conditions precipitate crises of forced migration, and those who are displaced both within and beyond their home countries struggle to properly feed themselves and their families. This is the case in many of the countries that rank the worst according to the GHI, as well as the countries for which there are inadequate data to calculate scores”, - says  the 2018 GHI Report.

The 2018 UNCTAD World Investment Forum is taking place in Switzerland on October 22-26. This year the event is entirely dedicated to financing sustainable development.  

Implementing the transformative 2030 Agenda and achieving the SDGs require significant capital -- public, private, blended finance, particularly in key sectors such as infrastructure, food security and rural development, sustainable energy, public health and education. The estimates suggest that developing countries alone face an annual financing gap of $ 2.5 trillion for achieving the SDGs (UNCTAD, 2014).

There is an urgent need of the global solution-oriented dialogue for closing this significant financial gap and engaging the private capital into financing the SDGs.

"Some $300 trln dollars in financial assets are managed by the global financial system on our collective behalf. The issue is to direct these funds, where they are needed first and where they have the greatest impact", -said Michael Moller, the Secretary-General of the UN Office in Geneva. 

The 14th AGM of the Intergovernmental Forum on Mining, Minerals, Metals and Sustainable Development (IGF) is taking place in Switzerland from October 16 to October 20. 

The IGF was one of the Partnership Initiatives launched at the World Summit on Sustainable Development  (WSSD) in 2000 (Johannesburg, South Africa). The Forum serves as a platform for collaboration among governments, mining companies and civil society in the area of mining policies, sharing best practices, creating multi-stakeholder partnerships to achieve progress on the implementation of SDGs in relation to mining. It is devoted to optimizing the benefits of mining to achieve poverty reduction, inclusive growth, social development and environmental stewardship. The IGF is a voluntary initiative that provides opportunities for national governments to collectively advance the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation (para. 46, 62(g)), Agenda 2030 and the SDGs, contribute to the implementation of Paris Agreement. 

October 13 is the International Day for Disaster Reduction. 

The last twenty years have seen a dramatic rise of 151% in direct economic losses from climate-related disasters, according to a report released today by the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction. This statistics reflects the increase in climate-related disasters by 9% in comparison to the period from 1978 to 1997, - says the recent UN Report. 

The study demonstrates, that during this period, 1.3 million people lost their lives and 4.4 billion people were injured, rendered homeless, displaced or in need of emergency assistance. 563 earthquakes, including related tsunamis, accounted for 56% of total deaths or 747,234 lives lost. The report’s analysis makes it clear that economic losses from extreme weather events are unsustainable and a major brake on eradicating poverty in hazard exposed parts of the world.

Open-ended intergovernmental working group on transnational corporations and other business enterprises with respect to human rights, established by the resolution 26/9 of the Human Rights Council on its 26th session, on 26 June 2014 will gather this month to discuss the zero draft of the “legally binding instrument to regulate, in international human rights law, the activities of transnational corporations and other business enterprises”, as well as the zero draft optional protocol annexed to the instrument.The treaty on business and human rights is sought to rebalance a profound asymmetry between TNCs' rights and obligations. The increasing economic power and extensive rights of corporate actors as a consequence of globalization, privatization and liberalized trade and investment have not been paralleled by increasing obligations of corporations under international human rights law, in spite of the fact that corporations can fundamentally impede the enjoyment of human rights. 

At the week-long meeting in the Republic of Korea government delegates considered the key findings of the report line-by-line and adopt these as the “Summary for Policy Makers” (SPM), that got approved few days ago and released today. 

The report’s full name is Global Warming of 1.5°C, an IPCC special report on the impacts of global warming of 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways, in the context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change, sustainable development, and efforts to eradicate poverty.

Limiting global warming to 1.5°C would require rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society, the IPCC said in a new assessment. With clear benefits to people and natural ecosystems, limiting global warming to 1.5°C compared to 2°C could go hand in hand with ensuring a more sustainable and equitable society, the IPCC said. 

Climate change affects women’s and men’s assets and well-being differently—in terms of agricultural production, food security, health, water and energy resources, climate-induced migration and conflict, and climate-related natural disasters, - said  Åsa Regnér, Assistant Secretary-General of the UN and Deputy Executive Director of UN Women at "Empowering women through the sustainable management of natural resources: Women as agents of change in tackling interlinked challenges related to climate change – sustainable land use, resilience and human security".

In many contexts women’s dependence on and unequal access to land, water, and other resources and productive assets—compounded by limited mobility and decision-making power—mean that they are disproportionately affected by climate change. Women are key actors in building community resilience and responding to climate-related disasters.  

The expansion of agricultural production in China has been remarkable, but at the expense of the sustainable use of its natural resources, - says the recent report of the OECD Innovation, Agricultural Productivity and Sustainability in China.

Today, the environmental pressures, coupled with rising labour costs and a rapidly ageing rural population, require structural policy reforms. The Report seeks to review and assess recent policy developments in terms of their impact on productivity growth and environmental sustainability.

The report reviews the support agricultural policies for farms target price system for agricultural products, agricultural policies targeted at environmental sustainability (agri-environmental payments, subsidies to support wetlands) and agricultural trade policies. In respect to price support policies the report concludes that they induce intensive production, leading to an excessive use of inputs.

"Wetlands, amongst the world’s most economically valuable ecosystems and essential regulators of the global climate, are disappearing three times faster than forests", says Global Wetland Outlook by the Ramsar Convention, a globally treaty ratified by 170 countries to protect wetlands and promote their wise use. Without wetlands, the global agenda on sustainable development will not be achieved, - says Martha Rojas Urrego, Secretary General of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands.

Wetlands are critical to human and planet life. Directly or indirectly, they provide nearly all global consumption of freshwater. More than one billion people depend on them for a living and they are among the most biodiverse ecosystems. Up to 40% of the world’s species live and breed in wetlands, although now more than 25% of all wetlands plants and animals are at risk of extinction.

"The changing landscape on global trade and the environment adds a new dimension to historical challenges and requires new thinking on global and national governance mechanisms", - says the Report “Making trade work for the environment, prosperity and resilience”, issued by WTO and UN Environment yesterday. It underscores the interlinkages between trade and SDGs, which "run through nearly all the SDGs, in direct and indirect ways. If properly supported, trade can serve as a lever to address some of the world’s most pressing environmental issues". The Report details how governments can work together to ensure that trade and a healthy environment reinforce each other. 

In his welcome remarks to the Opening Plenary of the 2018 Public Forum on 2 October, WTO Director-General Roberto Azevêdo underlined the importance of modernizing and adapting the rules of global trade in order to manage the major social and economic challenges ahead from technological change."We have to set a path towards better global trade by 2030 – trade that is even more sustainable and inclusive, and which is responsive to emerging challenges", - said Roberto Azevêdo, Director-General of the WTO. 

This year WTO Public Forum considers what sustainable trade will look like in 2030 and beyond. Under the umbrella of the main theme of "Trade 2030", the Public Forum's sub-themes will be sustainable trade, technology-enabled trade, and a more inclusive trading system.

On the eve of the COP 24 in Poland, the Brookings institution, one of the leading independent policy think tanks, has published the short report "Paris Agreement and its future", where identified the significance of the Paris Climate Accord and addressed the main points of the critics made against it, namely non-binding targets. 

Critics who dismiss Paris because of the non-binding targets not only misunderstand what was possible, but also miss a larger point about the Paris idea, -says the Report. The critics miss the core point that Paris made a different bet, namely, that the rising force of norms and expectations will make climate action important to global standing and reputation and will goad and prod countries to do better and do more. Norms and expectations might sound weaker than binding targets, but, in reality, such targets would almost surely depress ambition, since many countries would opt for lower targets out of fear of the consequences of coming up short.

The global hunger is on the rise and reached 821 million in 2017 according to The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2018 released this month. 

Hunger has been on the rise over the past three years, returning to levels from a decade ago. This reversal in progress sends a clear warning that more must be done and urgently if the Sustainable Development Goal of Zero Hunger is to be achieved by 2030. The report is part of tracking progress towards Sustainable Development Goal 2-Zero Hunger, which aims to end hunger, promote food security and end all forms of malnutrition by 2030. 

This year’s report focuses on the role of climate variability and extremes to explain the observed trends in food security. The annual UN report found that climate variability affecting rainfall patterns and agricultural seasons, and climate extremes such as droughts and floods, are among the key drivers behind the rise in hunger, together with conflict and economic slowdowns.

Recently, the international community has become increasingly aware of the range of services provided by marine ecosystems and of the rich biodiversity of pelagic and benthic ecosystems beyond the limits of national jurisdiction (UN, 2017).

The UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) was developed as a comprehensive system of law and order in the world’s oceans mainly and primarily for Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), but it left the international waters and the high seas which represent around two thirds of the oceans without the mechanisms of effective protection of the marine environment and with-no guarantees of the sustainable character of the economic activities or mechanisms to manage  negative impacts or sharing the benefits of such activities Exploring new economic opportunities, supported by the significant technological advancements, may extend the list of the existing negative anthropogenic impacts on the ecosystem of the ocean.

The World Economic Forum Sustainable Development Impact Summit 2018 was held this week in New York, in the midst of the UNGA. It aimed at providing a multistakeholder platform for concerted action for achieving the SDGs and climate policy goals. 

The Sustainable Development Impact Summit builds on the agenda of the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos-Klosters, Switzerland, and related projects of the Center for the Fourth Industrial Revolution in San Francisco, California.

The Forum aims to  provide a truly global platform for bringing the best minds together to solve the world’s most pressing and complex problems and provide the answers for the complex issues such as: What is needed for a transformation to a sustainable marketplace?  How can leaders propel action to secure the global commons now? How can Digital Intelligence be Raised? How to mitigate the Impacts of Climate Change? 

Three years on from the commitments made at COP21 in Paris, the overwhelming majority of governments have not taken the necessary action to contain growing risks to the climate. With emissions on the rise again, OECD governments need to get serious about shifting their economies to a low-carbon model and stop investing in carbon-intensive infrastructure, - says the recent OCD Report Financing Climate Futures . 

A preview of an OECD-UN Environment-World Bank Group report, Financing Climate Futures: Rethinking Infrastructure, indicates that only nine countries out of the 180 signatories to the 2015 Paris Agreement on Climate Change have submitted to the UNFCCC their long-term low-carbon strategies for 2050.

Governments are also failing to make enough use of public spending as a lever to decarbonise economies by investing in low-emissions infrastructure and innovation. The report suggests ways to bring more public and private financial flows into line with the Paris goals, in particular in infrastructure finance. It says this should be done through better planning and foresight, by integrating climate concerns into all budgetary decisions and leveraging public procurement into low-emission infrastructure.

Many experts in the US foresee that the courts and climate litigation will be playing a central role in developing climate-related policy in the United States. Traditionally, lawsuits were filed against government, but there is now a steep rise in climate lawsuits brought directly against companies: seven climate lawsuits were filed against companies in 2017, and six had so far been filed by May 2018. Climate litigation is emerging a separate law and judicial practice in the US.

Researchers at the George Washington University have published a study that analyzes 873 climate change-related lawsuits filed in the US over a 26-year period in order to outline the strategies which are more likely to win or lose the case, and why. 78 lawyers, advocates and scientists involved in these cases were interviewed in order to find out more about the evidence and strategies they typically used in building these cases.

The relationship between voluntary sustainability standards (VSS), trade and sustainable development are among the most pronounced concepts sought-after the realm of green global value chains, says the 3rd Flagship Report of the United Nations Forum of Sustainability standards (UNFSS), released this month. 

VSS are being discussed as a key instrument to help multinational corporations and governments contribute towards achieving the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and its 2030 targets (WWF, 2017).  However, the potential of VSS to deliver on these objectives remains uncertain and contested, - underscores the Report. The impact of VSS on trade is subject to much debate, particularly due to a limited uptake by the growing economies of India and China, which seek to preserve their competitive advantages based on the relaxed regulations related to labour, environment, taxation of the negative externalities. The key questions of this report include: What are the impacts of VSS from the trade policy perspective? What sustainability concerns do VSS address? Do VSS have significant impact upon developing countries trade success and in their achievements of the SDGs? What can public actors do to support VSS’ contribution to trade opportunities? What can potentially be the stipulated roles of global governance?

The Agricultural Outlook 2018‑2027 is a collaborative effort of the OECD and FAO, that provides an assessment of the ten‑year prospects for agricultural and fish commodity markets in the context of achieving the SDG targets and the commitments made in the UNFCCC’s 2015 Paris Agreement. 

The Report underscores the role of enabling policy environment, that is a crucial condition to achieve the SDGs and make progress towards zero hunger, particularly in the context of climate change. The special focus of the Report is on the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). This region is characterized by fragility and political instability, which undermine food security.

After seven years of silence, the UN Security Council (UNSC) again debated the security implications of climage change. On the meeting "Understanding and Addressing Climate‑related Security Risks" held last month, the UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed described climate change as “one of a web of factors that can lead to conflict”. 

Indeed, there is a growing evidence, that drought, desertification, land degradation and food insecurity are driving conflict and causing political instability. The climate change and security links are real, multiple, far-reaching. What are the appropriate type of the actors to address these complex issues. 

The question is wether the UNSC, primary responsible for maintenance of international peace and security and addressing the interstate armed conflicts (Art. 24 UN Charter),  is a proper forum for addressing climate-security nexus has been debated since a decade.

Indigenous and community lands is the source of subsistence for 2,5 billion people. ​The increasing demand for the resources is driving the commercial interest onto these territories, typically held under informal customary arrangements. There is an urgent need to formalize and protect the land rights of the Indigenous and rural communities. People, sustainably managed lands  for generations, risk to be left behind.According to the World Resources Institute (WRI), indigenous people and communities collectively hold more than half of the world’s land, but legally they own just 10 percent of land globally, and another 8 percent is designated by governments for community use. The Report uncovers the existing disparities in formalization of the land rights by the Indigenous people, communities and the companies: the companies and the investors have a clear advantage in the land rights formalization procedures.

August 9 is the International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples. According  to the UN, there are an estimated 370 million indigenous people in the world, living across 90 countries. They make up less than 5 per cent of the world's population, but account for 15 per cent of the poorest. They speak an overwhelming majority of the world’s estimated 7,000 languages and represent 5,000 different cultures. Indigenous peoples have a profound spiritual connection to their lands and resources.

This year the UN focuses on theme “Indigenous Peoples Migration and Movement”, the current situation of indigenous territories, the root causes of migration, trans-border movement and displacement, with a specific focus on indigenous peoples living in urban areas and across international borders. Despite the widespread assumption that indigenous peoples live overwhelmingly in rural territories, the current reality is that sprawling urban areas are now home to a significant proportion of the indigenous population

The 2018 SDG Index and Dashboards Report, co-produced by by the Bertelsmann Stiftung and the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN), has found that no country is on full track to achieve all the SDGs. 

The report is the third edition of the annual overview of countries’ performance on the 17 SDGs. For the first time, this edition covers all 193 UN member states and presents data on changes over time in SDG indicators. The Report is built on the previous year investigation of the international spillover effects in meeting the SDGs, which noted that "development patterns of the rich countries may generate adverse “spillovers” that may hinder the ability of poorer countries’ to achieve the SDGs".  

Fragility poses a major global threat to the implementation of the 2030 Agenda. The conflict, terrorism, homicides, the threat of pandemics, forced displacement, disasters, famine and more, have fragility at their core, - - says the recent OECD Report: States of Fragility. The report shows that, without action, more than 80% of the world’s poorest will be living in fragile contexts by 2030. Yet delivery of results on  Agenda 2030 is already in jeopardy.

The new type of litigation that links climate and rights is emerging. In the US the number of law suits aimed at holding oil companies responsible for the impacts of climate change is also on the rise. Still the climate action aimed at transforming responsibility into the liabilities does not enjoy a great support of the courts. 

On July 19, 2018 the US District Court Southern District of New York dismissed the claim of the City of New York against the oil companies BP P.L.C. (“BP”), Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Exxon, and Royal Dutch Shell. The City of New York alleged that these oil companies "have contributed to the temperature increases and global-warming-induced sea-level rise affecting New York City".through the production and sale of fossil fuel products".   

"Three years after its adoption, most governments have failed to turn the vision of the 2030 Agenda into real policies. Even worse, policies in a growing number of countries are moving in the opposite direction, seriously undermining the spirit and the goals of the 2030 Agenda", - says the Spotlight Report 2018: Exploring new policy pathways.

The Report provides one of the most comprehensive independent assessment of the implementation of the 2030 Agenda. It was launched on the opening day of the High Level Political Forum for sustainable development 2018 (HLPF 2018) by a global coalition of civil society organizations and trade unions.

There is a growing recognition that universally adopted SDGs can only be achieved through an unprecedented transformations of technologies, economies, and societies worldwide.

According to the Report issued by the "World in 2050 initiative" (TWI2050), six Transformations needed to Achieve SDGs, long term sustainability and beyond: i) Human capacity and demography; ii) Consumption and production; iii) Decarbonization and energy, iv) Food, biosphere and water; v) Smart cities and vi) Digital revolution. The Report provides policy recommendations on how to achieve integrated pathways that implement these transformations, which require innovative governance structures and capabilities, metrics of development, political action and the formation of actors of change on local, national and global levels.

Jul 28, 2018

Agriculture ministers of the Group of 20 (G20) member states met in Argentina on 27-28 July to reflect about the role of G20 countries in the global food system and tackle the issues on responsible soil management, food waste reduction and technology in agriculture. The latter one has a potential to make production more attractive for young people and bridge the generational gap in agricultural production. The ministers have also discussed the contribution of G20 towards enhancing global food security and improving nutrition by increasing agricultural productivity and incomes, while fostering the sustainable management of natural resources. The issue was considered in the context of increasing of global hunger, that now affects 815 million people worldwide.

Jul 26, 2018

The Report “The Human Rights Opportunity: 15 real-life cases of how business is contributing to the Sustainable Development Goals by putting people first", launched by Shift  in collaboration with the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), seeks to inspire transformative business action, that goes beyond the "do not harm" principle and invites private sector to be more proactive in implementing the key tenets of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) and support Agenda 2030.

Jul 25, 2018

When consumer interests are protected, social and economic progress follows - supporting achieving the SDGs, -  says the UNCTAD Report of the Intergovernmental Group of Experts on Consumer Protection Law and Policy, heard on 9 and 10 July 2018.

The Report aimed at informing policymakers and law enforcement agencies about the positive impacts of the consumer protection on promoting a more inclusive and sustainable development

The UNCTAD experts in consumer rights protection point out a clear link between better consumer rights and achieving the SDG. At the same time the UNCTAD experts see the existing gap - the link between consumer rights and achieving the SDGs is not properly minded in the indicator's framework.

Jul 24, 2018

Two most ambitious global agendas - Paris Agreement and Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development - aimed at achieving climate-resilient, sustainable development by 2030 and carbon neutrality by the second half of the century face significant challenges in implementation.

In its recent study "Connecting the Dots: Elements for a Joined-Up Implementation of the Agenda 2030 and Paris Agreement", The World Resources Institute (WRI) has highlighted the pontential synergies from the joint implementation of strongly interlinked agendas.

Jul 23, 2018

In recent times, cross-border migration and its implications for host countries have led political and public discourse agenda. But there is increasing recognition that far more people are migrating within their own countries than across borders. Climate change has emerged as a potent driver of internal migration.

Against this background, the World Bank report Groundswell: Preparing for Internal Climate Migration provides the analytical insights into the recent phenomenon of climate migration (within the countries and cross-borders). 

Jul 21, 2018

The loss in biodiversity is unprecedented. There is a need to mainstream biodiversity and ecosystem services into (inter)national and sectoral policies, production and consumption patterns, into economic growth and development objectives and cover all the land and sea scapes. Such a shift in approach requires strategic, coherent policies and well-orchestrated action at all levels and across the governments.

The recent OECD Report "Mainstreaming Biodiversity for Sustainable Development" provides "the entry points" for biodiversity mainstreaming in four key areas: 1) at the national level; 2) in the agriculture, forestry and fisheries sectors; 3) in development co-operation; 4) in monitoring and evaluation efforts.

Jul 12, 2018

"Further economic growth can facilitate sustainable development only if it is decoupled from the degradation of biodiversity and nature’s capacity to contribute to people. Such decoupling, however, has not yet happened and would require far-reaching change in policies and tax reforms at the global and national levels", - said Ms. Cristina Pasca Palmer, the Executive Director of the CBD. 

The CBD is the first global agreement on the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity. 2018th is the twenty-fifth anniversary of the entry of the CBD into force. Despite the efforts made by the individual states and the international community, the loss in biodiversity and the desctruction of ecosystems continue at unprecedented pace. 

Jul 08, 2018

Agenda 2030 and the SDGs recognize the importance of the access and benefit sharing from the use of the genetic resources and traditional knowledge. SDG 2 on zero hunger and SDG 15 on life on land – contain targets (2.5 and 15.6) calling for the promotion of access to and fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the utilization of genetic resources. Effective access and benefit-sharing from the use of genetic resources require cross-sectoral partnerships and mutual supportiveness between the existing access-benefit sharing mechanisms. 

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A Memorandum of Cooperation between the Secretariats of the CBD and the FAO International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, in which UN Biodiversity Convention and International Treaty have commited to enhanced cooperation on access and benefit-sharing of genetic resources, was signed today on the margins of the second meeting of the CBD’s Subsidiary Body on Implementation.

Jun 30, 2018

The NGO Major Group, tasked with facilitating the participation and enhancing the engagement NGOs in the processes related to the High Level Political Forum, the focal point for sustainable development at the UN, has published its 2018 HLPF Position Paper. The NGO Major Group calls for "a new development paradigm that prioritizes the flourishing of humans, nature, and animals"; underscores the need of the institutional change of global systems reorient them towards unleashing the humankind’s full potential, making them more responsive to equity and justice.

Jun 29, 2018

The High-Level Political Forum (HLPF) on sustainable development  will meet from 9 July to 18 July 2018. The HLPF is the main United Nations platform on sustainable development and it has a central role in the follow-up and review of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) at the global level. 

The 2018 theme of the High-Level Political Forum "Transformation towards sustainable and resilient societies" will be discussed in the context of rapid economic, ecological, social changes and emerging risks, which may undermine the progress towards achieving the SDG, advancing human development and prosperity. 

Jun 25, 2018

A number of civil organizations call the WHO upon to make a more meaningful contribution to ongoing discourse on access to innovation and medicines, that "goes beyond monitoring and coordination" and support the feasibility studies for developing alternative innovation models of R&D in order to delink the cost of innovation from the prices of medicines. In its last policy brief: "The Way forward on access to medicines", Health Action International (HAI) has recommended the WHO to "explore the possibility of an international treaty on biomedical research and present the options to member States".

Jun 24, 2018

FAO has published the guidelines for integrating the goals and targets of the Agenda 2030 into national laws. The study underscores, that the success of transforming Food and Agriculture to achieve SDGs depends upon "the fundamental premise" of the effective and transparent institutional sectoral and cross-sectoral cooperation across governments. For instance, managing and allocating water among competing sectors such as agriculture, industry and urban requires cross-sectoral water cooperation at all levels, that has to take a place through an inclusive stakeholder dialogue. 

The guidelines also point out the importance of developing the effective incentive mechanisms. 

Jun 19, 2018

The global progress is not keeping pace with the ambitions of the Agenda 2030, necessitating immediate and accelerated action by countries and stakeholders at all levels, - says Sustainable Development Goals Report 2018.

Jun 07, 2018

Imbalances in distributing the benefits of the international investment agreements, adoption of the Agenda 2030 have triggered the sustainable development-oriented reform of the global IIA regime. Since 2012, over 150 countries have taken steps to formulate a new generation of sustainable development-oriented IIAs which work for all stakeholders. Some countries revised their treaty models in line with UNCTAD’s Reform Package for the International Investment Regime.

Jun 04, 2018

The recent study by the UNCTAD "Economic Development in Africa: Migration" reveals, that contrary to some perceptions, most migration in Africa today is intra-continental. It plays a significant role in regional economic integration, growing prosperity on the continent and achieving the Africa's agenda 2063. It can also play a key role in the structural transformation of the continent’s economies, and if managed well, may serve as the important means for achieving the SDGs in Africa and beyond.

May 27, 2018

Agenda 2030 called all the governments upon to pursue policy coherence by creating and enabling environment for sustainable development at all levels and by all actors as a key means of implementation ( SDG target 17.14). The 2018 edition of Policy Coherence for Sustainable Development (PCSD), published today, seeks to contribute to the “Transformation towards sustainable and resilient societies” – the theme of the 2018 United Nations High-level Political Forum (HLPF). In July, HLPF will be doing an overview of the progress in implementing five SDGs: water (SDG6), on energy (SDG7), on cities (SDG11), on sustainable consumption and production (SDG12), on biodiversity (SDG15).

May 26, 2018

Gender equality lies at the heart of the Nordic social policy, that is based on the tripartite cooperation between employers' organizations, trade unions, and the state, that provides universal health coverage, social protection, education and labour markets supports. The Nordic model has helped deliver large gains in gender equality in employment over the past half-century, - says the recent OECD Report.

In his speech dedicated to the presentation of the Report the OECD Sectretary- General said: "The Nordic policy approach is not only about supporting women. It aims to encourage all men and women to participate fully in paid work. Nordic countries provide a continuum of support to families with children, consisting of generous paid leave for new parents; subsidised and high-quality early childhood education and care; and out-of-school-hours care".

May 25, 2018

The Atlas of Sustainable Development Goals 2018 presents maps, charts, and stories related to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals. The data draw on the World Development Indicators the World Bank's compilation of internationally comparable statistics about global development and the quality of people's lives.

May 23, 2018

The Draft of the EU Budget 2019 foresees the spendings for tackling roots and causes of migration by implementing two major initiatives -- the Partnership Framework with non-EU countries under the European Agenda on Migration and the European Fund for Sustainable Development (EFSD).

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May 23, 2018

A group of 26 large institutional investors, that collectively represent $7.8 trn in assets under management, have petitioned Royal Dutch Shell to formulate concrete targets for pursueing the ambition expressed by the company in November 2017, that is to seek to reduce the Net Carbon Footprint of its energy products by around 20% by 2035, and to deliver cuts consistent with societal ambition,

May 21, 2018

The 2030 Agenda raises issues in terms of the orientation of IPR systems towards the needs of sustainable and inclusive development, says the UNCTAD Technology and Innovation Report 2018: “Harnessing Frontier Technologies for Sustainable Development”.