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UN / GLOBAL SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT REPORT
STORY: UN / GLOBAL SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT REPORT
TRT: 02:18
SOURCE: UNIFEED
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 12 SEPTEMBER 2023, NEW YORK CITY / FILE
FILE – NEW YORK CITY
1. Wide shot, exterior, United Nations Headquarters
12 SEPTEMBER 2023, NEW YORK CITY
2. Wide shot, briefing room
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Astra Bonini, Senior Sustainable Development Officer, Division for Sustainable Development Goals, UN DESA:
“The picture at the halfway point for the 2030 Agenda is a sobering one in key areas for leaving no one behind, including the headline goal of eradicating poverty, as well as ending hunger and advancing gender equality. Progress has been set back significantly in recent years. This is in part due to the lingering drag of the COVID 19 pandemic, the highest level of armed conflict globally since 1945, and climate related disasters as well as inflation and the rising cost of living.”
4. Med shot, Bonini and Scholz speaking to the journalists
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Astra Bonini, Senior Sustainable Development Officer, Division for Sustainable Development Goals, UN DESA:
“On the other hand, the scientific understanding of why these are happening and how current crises are connected also leads the way to appreciating how they can be turned around through actions that are within our current capabilities, drawing on existing knowledge and technologies, but which need to start now. Approach will vary across contexts, but we know enough to be able to take action swiftly.”
6. Wide shot, briefing room
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Imme Scholz, Co-President of the Heinrich Böll Foundation and Co-Chair of the Independent Group of Scientists that prepared the GSDR:
“The first finding was, obviously, that incremental and fragmented change is insufficient to reach the goals up to 2030 or even 2050. So what we need instead is strategic, whole of society transformation locally, nationally and globally, leaving no country society or person behind.”
8. Close up, journalist
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Imme Scholz, Co-President of the Heinrich Böll Foundation and Co-Chair of the Independent Group of Scientists that prepared the GSDR:
“We urge the international community to focus on increasing resilience to the various interlinked crisis societies and countries are going through, to improve the critical underlying conditions for transformative action. So this includes coordinated action for the prevention of violent conflict and action to resolve ongoing conflict, because the longer a society is in conflict, the more time it loses for implementing the SDGs and improving human development.”
10. Wide shot, journalist in the briefing room
Ahead of the SDG Summit, a new UN report by an independent group of scientists launched today (12 Sep) calls for transformational shifts rooted in science that would urgently reverse course and turbocharge the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Presenting the report to journalists in New York, the Senior Sustainable Development Officer at the Division for Sustainable Development Goals of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA), Astra Bonini, said “the picture at the halfway point for the 2030 Agenda is a sobering one”.
According to Bonini, that’s the case “in key areas for leaving no one behind, including the headline goal of eradicating poverty, as well as ending hunger and advancing gender equality.”
The expert added, “Progress has been set back significantly in recent years. This is in part due to the lingering drag of the COVID 19 pandemic, the highest level of armed conflict globally since 1945, and climate related disasters as well as inflation and the rising cost of living.”
On the other hand, continued Bonini, “the scientific understanding of why these are happening and how current crises are connected also leads the way to appreciating how they can be turned around through actions that are within our current capabilities, drawing on existing knowledge and technologies, but which need to start now. Approach will vary across contexts, but we know enough to be able to take action swiftly.”
Drawing on the latest data and scientific insights, the Global Sustainable Development Goals Report 2023, entitled “Times of crisis, times of change: Science for accelerating transformations to sustainable development,” offers practical solutions to accelerate SDG implementation.
The Co-President of the Heinrich Böll Foundation and Co-Chair of the Independent Group of Scientists that prepared the report, Imme Scholz, also briefed journalists, telling them that “the first finding was, obviously, that incremental and fragmented change is insufficient to reach the goals up to 2030 or even 2050.”
Scholz said that what the world needs instead is “strategic, whole of society transformation locally, nationally and globally, leaving no country society or person behind.”
The Co-Chair concluded, “We urge the international community to focus on increasing resilience to the various interlinked crisis societies and countries are going through, to improve the critical underlying conditions for transformative action. So this includes coordinated action for the prevention of violent conflict and action to resolve ongoing conflict, because the longer a society is in conflict, the more time it loses for implementing the SDGs and improving human development.”
At this critical juncture, midway to 2030, the evidence makes clear that incremental and fragmented change is insufficient to achieve all 17 SDGs in the remaining seven years, or even by 2050.
The report shows new evidence that understanding the interconnections between individual goals will be essential. Decision-makers must devise policies that manage difficult trade-offs and avoid international spillovers—for example, rising carbon emissions in one country due to the production of goods consumed in another.
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