s we enter the final years before the 2030 deadline to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), there is a critical need to examine how youth will play a central role in taking us to the finish line.
In recent years, the world’s youth have demonstrated through activism that they are deserving of a lead role in the SDG efforts. However, most of world’s youth continue to wallow in poverty, remaining marginalized by state actors not keen on creating enabling policies that can empower them.
In September 2015, 193 countries came together at the United Nations to adopt and commit to a long-term, comprehensive strategy to tackle the world’s greatest challenges related to global sustainable development. The result was the SDGs, a list of 17 goals to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all by 2030.
The goals that 193 nations came together to adopt in 2015 are daunting—especially in a post-COVID-19 lens. While each goal matters on its own, they are all interconnected, incorporating social, economic, and environmental sustainability, which the UN calls a global blueprint for dignity. The SDG framework has been successfully adopted and its vision is shared globally. However, one major challenge persists: implementation.
Although many countries and multilateral agencies have embraced the SDGs, awareness has remained a challenge, and education on SDGs is necessary to ensure that citizens see them as a reference for ending poverty. This would also help in the public owning and supporting their implementation.
This awareness should target the public at different levels, including schools, places of worship, and villages. The single most important factor in the attainment of SDGs is bringing the information to the people—leaving no one out.
The late Nelson Mandela once aptly noted: “overcoming poverty is not a task of charity, it is an act of justice. Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural. It is man-made, and it can be overcome and eradicated by the actions of human beings.”
There is also the challenge of financing. It is estimated that it will cost between $3.3 trillion and $4.5 trillion per year to achieve the 169 specific targets, which is a Herculean, especially in developing countries.
So, where will the solutions come from? Simply put, empowering youth is critical in ensuring the success of the SDGs. The world needs volunteers, innovators, and leaders to realize the global goals. As the former World Bank President Jim Yong Kim once noted at the annual Youth Summit, young people have the power to make a lasting impact on ending extreme poverty and addressing climate change. They have fresh ideas, positive attitudes, and opportunities to influence change.
Today, the world has the largest youth population ever, with 1.8 billion young people across the planet. This is a demographic dividend that cannot be ignored.
Youth have the power to create an enormous wave of change, which will impact how our world looks and functions in the future. We need to invest in young women and men’s voices, actions, and leadership if we want a social transformation that will make the world a better place.
But we must realize young people are also victims of poverty, unemployment, and violence among other problems, and they righteously expect the development goals to address their challenges.
Importantly, young people today are not accepting their plight as fate accompli. They are speaking out for justice and human rights and advocating global action for people and the planet. Youth today are far more connected and integrated through online and offline communication channels than ever before, and are abreast of policy dialogues and discussions more so than any other generation before them.
They have raised their voices by actively engaging in UN development groups and supporting national and thematic consultations taking part in the high-level panel on the post-2015 development agenda. In most cases, more than any other age group, youth participation online and offline has been clear, loud, and full of inspiring energy.
Over seven million youth voted in the global conversation UN Secretary-General’s My World in 2015, whose result informed Member States and United Nations discussions about the development agenda, including the SDGs.
Youth as the current inhabitants and future inheritors of the planet have to take charge of this agenda. Youth can extensively take part in creating awareness and communicating these goals to their peers and society at large using both online and offline methodologies.
Although there is no specific SDG on youth, many of the 169 targets and indicators have a strong youth-specific focus. Every single goal has a youth aspect to it and without young women and men, SDGs simply cannot succeed.
Young people and their organizations and networks are already active in identifying solutions, innovative approaches, and taking action in implementing the SDGs.
Young people can also play another critical role in monitoring for the implementation the SDGs. And they are uniquely positioned to be interlocutors in between their own age group and older generations.
No single country or agency can tackle global challenges like poverty, inequality, and climate change alone and if we truly want to achieve the UN SDGs by their looming deadline we need to involve youth at the decision-making table. They are more than capable and motivated to see us through the finish line.
a global affairs media network
Youth Must Lead the Way in SDGs’ Final Years
Photo via Adobe Stock.
October 19, 2021
Today, the world has the largest youth population ever, with 1.8 billion young people across the planet. This is a demographic dividend that cannot be ignored if we want to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.
A
s we enter the final years before the 2030 deadline to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), there is a critical need to examine how youth will play a central role in taking us to the finish line.
In recent years, the world’s youth have demonstrated through activism that they are deserving of a lead role in the SDG efforts. However, most of world’s youth continue to wallow in poverty, remaining marginalized by state actors not keen on creating enabling policies that can empower them.
In September 2015, 193 countries came together at the United Nations to adopt and commit to a long-term, comprehensive strategy to tackle the world’s greatest challenges related to global sustainable development. The result was the SDGs, a list of 17 goals to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all by 2030.
The goals that 193 nations came together to adopt in 2015 are daunting—especially in a post-COVID-19 lens. While each goal matters on its own, they are all interconnected, incorporating social, economic, and environmental sustainability, which the UN calls a global blueprint for dignity. The SDG framework has been successfully adopted and its vision is shared globally. However, one major challenge persists: implementation.
Although many countries and multilateral agencies have embraced the SDGs, awareness has remained a challenge, and education on SDGs is necessary to ensure that citizens see them as a reference for ending poverty. This would also help in the public owning and supporting their implementation.
This awareness should target the public at different levels, including schools, places of worship, and villages. The single most important factor in the attainment of SDGs is bringing the information to the people—leaving no one out.
The late Nelson Mandela once aptly noted: “overcoming poverty is not a task of charity, it is an act of justice. Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural. It is man-made, and it can be overcome and eradicated by the actions of human beings.”
There is also the challenge of financing. It is estimated that it will cost between $3.3 trillion and $4.5 trillion per year to achieve the 169 specific targets, which is a Herculean, especially in developing countries.
So, where will the solutions come from? Simply put, empowering youth is critical in ensuring the success of the SDGs. The world needs volunteers, innovators, and leaders to realize the global goals. As the former World Bank President Jim Yong Kim once noted at the annual Youth Summit, young people have the power to make a lasting impact on ending extreme poverty and addressing climate change. They have fresh ideas, positive attitudes, and opportunities to influence change.
Today, the world has the largest youth population ever, with 1.8 billion young people across the planet. This is a demographic dividend that cannot be ignored.
Youth have the power to create an enormous wave of change, which will impact how our world looks and functions in the future. We need to invest in young women and men’s voices, actions, and leadership if we want a social transformation that will make the world a better place.
But we must realize young people are also victims of poverty, unemployment, and violence among other problems, and they righteously expect the development goals to address their challenges.
Importantly, young people today are not accepting their plight as fate accompli. They are speaking out for justice and human rights and advocating global action for people and the planet. Youth today are far more connected and integrated through online and offline communication channels than ever before, and are abreast of policy dialogues and discussions more so than any other generation before them.
They have raised their voices by actively engaging in UN development groups and supporting national and thematic consultations taking part in the high-level panel on the post-2015 development agenda. In most cases, more than any other age group, youth participation online and offline has been clear, loud, and full of inspiring energy.
Over seven million youth voted in the global conversation UN Secretary-General’s My World in 2015, whose result informed Member States and United Nations discussions about the development agenda, including the SDGs.
Youth as the current inhabitants and future inheritors of the planet have to take charge of this agenda. Youth can extensively take part in creating awareness and communicating these goals to their peers and society at large using both online and offline methodologies.
Although there is no specific SDG on youth, many of the 169 targets and indicators have a strong youth-specific focus. Every single goal has a youth aspect to it and without young women and men, SDGs simply cannot succeed.
Young people and their organizations and networks are already active in identifying solutions, innovative approaches, and taking action in implementing the SDGs.
Young people can also play another critical role in monitoring for the implementation the SDGs. And they are uniquely positioned to be interlocutors in between their own age group and older generations.
No single country or agency can tackle global challenges like poverty, inequality, and climate change alone and if we truly want to achieve the UN SDGs by their looming deadline we need to involve youth at the decision-making table. They are more than capable and motivated to see us through the finish line.
