National consultation on ‘Post-2015 development agenda’ takes place
As the deadline for the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) draws to a close next year, a new global development agenda is in the offing.
Advertisement
To help countries make inputs into shaping the future global development agenda, open and inclusive national consultation processes were initiated in 2012.
The United Nations has been supporting a series of global thematic and national level consultations to solicit inputs on priorities and feedback on means of implementation to help define the future global development framework that will succeed the MDGs.
New global development agenda
Briefing journalists on the processes of the new global development agenda, Mr. Kordzo Sedegah, economic Specialist with the United Nations Development programme (UNDP) said, Ghana was one of the countries selected to host a national consultation for the first round to solicit the priorities that should be the focus of the Post-2015 agenda, spanning 2015 to 2030.
“Through a series of regional and national consultations, stakeholders identified issues of inequalities, environmental sustainability, food security, strengthened governance at all levels, population dynamics, health, education and support system for persons living with disability as priorities for the successor development agenda.”
Mr Sedegah who was speaking at a media encounter organised by the National Development Planning Commission (NDPC) and the United Nations System, said a second round of national consultation is being organised to identify how the Post-2015 agenda will be implemented.
Ghana and other countries have been selected to identify and propose critical elements that will allow a successful implementation of the new agenda at the local level.
National consultations
To effectively execute this task, Ghana will hold a national level discussion tomorrow, June, 19, 2014 in Accra to draw on the country’s experience in the localisation of the MDGs and to stimulate inclusive dialogue on the means of achieving the Post-2015 development agenda.
The theme of the consultation is ‘Localisation of Post-2015 Development Agenda’ and according to Mr Sedegah, the participants include policy makers and planners, local governments, civil society, academia, local communities, development partners and the private sector.
This will be followed by community, district and regional level consultations to help to bring global and national goals to bear on local levels, in response to local needs and priorities.
Mr. Sedegah indicated that this second round of national consultations will also secure inputs through a series of surveys and outreach on the experience of localising the MDGs in Ghana and ‘issues related to greening the economy in the context of the emerging focus on sustainable development goals.’
The local consultations aims at reaching out to all segments of society and will rely on already established participatory and inclusive governance mechanism to ensure that all stakeholders feel empowered by the future framework so that it fully has the buy-in and ownership, as well as, most importantly, the agenda can be implemented and monitored by all, said Mr. Sedegah.
He said, the results of these dialogues will inform various regional and international policy discussions, and reports to be presented to the UN member state driven process to deliberate and decide upon the Post-2015 development framework.
Global progress on Post-2015 Agenda
Expanding on the post -2015 development agenda process, Ms Radhika Lal, also an Economic Advisor with the UNDP, said globally, the Post-2015 process and the discussions on the successor goals were going well.
She said Ghana co-hosted the global thematic consultation on inequalities with the Government of Denmark and also contributed to the Common African Position (CAP) which has the overarching goal of eradicating poverty and reducing inequality.
Ms Lal said there is an emerging consensus that poverty, education, health, energy, water and food will make it into the global development agenda, emphasising that ‘two key issues coming out of Africa are peace and governance.’
The consultation process has so far engaged almost two million people from 193 countries in shaping the debate on the Post-2015 agenda.
Governments have committed themselves to adopt the agenda at a global summit in September 2015 so that the vision, goals and targets can guide the MDGs successor goals at the end of 2015.
A global discussion of how to improve implementation and measurement of goals and targets in the new development agenda is underway.
Writer E-mail: rosemary.ardayfio@graphic .com.gh
Advertisement