On 24 September 2019 (12:30 PM - 1:30 PM EST), the United Nations Environment Programme and the Germany Ministry of the Environment, in collaboration with the GGKP and other initiatives, are pleased to invite you to Creating Opportunities for Inclusive and Sustainable Economies, a launch event for the "GO for SDGs" Initiative.
At the outset of the SDGs summit in New York City, a panel of high-level representatives from governments, international organisations and civil society academia will showcase exemplary policies and practices that foster sustainable consumption and production and offer the possibility of scaling to make our transition “fast, fair and green.”
Registration is required by 19 September via [email protected].
Speakers
H.E. Ms. Svenja Schulze, Federal Minister for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety, Germany
H.E. Ms. Krista Mikkonen, Minister of the Environment and Climate Change, Finland
H.E. Prakash Javadekar, Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, India
H.E. Lucía Ruíz Ostoic, Minister of the Environment, Peru
Inger Andersen, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme
Why “GO for SDGs”?
The economic transformation needed for meeting the Sustainable Development Goals is unprecedented: it will amount to a total turn-around of our lifestyles, production patterns and approaches towards policymaking. Making this transformation “fast, fair and green” and using it for creating good jobs, decent working conditions, adequate livelihoods and inclusive outcomes is key to leaving no one behind.
As part of Germany’s and UNEP’s promise to step up their efforts for globally implementing the SDGs, the German Ministry for Environment and UNEP have created ‘Global Opportunities for SDGs’ (or in short: GO for SDGs). This new initiative aims to accelerate and raise ambition for building inclusive and sustainable economies and societies, by facilitating regional dialogue and exchange among practitioners on best practices for replicating and scaling-up effects, and by fostering local institutional learning and experience sharing.
How to “GO for SDGs”?
Over the last decade, the momentum towards an inclusive green economy and the shift to more sustainable patterns of consumption and production is growing exponentially. Governments, business, and civil society are pioneering new economic pathways and policies that aim to protect the environment while creating prosperity and ensuring well-being for current and future generations.
These efforts have spurred innovative approaches and crosscutting initiatives that engage a wide range of economic actors and sectors, contributing to the SDGs and Paris Agreement. Despite these success stories and the positive track record of available tools and policies, a successful turn-around depends on scaling and accelerating their uptake and transformative capacity.
Enter GO for SDGs. This new initiative will act as a regional pacemaker and enabler, fostering exchange on innovative and successful practices from countries while building on existing pools of expertise around the world and further strengthening local capacities. Specifically, it will be galvanizing support and enhancing the capacity of three change-agent groups: policy makers, business, and society/youth. These groups will be the key to guiding and implementing sustainable economic policies, investments, business models and enable consumer choices towards sustainability through newly designed regional sustainability hubs and regional sustainable business fora.
In order to fulfil the proclaimed goal of a “just and fair” transformation, the initiative will also collaborate closely with international labour and trade organisations, making sure that the foreseen transformation will also lead to better paid jobs, and healthier, safer working conditions for all.
GO for SDGs will work as a lever to apply existing tools and instruments at large scale. It will build on existing partnerships and programs such as the One Planet Network, the Partnership for Action on Green Economy (PAGE), the Green Growth Knowledge Partnership (GGKP), ITUC’s Just Transition Center and the World Economic Forum’s UpLink Initiative among others. In this way, it will ensure the tailor-made dissemination and scaling up of their work for regional delivery and networking, dramatically accelerating the pace of change that is possible in one country at a time.