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	Creating conditions necessary for peace, justice and inclusion by TAP Network, Forus, civil society agencies Transparency, Accountability and Participation Network, agencies   Sep. 2023   Poverty & Hunger eradication targets to miss UN’s 2030 deadline by wide margins, by Thalif Deen for the Inter Press service   When the UN’s 193 member states reviewed the current status of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), including the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger by 2030, the verdict was mostly failures—and with little or no successes.   The hunger/poverty nexus was best characterized by Alvaro Lario, President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), who warned last week that under current trends, at least 575 million people will still be living in extreme poverty in 2030—and as many people suffering from hunger by 2030 as in 2015 (over 600 million people).   “Hunger remains a political issue, mostly caused by poverty, inequality, conflict, corruption and overall lack of access to food and resources. In a world of plenty, which produces enough food to feed everyone, how can there be hundreds of millions going hungry?” he asked.   According to the UN, all developing countries also suffer from severe debt problems. These countries cannot fund progress on the SDGs if they are facing exorbitant borrowing costs and paying more on debt servicing than on health or education.   “Developing countries face borrowing costs up to eight times higher than developed countries – a debt trap. And one in three countries around the world is now at high risk of a fiscal crisis. Over 40 per cent of people living in extreme poverty are in countries with severe debt challenges,” warned UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres last week.   The high-level segment of the UN General Assembly attracted about 88 Heads of State, six vice presidents, 43 Heads of Government, four deputy prime ministers, 41 ministers, seven chiefs of delegations, plus three high-level speakers from UN observer states.   The high-level meetings included the SDG Summit and a forum on Financing for Development (FfD), among others. The active participants also included scores of civil society organizatiions (CSOs).   Mandeep Tiwana, Chief Officer – Evidence and Engagement at CIVICUS told IPS that a major reason the SDGs are off-track is because 85% of the world’s population live in countries with severe civic space restrictions which severely impedes meaningful civil society partnerships and deprives communities of innovations in sustainable development, service delivery to the most excluded, and importantly, transparency, accountability and participation in how development policies are implemented.   The SDG Stimulus put forward by Secretary General Guterres, he pointed out, should be accompanied by guarantees for civic freedoms and effective civil society partnerships.   Otherwise, funds intended for sustainable development, that leaves ‘no one behind’, are likely to be channeled to support networks of patronage and to shore up repressive state apparatuses, he noted.   “It’s unacceptable in this 75th year of the celebration of the Universal of Declaration of Human Rights that civil society activists and investigative journalists should be persecuted for uncovering high level corruption and serious human rights violations”.   He said demanding transformative social and economic policies is a dangerous activity in far too many countries around the world.   “The globe is a facing an acute crisis of leadership due to a toxic mix of authoritarianism and populist nationalism which is leading to unabashed promotion of perceived national interest at the expense of the rules based international order intended to create a better world for all,” Tiwana declared.   Guterres gave a new political twist to the SDGs when he said the ”goals” were really ”promises”   “A promise to build a world of health, progress and opportunity for all. A promise to leave no one behind. And a promise to pay for it”.   This was not a promise made to one another as diplomats from the comfort of this chamber, he argued. “It was — always — a promise to people”.   People crushed under the grinding wheels of poverty. People starving in a world of plenty. Children denied a seat in a classroom. Families fleeing conflicts, seeking a better life. Parents watching helplessly as their children die of preventable disease.   People losing hope because they can’t find a job — or a safety net when they need it. Entire communities literally on devastation’s doorstep because of changing climate. So, the SDGs aren’t just a list of goals, he declared.   In an interview with IPS, Amitabh Behar, interim Executive Director of Oxfam International, said: “Unfortunately, in Oxfam’s programmatic, advocacy, and campaigning work, we see clearly that at this half-way point, we are very off-track to achieve the SDGs.”   The UN SG’s latest progress report shows that 80% of SDG targets are either showing weak progress or regression. Much blame is cast on the pandemic, but in reality – it simply magnified an already bleak trend.   By many measures, he said, Goal 10 is the furthest off-track of all the goals. For example, inequality between countries has risen for the first time in three decades.   Oxfam, a global organization that fights inequality to end poverty and injustice, is bringing this focus on inequality (Goal 10) and how it intersects with the entire 2030 agenda, said Behar who previously served as the Chief Executive Officer of Oxfam India.   At this year’s General Assembly, Oxfam pushed leaders to make bold commitments and more importantly follow-up with action to get the SDGs back on track.   “We know what works to address these challenges, and we know there are more than enough resources to do so. We must ensure that resources and capacity are in the hands of those on the frontlines tackling these complex issues.”   He said the lives and futures of millions of the most vulnerable people are directly impacted by the decisions and actions taken by leaders now and “we are running out of time”.   “We heard leaders reiterating their commitments to tackling issues of inequality, hunger, poverty and more. If they can work together to prioritize and finance the solutions to these issues, there is still hope to get the 2030 agenda back on track.”   Asked what was really needed to accelerate the pace, Behar said: “We are not seeing the financial and policy commitments from leaders needed to tackle the major challenges of our day – economic, gender and racial inequalities, the climate crisis, and the ongoing conflicts and humanitarian crises”.   Most of the trends and barriers which are contributing to the dire state of SDG implementation, he said, were in place before COVID, including the widespread unwillingness to put in place highly redistributive fiscal policy at the national level – or other measures to rein in the power of the top 1% of large corporations, and the failure of rich countries to meet their commitments or responsibilities, climate finance, official development assistance (ODA), debt relief and international finance reform.   “We support the Secretary-General’s emphasis on the importance of financing the SDGs and his call for an “SDG Stimulus” including a surge in development finance, reform of multi-lateral development banks, action on debt relief, the expansion of contingency financing in invest in basic services and clean energy, and to deal with the root causes of this situation”.   “We are calling on leaders to work on these areas so we can regain the momentum we’ve lost on the SDGs and get back on track before we’re too late,” he said.   * Report of the Secretary-General: Progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals: Towards a Rescue Plan for People and Planet : http://tinyurl.com/33prnjwx   July 2023   Creating conditions necessary for peace, justice and inclusion. (TAP Network)   Halfway to 2030, Report on Sustainable Development Goal 16 (SDG16) represents a joint civil society effort to assess progress towards peaceful, just and inclusive societies at this critical halfway point to the 2030 target date for the implementation of the SDGs in 2023.   In addition to providing in-depth analysis around key SDG16+ issues, this report is also intended to provide key recommendations to governments and the international community on where action and ambition must be directed in the second half of SDG implementation to 2030. The report also provides insights into the leadership role of civil society in advancing SDG16+ at all levels to-date, showcasing best practices and case studies around civil society action.   A central feature of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is interlinkages; the goals, targets and indicators are interconnected, with the implementation of each supporting the attainment of the others. Given this interconnectivity, when working towards implementation, various goals, targets, and indicators should be considered in tandem, to safeguard against the potential undermining of essential objectives and the effectiveness of the broader agenda.   The preamble of the 2030 Agenda affirms that “the interlinkages and integrated nature of the Sustainable Development Goals are of crucial importance in ensuring that the purpose of the new Agenda is realized.” In other words, all 17 SDGs depend upon one another; no single goal can be fully realised alone.   SDG16 was designed to be an enabler, or in other words, to provide support for the achievement of other Goals. SDG16 targets critically important issues that have significant implications for people worldwide, including violence, insecurity, conflict, injustice, exclusion, inequality, discrimination, weak institutions and poor governance.   These issues also undermine government capacities to achieve sustainable development across numerous fronts: ensuring identity and reducing bribery and corruption to remove barriers to accessing education and essential services; ensuring public participation to give people a voice and a role in decision making; ensuring access to information to facilitate oversight and transparency; ensuring people’s fundamental freedoms to give them the opportunity to challenge decisions; ensuring access to justice for people to protect and assert their rights.   SDG16 is rooted in a human rights-based framework to address issues of universal relevance, significant to individuals in all nations. Sustained peace and non-violence, access to justice, rule of law, effective and accountable institutions, inclusive governance, participatory decision making and respect for human rights are all needed in order to advance other areas of sustainable development.   They are all key elements of SDG16 that ensure that the foundational objectives of ‘leaving no one behind’ and ‘reaching the furthest behind first’ are upheld.   The success of SDG16 is equally reliant on the other goals. Progress on targets for peace, justice and inclusion directly affects outcomes for all other SDGs, while social, economic and environmental progress plays an equally important role in creating the conditions necessary for peace, justice and inclusion.   http://www.sdg16now.org/report/   * The Transparency, Accountability and Participation (TAP) Network is a global civil society coalition working to advance and catalyse ambitious action to achieve SDG16+ to promote peaceful, just and inclusive societies. The TAP Network’s members represent hundreds of civil society organisations (CSOs) around the world.   July 2023   New Forus Report: “Sustainable Development by Shifting the Power”   The Forus network issued a new report at the 2023 United Nations High Level Political Forum, titled “Sustainable Development by Shifting the Power: Capacity Strengthening of Civil Society as a Tool for the Implementation of SDG17”.   The report co-created by 14 Forus members from different regions and contexts, calls for transformative changes in the international development sector, with a focus on power dynamics, localization, and decolonization. It highlights the crucial role of civil society organizations in advancing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and stresses the importance of capacity strengthening initiatives that are driven by the needs and priorities of CSOs themselves. The report also provides recommendations to relevant stakeholders and reaffirms the commitment to support CSO capacity strengthening and foster inclusive practices:   http://www.forus-international.org/en/custom-page-detail/102430-new-forus-report-sustainable-development-by-shifting-the-power http://www.openglobalrights.org/transforming-global-aid-architecture-leave-no-one-behind/ http://lens.civicus.org/un-general-assembly-pr-and-platitudes/ http://www.socialwatch.org/node/18696 http://www.socialwatch.org/varios/2023-Civil-Society-Statement-at-LDC5.pdf   Oct. 2022   A UN expert warned today that with the world approaching the halfway mark towards 2030, current trends show that almost all States will miss nearly all Sustainable Development Goals and targets.   “Failing to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals will condemn billions of people to misery and jeopardise the future livability of the planet for everyone,” said David Boyd, UN Special Rapporteur on human rights and the environment presenting his report to the United Nations General Assembly.   “On the other hand, meeting them would dramatically improve the quality of life for billions of people, and protect the extraordinary Earth that is needed to sustain all forms of life,” Boyd said.   The expert’s report said that today’s global economy was based on two pillars—the exploitation of people, and the exploitation of the planet—that were fundamentally unjust, unsustainable and incompatible with the full enjoyment of human rights. Boyd said the Sustainable Development Goals aim to address these problems by transforming the economy, alleviating inequality and protecting the environment.   “There are two main reasons why we are not on track to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals,” the UN expert said. “The first is that States have misunderstood the Goals as political aspirations when in fact they have a rock-solid foundation in international human rights law. Every single Goal and over 93% of the 169 targets are directly connected to an international human rights treaty.”   “The second problem is grossly inadequate levels of investment in achieving the goals, with an annual gap of more than $4 trillion,” Boyd explained. His report identifies seven sources of funding that could generate up to $7 trillion annually towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.   Examples include new taxes on wealthy individuals and pollution, debt relief for low- and middle-income States, closing tax loopholes, redirecting subsidies from environmentally destructive activities to sustainable actions and fulfilling longstanding commitments to foreign aid and climate finance.   “The recent UN recognition of the human right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment should be a catalyst for accelerated action to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals,” Boyd said.   The Special Rapporteur urged States to take immediate and ambitious rights-based action to improve air quality, ensure everyone has access to safe and sufficient water, transform industrial agriculture to produce healthy and sustainable food, accelerate actions required to address the global climate and energy crises, replace fossil fuels with renewable energy, and conserve, protect and restore biodiversity. He also called on States to ensure that a rights-based approach is at the heart of the post-2020 global biodiversity framework and detoxify people’s bodies and the planet.   “Employing a human rights-based approach to each of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals is the best way to ensure effective and equitable action, prioritising vulnerable and marginalised populations and making sure that no one is left behind,” Boyd said.   http://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2022/10/trillions-needed-close-finance-gap-sustainable-development-goals-says-un http://www.ohchr.org/en/special-procedures/sr-environment/annual-thematic-reports Visit the related web page
	Most of the world continues to fail to fight corruption by Transparency International   The 2022 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) released by Transparency International shows that most of the world continues to fail to fight corruption: 95 per cent of countries have made little to no progress since 2017.   According to the Global Peace Index, the world continues to become a less peaceful place. There is a clear connection between this violence and corruption, with countries that score lowest in this index also scoring very low on the CPI.   Governments hampered by corruption lack the capacity to protect the people, while public discontent is more likely to turn into violence. This vicious cycle is impacting countries everywhere from South Sudan (13) to Brazil (38).   Delia Ferreira Rubio, Chair of Transparency International said:   “Corruption has made our world a more dangerous place. As governments have collectively failed to make progress against it, they fuel the current rise in violence and conflict – and endanger people everywhere. The only way out is for states to do the hard work, rooting out corruption at all levels to ensure governments work for all people, not just an elite few.”   Despite its well-documented negative effects, corruption is hard to eradicate, partly because not everyone is equally affected by it. While some parts of society – often the most vulnerable ones – suffer from inefficient or non-existent public services, other groups may benefit from the corrupt status quo through kickbacks, handouts, lucrative government contracts or privileged access to policy-makers.   When corruption is systemic, public resources are constantly diverted away from projects, policies and services that serve the common good and benefit the public at large to favour specific groups and interests instead.   Corruption thus creates conditions in which conflict is more likely to occur by fostering division between different groups and eating away at the rule of law.   It also fuels the kind of state capture that generates hostility among excluded groups, providing incentives for opposition factions to violently contest state resources and the regime to aggressively persecute opponents.   This is particularly dangerous when the resulting disparities coincide with ethnic, religious or other identity lines. Corruption, exclusion and outright discrimination thus increase the risk of violent outbreaks and make them harder to control once they erupt.   In addition, theft, embezzlement and mismanagement of public funds reduce the quantity of public resources available for redistribution and undermine the quality and availability of public services. This makes it harder to tackle poverty, hunger and inequality, while providing good healthcare and education. Corruption is thus widely recognised as a key obstacle to achieving the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals.   The CPI ranks 180 countries and territories by their perceived levels of public sector corruption on a scale of zero (highly corrupt) to 100 (very clean).   The CPI global average remains unchanged at 43 for the eleventh year in a row, and more than two-thirds of countries have a serious problem with corruption, scoring below 50.   Denmark (90) tops the index this year, with Finland and New Zealand following closely, both at 87. Strong democratic institutions and regard for human rights also make these countries some of the most peaceful in the world according to the Global Peace Index.   South Sudan (13), Syria (13) and Somalia (12), all of which are embroiled in protracted conflict, remain at the bottom of the CPI.   26 countries – among them the United Kingdom (73), Qatar (58) and Guatemala (24) – are all at historic lows this year.   Corruption, conflict and security are profoundly intertwined. The misuse, embezzlement or theft of public funds can deprive the very institutions in charge of protecting citizens, enforcing the rule of law and guarding the peace of the resources they need to fulfil that mandate.   Criminal and terrorist groups are often aided by the complicity of corrupt public officials, law enforcement authorities, judges and politicians, which allows them to thrive and operate with impunity.   The Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 was a stark reminder of the threat that corruption and the absence of government accountability pose for global peace and security: kleptocrats in Russia (28) have amassed great fortunes by pledging loyalty to President Vladimir Putin in exchange for profitable government contracts and protection of their economic interests. The absence of any checks on Putin’s power allowed him to pursue his geopolitical ambitions with impunity. This attack destabilised the European continent, threatening democracy and killing tens of thousands.   After decades of conflict, South Sudan (13) is in a major humanitarian crisis with more than half of the population facing acute food insecurity – and corruption is exacerbating the situation. A Sentry report from last year revealed that a massive fraud scheme by a network of corrupt politicians with ties to the president's family siphoned off aid for food, fuel and medicine.   The combination of corruption, authoritarianism and an economic downturn has proved especially volatile in Brazil (38), where President Jair Bolsonaro’s term was marked by the dismantling of anti-corruption frameworks, the use of corrupt schemes to favour political allies and amass political support in the legislature, disinformation and attacks on civic space. In January, after Bolsonaro lost his re-election bid, his supporters launched a violent attack against the parliament, supreme court and presidential palace, threatening the lives of police officers and journalists and vandalising buildings, with the goal of disrupting the peaceful transition of power to newly elected President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.   Complaints of corruption helped spark civil war in Yemen (16) eight years ago. Now, the state has collapsed, leaving two-thirds of the population without sufficient food – one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world.   Even in countries with relatively strong measures against corruption, the defence sector often remains secretive – opening the door for undue influence and other forms of corruption. According to the Government Defence Integrity Index, only nine countries out of the 85 assessed have a low or a very low risk of corruption. This is particularly troubling as many governments prepare to ramp up their military spending in response to emerging threats and in response to the war in Ukraine.   In Germany (79), for example, the government has set up a new 100 billion euro fund to revamp its military, but such simplified procurement opens up significant risks for corruption. However, a new national security strategy currently being debated within the government could help to strengthen integrity and transparency mechanisms if adopted.   Transparency International calls on governments to prioritise anti-corruption commitments, reinforcing checks and balances, upholding rights to information and limiting private influence to finally rid the world of corruption – and the violence it brings.   Daniel Eriksson, Chief Executive Officer of Transparency International, said:   “The good news is that leaders can fight corruption and promote peace all at once. Governments must open up space to include the public in decision-making – from activists to marginalised communities to young people. In democratic societies, the people can raise their voices to help root out corruption and demand a safer world for us all.”   http://www.transparency.org/en/press/2022-corruption-perceptions-index-reveals-scant-progress-against-corruption-as-world-becomes-more-violent http://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2022 http://www.transparency.org/en/blog/cpi-2022-corruption-watch-list-united-kingdom-sri-lanka-georgia-ukraine http://www.transparency.org/en/news/cpi-2022-corruption-fundamental-threat-peace-security http://www.transparency.org/en/news http://www.transparency.org/en/blog http://www.globalintegrity.org/2023/03/17/local-voices-against-kleptocracy/ Visit the related web page
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