Matrix Report
In an unfortunate development, Pakistan’s place on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) has dropped from 130 to 134 in a year. The revelation came through a UN report on SDGs, which has ranked Sweden at the top. For a country, such as Pakistan, which aspires to achieve the status of middle-income country by 2030, the ranking does not augur well. Likewise, given the stark performance of Pakistan on Human Development Index, standing at 159 out of 189 countries, it is high time that we reflect both on improving our domestic situation, regarding human development; hence, enhancing our standing in the global community, as well.
SDGs were fist launched by United Nations (UN) in 2015, capitalizing on the gains achieved by Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The conclusion of the 15-year long term, Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in 2015, ushered the UN to embark on achieving a more ambitious agenda of Developmental Goals, by 2030. Broadening the scope of MDGs, from eight target sectors, the three-dimensional SDGs’ agenda, envisions for itself, the attainment of economic, social and environmental development, by setting up goals in 17 target areas. These goals are directed at poverty and hunger eradication, providing quality education to all, bringing gender equality, reducing wealth inequality and action to mitigate climate change, improving peace and justice among others, with each goal assigned a specific number such as poverty eradication is goal number 1 at SDGs.
Interestingly, Pakistan has been the first country to adopt the SDGs via unanimous parliamentary resolution. It has also integrated it, into its developmental policies such as Vision 2025. Yet, the SDGs annual report evaluating country performance through indices, present a bleak picture for Pakistan. As per the report, which for Pakistan has been constructed against 85 indicators, the only issue area related to climate change representing goal 13 on SDGs agenda, has shown improvement, which validates PM Imran Khan’s earnest efforts for climate change mitigation, such as his 10-billion trees tsunami initiative. The poor performance in rest of the sectors such as goal 4 on SDGs i.e. quality education in case of Pakistan shows very poor performance such as secondary school completion rate and gender disparity in opportunity to education which are 48.2 % and 58.5% respectively,
However, the current government is attempting at integrating SDGs into Standing Committees of Parliament yet these efforts are far from the ideal situation. According to the statement by Dr. Hafiz A. Pasha, former Federal Minister, less than 1% of the GDP during the last 4 years have been allocated to the human development programs. There are also communication and coordination gaps among other identifiable loopholes, in the SDGs effective implementation.
As the way forward, the effective implementation of SDGs would require joint efforts by UN agencies, National government, an active civil society, a responsible citizenry, pro-active academia, and business communities. Mere enactment of policies in alignment to the SDGs agenda, could only be effective if there is political will, procurement and allocation of proper resources, empowered local governments, and responsive and efficient bureaucracy. Pakistan’s remarkable performance in the climate mitigation area, is an evidence of the fact that Pakistan has the capacity to achieve SDGs; if there is will to do something then there is no reason for why it cannot be achieved.
