1. Challenges and Opportunities of the Post
2015 Global Development Agenda
Artemy Izmestiev, UNDP Seoul Policy Centre
Seoul, September 2012

2. Content
• Preparatory Process for developing the new Global
development framework
• Role of the UN system & Fundamental principles
• Challenges
• Opportunities
• Asian approaches on post-2015

3. Preparatory Process for the new Global
development framework
• The Report by the Secretary General: June 2012
Accelerating progress towards the Millennium
Development Goals: options for sustained and
inclusive growth and issues for advancing the
United Nations development agenda beyond 2015
• High Level Panel on post-2015 development
framework established August 2012
• 50+ national consultations and 9 thematically
focused meetings by March 2013
• HPL report presentation at GA Sept 2013

4. UN Task Team on Post-2015
Prepared the report for the SG
Macro questions it raised:
•What should be the purpose of the post-2015
agenda: advocacy, guidepost, instrument for policy
coherence?
•Was a 15-year timeframe realistic to bring about
transformative change?
•Should the post-2015 agenda be prescriptive and
if so, how far can it go without constraining policy
space at country level?

5. Fundamental principles
G Report: “The
world cannot
continue on its
current course.
There is a need for
an agenda aimed at
transformative
change leading to a
shared, secure and
sustainable future
for all”.
undamental
principles for future
agenda:
Human rights
•
Equality
•
Sustainability
•

6. Challenges

7. Challenges of Post-2015: process
• Reaching agreement is increasingly difficult;
• How ambitious should the goals be and where to
draw a line?
• How should the global goals be linked to the
national processes?
• What should be the international governance of
post-2015 agenda including the monitoring?

8. Challenges of Post-2015: Format
• How to make sure that the goals are simple and
can be easily communicated?
• How to ensure measurability and robustness of
data?
• To which extent the current MDGs should be
taken used in formulation of the new framework?

9. Opportunities

10. UN Task Team on Post-2015 (cont.)
Role for the UN system:
•Putting the concept of sustainable development at
the heart of the post-2015 agenda
•How to build on MDGs
•Expanding the scope beyond MDGs
•Designing the future goals to address both local
and global development challenges
•Incorporating measurability and accountability

11. Consultations
• 50+ consultations in developing countries in
2012-2013
National consultations will not focus on goal setting and
universality, but on how people see their future.
• Global and regional thematic meetings;
• Social media discussions and other forms of
outreach.
Web platform to foster outreach.
Consensus & buy in- participation

12. Themes of Global Meetings
• Inequalities (across all dimensions):
• Health (MDGs 4, 5, 6 + non communicable
diseases)
• Education (at all levels)
• Growth and employment
• Environmental sustainability
• Food security and nutrition
• Governance (at all levels)
• Conflict and fragility
• Population dynamics

13. Youth Engagement
• Giving regional youth a voice in the global consultations
• Follows an UNDP initiative in the Pacific Islands
• 40 students. Korea, Japan, China, Mongolia.
• 3 days of debates and workshops
- Did the MDGs work?
- Do we need another framework?
- What is the world we want to see post-2015?
• Declaration to be fed into global consultations.

14. Opportunities for CSOs
• UN-CSO Dialogue
• Country and thematic consultations
• CSO Platforms (e.g. Beyond 2015)
• Promote awareness and creativity
• Link with other areas of global agenda

15. Asian Approaches to Post-2015
• Asia’s experience with the implementation of the
MDGs holds valuable lessons for the formulation
of the new global development agenda
• Asia is the only developing region that has
successfully narrowed the gap with advanced
economies over the past half century
• Investment in human capital and the creation of
enabling conditions for its development were
important to Asian countries’ progress

16. Asian Approaches to Post-2015 (cont.)
• World today is very different from the world
when the MDGs were formulated (poverty is
increasingly an MIC phenomenon, rise of
emerging countries)
• Asia is on the forefront of changing global
dynamics, being home to many of the world’s
“emerging” nations
• Merit of “creative chaos” that may be present at
the initial stages of the consultations
• Keep the global ambition high in the formulation
of the future goals

17. Thank you!
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