Topic 1

History of Sustainable Development Goals

HS 200
Lecture 1
Prof. Anamika Barua
Dept. of HSS
 What are we going to discuss?
• The origins of the Sustainable Development
Goals (SDGs). How did they arise?
• What are Millennium Development Goals
(MDGs) and how is it different from SDGs ?
• How many SDGs are there and what are they?
• What is Agenda 2030?
 History of SDGs – traces back to 1970s
• 1972 - The United Nations Conference on the Human Environment
of (also known as the Stockholm Conference)
– UN's first major conference on international environmental issues.
– There was a recognition that the economy on one side and the
environment on the other hand, were on a kind of collision course
– The increasing weight of human activity on nature was leading to
environmental risks of a magnitude and a scale that were unprecedented
– The same year an important book “Limits to Growth” – explained using
computer model for the first time that if economy continues in the same
manner the burdens on the physical earth systems would become
overwhelming.
• So limits to growth and the Conference on the Human
Environment a way back in 1972 put us on the course towards the
Sustainable Development Goals.
SDGs and Sustainable development (SD) is linked so
let us also understand SD
• In 1983, United Nations, established a World Commission on the
Environment and Development (WCED).
– to address the growing concern related to environmental deterioration
and the consequences of such deterioration on economic and social
development.
– to propose ‘long term environmental strategies for achieving sustainable
development to the year 2000 and beyond
• The group was soon called the Brundtland Commission after its chairwoman
– Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland, then the prime minister of Norway.
• After three years, in 1987, the group presented its answer in a report called
Our Common future, also known an Brundtland report
• The report defined sustainable development as “meeting the needs of the
present without compromising the ability of the future generation to meet
their own needs”.
• This was another breakthrough after 15 years of Stockholm conference
 What Brundtland report tried to emphasize

• Coordinated global action on environmental

problems combined with economic development
• It accepted that there is environmental limits to
economic growth
• Poverty and environment is interlinked and need
to addressed jointly
• The idea of intergenerational justice and
intergenerational sustainability
 The Rio Earth Summit
• In 1992, in Rio de Janeiro ( also known as Rio Earth Summit), on
the 20th anniversary of the Stockholm Conference the concept
of sustainable development as a shared global concept
• Representation from 172 countries and 110 head of UN member
states attended this summit
• Led to the adoption of three major multilateral environmental
agreements

– The first, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the

second,
– the Convention on Biological Diversity for biological conservation
and the third,
– the UN Convention to Combat Desertification to stop the spread
of deserts in the dryland regions of the world.
 Rio + 20 (after 20 years of Earth Summit)
• The UN member states came together in 2012, once again in
Rio - known as the Rio +20 conference, on the 20th
anniversary of the Earth Summit
• There was a realization during the summit that not only the
concept of sustainable development had not really taken
hold, but the three multilateral environmental agreements
had not functioned properly, they were not being
implemented
• So the question raised were how can we make people
understand the urgency of the situation related to
environmental degradation ? What can be done to make
government proactive?
• That was the time Millennium Development Goal (MGD) was
brought to the forefront, initially initially the government of
Colombia and then many other governments.
 What is MDG?
(Let me now explain to you what is MDG and why it was discussed in the Rio 20
summit)

• In September 2000, building upon a decade of major

United Nations conferences and summits, world leaders
came together at the United Nations Headquarters in
New York to adopt the United Nations Millennium
Declaration.

• The Declaration committed nations to a new global

partnership to reduce extreme poverty, and set out a
series of eight time-bound targets - with a deadline of
2015 - that have become known as the Millennium
Development Goals (MDGs).
The Eight MD Goals and Achievements
• Eradicate extreme poverty • Since 1990, the number of people living in
extreme poverty has declined by more than
and hunger half.
• Achieve universal primary • The proportion of undernourished people in
the developing regions has fallen by almost
education half.
• Promote gender equality and • The primary school enrolment rate in the
developing regions has reached 91 percent,
empowerment and many more girls are now in school
• Reduce child mortality compared to 15 years ago.
• Remarkable gains have also been made in the
• Improve maternal health fight against HIV/AIDS, malaria and
• Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria tuberculosis.
• The under-five mortality rate has declined by
and other diseases more than half, and maternal mortality is
• Ensure Environmental down 45 percent worldwide.
• The target of halving the proportion of people
sustainability who lack access to improved sources of water
was also met.
The success of MDGs motivated to think of goal
based SD initiative
• The goal-based development to fight poverty, the Millennium
Development Goals, was quite successful.
• There was a widespread feeling among policy makers and civil society
that fight against poverty should continue beyond 2015.
• There is also widespread understanding that worldwide environmental
objectives need a higher profile alongside the poverty-reduction
objectives.
• So, in Rio + 20 the idea was - how about goal based initiatives for
sustainable development or Sustainable Development Goals?
• The idea caught on, that the MDG era, 2000 to 2015 would be
followed by a Sustainable Development Goal or SDG era for the period
2015 to 2030.
• The member states in the general assembly* went to work after the
Rio +20 summit and began to negotiate what should these SDGs be
 What was the process towards SDGs
• An open working group with representatives from 70 countries was
established in March 2013.
• At the same time, the UN conducted a series of “global
conversations”, which included 11 thematic and 83 national
consultations and door-to-door surveys, as well as an online survey
where people were asked to highlight topics they would like to see
approached in the goals.
• The results of the consultations were taken into account in the
working group's discussions.
• Initially the list of proposed goals was about 300, but that was too
many, so over the three years (2012-2015) members negotiated,
compressed, chose the priorities, aggregated objectives and so forth,
• By the middle of 2015 - 17 high priority goals were identified for
prosperity, people, and planet or for economic, social, and
environmental objectives
 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
• The well-known Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
are a new, universal set of goals targets and indicators,
that were adopted on September 25th, 2015
• to “end poverty in all its forms” by 2030 (hence agenda
2030) “and balance the three dimensions of sustainable
development: the economic, social and environmental.”
• The core of the Sustainable Development Goals is to
help the world to move irresistibly towards sustainable
development.
• That means a planet of shared prosperity, of social
inclusion, and of environmental sustainability.
 SDGs a step ahead
• SDGs follow and expand on the eight millennium development
goals (MDGs), which were launched in 2001 and expired in
2015.
• Every country is requested to incorporate the ambitious 17
goals into their agendas and political policies and to work
towards achieving SDGs.
• The MDGs focused primarily on poverty and health, for poor
countries to achieve, with financial support from wealthy
states
• The 17 goals of SDGs comprise 169 targets, include new areas
such as climate change, economic inequality, innovation,
sustainable consumption, peace and justice.
 17 SGDs
GOAL 1: No Poverty • The 2030 Agenda for
GOAL 2: Zero Hunger
GOAL 3: Good Health and Well-being
Sustainable Development
GOAL 4: Quality Education that includes 17
GOAL 5: Gender Equality Sustainable Development
GOAL 6: Clean Water and Sanitation Goals (SDGs).
GOAL 7: Affordable and Clean Energy
GOAL 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth
GOAL 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure • Building on the principle
GOAL 10: Reduced Inequality
of “leaving no one
GOAL 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities
GOAL 12: Responsible Consumption and Production
behind”, the new Agenda
GOAL 13: Climate Action emphasizes a holistic
GOAL 14: Life Below Water approach to achieving
GOAL 15: Life on Land sustainable development
GOAL 16: Peace and Justice Strong Institutions
GOAL 17: Partnerships to achieve the Goal
for all.
 Targets
• Each of the 17 goals has several targets and
indicators
• The targets will be discussed when each of the
goals will be discussed in detail
• Many SDGs are interdependent and must be
pursued together as progress in one field
often depends on progress in the others.