By Amy Musgrave
The next five presidencies of the G20 must focus their efforts on accelerating progress towards attaining the United Nation’s (UN) Sustainable Development Goals, according to President Cyril Ramaphosa.
South Africa assumes the G20 presidency from 1 December 2024 to November 2025. This is approximately five years before the deadline of the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
“At the launch of the Special Edition of the Sustainable Development Goals Progress Report on 25 April 2023, the Secretary-General drew attention to the gravity of the situation.
“Just 12% of the SDG targets are on track. Progress on 50% is weak and insufficient. On more than 30% of the SDGs we have stalled or gone into reverse.
If we are to meet the 2030 deadline a paradigm shift is necessary,” Ramaphosa said on Wednesday.
He was addressing the 2nd foreign ministers meeting of the G20 in New York. It was being held on the margins of the 79th session of the UN’s General Assembly.
Ramaphosa told the meeting that the UN had to remain the centrepiece of multilateralism, while at the same time it must be modernised to make it fit-for-purpose and more effective, agile and forward-looking.
“The UN needs to be inclusive. It needs to represent current geopolitical relations and the prevailing international realities,” the president said.
South Africa has adopted as the theme for its G20 presidency, ‘Solidarity, Equality and Sustainable Development’.
Ramaphosa said that South Africa aimed to mobilise countries towards taking practical steps to resolve global challenges. At the same time, it would strengthen international cooperation within a rules-based system.
“In an interconnected world, the challenges faced by one nation affect all nations. Through solidarity we seek to advance a unified effort and mutual support among member nations.
“By advancing equality, we seek to ensure fair treatment, opportunities and advancement for all individuals and nations. This must be irrespective of their economic status, gender, race, geographic location or other characteristics,” he said.
Sustainable development was about meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs, Ramaphosa said.
The pace of mobilising the necessary resources to ensure that countries with developing economies met the SDG targets did not only need to be accelerated, “it has to be… turbo-charged”, he said.
South Africa’s G20 presidency will place Africa’s developmental priorities at the top of its agenda.
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