African Countries Recommit to Achieving SDGs by Investing in Green Growth

Addis Ababa, March 9/2022/ENA/ African countries recommitted to achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by building better through investing in green growth to unlock the continent’s development opportunities.

Confirming Africa’s capacity to drive sustainable development, African governments have reaffirmed commitment to meeting the SDGs at the 8th Session of the African Regional Forum on Sustainable Development (ARFSD), held in Kigali, Rwanda.

The ARFSD is an annual multi-stakeholder platform organized jointly by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and host governments in collaboration with the African Union Commission, the African Development Bank and other entities of the United Nations system.

Its objective is to review and catalyze actions to achieve the SDGs and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development adopted by United Nations Member States in September 2015.   

More than 1,800 participants comprising ministers, senior officials, experts and practitioners from United Nations Member States, the private sector, civil society, academia and United Nations organizations and high-level representatives of the Governments of 54 ECA members states participated at the 8th session of ARFSD.

The meeting was held under the theme, ‘Building forward better: a green, inclusive and resilient Africa poised to achieve the 2030 Agenda and Agenda 2063’.

According to ECA, the two agendas provide a synergistic framework for achieving inclusive and people-centered sustainable development in the region.

Opening the forum, the President of Rwanda, Paul Kagame, called on African countries to be assertive and build better using Agenda 2063 as a blueprint despite many challenges that have reversed Africa’s development gains.

Despite the impact of COVID-19 on the economic and health sectors in the continent, Africa must build multilateral partnerships and strengthen capacities in the manufacturing of vaccines and pharmaceuticals, Kagame implored delegates.

“Africa should prioritize domestic resource mobilization to finance its development particularly its national health care system,” he said.   

Kagame noted that strong mechanisms are needed to monitor and change the implementation of the SDGs. “We have to own and lead the process and support one another. That’s why these agendas [2030 Agenda and Agenda 2063] are important because it is about achieving the stability and sustainability of our continent.”

United Nations Deputy Secretary General, Amina Mohammed for her part stated that the pandemic had caused disappointment for global solidarity and African economies, especially in education and health systems, worsened by insufficient access to the Internet and sustainable, affordable energy.

The Deputy Secretary General called on member States to focus on the 2030 Agenda and Agenda 2063.

ECA’s Director of Technology, Climate Change and Natural Resources,  Jean Paul Adam, noted that current assessments of the 2030 Agenda and Agenda 2063 implementation progress indicate that most African nations are off-track to achieve the targets and set goals of the two development blueprints within the set timeframe.

The Forum released the Kigali Declaration in which it highlighted the successful deliberation of the 8th ARFSD and mandated Rwanda to represent the continent in presenting the commitments for discussion at the High-Level Political Forum on SDGs set for New York in July 2022, according to ECA.