ASTANA (TCA) — The first meeting of the Partnership Working Group on promoting Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) under the UN auspices in Kazakhstan was chaired by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan Kairat Abdrakhmanov on November 7.
In his opening remarks, the foreign minister called on all the group participants to work actively, and emphasized that the Sustainable Development Goals are fully correlated and in line with the strategic and policy documents of the President of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev, therefore, the achievement of the SDGs will directly contribute to the implementation of the President’s initiatives, the Kazakh Foreign Ministry reported. It is important that the implementation of the SDGs will become a practical indicator of the success of Kazakhstan’s steps to become one of the developed countries in the world.
The meeting highlighted the unique nature of all 17 Sustainable Development Goals and that in order to achieve them, all countries, regardless of their economic status, should work together. The priority is given to eliminating poverty, implementing strategies that stimulate economic growth and meet the social needs of people in education, health, social protection, employment opportunities, solving problems caused by climate change, and ensuring environmental protection.
Participants of the event discussed the promotion of the Sustainable Development Goals in Kazakhstan, as well as the preparation for the Voluntary National Review (VNR), which will be presented by Kazakhstan at the UN High-level Political Forum in July 2019 in New York.
The event was attended by representatives of relevant state agencies of Kazakhstan, international organizations, in particular the United Nations Development Program, UNICEF, UN Women, the European Union, the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, as well as research institutes and civil society organizations.
The Sustainable Development Goals, known as the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, are a set of goals for future international cooperation that replaced the Millennium Development Goals at the end of 2015. The SDGs are planned to be reached by 2030.
To successfully implement the SDGs, the Government of Kazakhstan established interagency working groups in 5 areas: People, Planet, Prosperity, Peace, and Partnership. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan was appointed coordinator of the Partnership Working Group on the 17th Goal Global Partnership for Sustainable Development. At the country level, this important work is coordinated by the Ministry of National Economy of Kazakhstan.
