In 2015, United Nations
in World’s Agenda for Sustainable Development 2015-2030 presented 17 life
changing goals called Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
SDGs were an open
and urgent call for action for all developed and developing countries to
participate in a global partnership. This partnership was aimed at eradicating
hunger, poverty and all form of deprivations while designing strategies to
improve health and education, reduce inequality, and increase economic growth.
In addition, it aimed at addressing the issue of climate change and working to
preserve our terrestrial and aquatic environments. Until the start of 2020,
nations were progressing to achieve their individual targets until this
Covid-19 outbreak spread through the world and brought everyone at square one.
The lock down situation made all conditions worse, economies decline,
industries had no option left other than downsizing and only a few could
survive. Developed countries are also in crisis while developing and under-developed
world are expecting masses of unemployed people and poor health infrastructure
that could not cater everyone.
Unequivocally stating, Covid-19
is not going to vanish any soon, adaptation is the only key to our survival.
This situation calls for actions at international level and the agendas need to
be redefined as well as targets will need to be reworked. SDGs address all the
aspects of development and therefore can be used as a tool to support declining
economies, specially if reworked effectively.
In a socially distanced world,
next decade may evidence a technology boom and hence there is a need to train
all segments of our society on effective use of technology. Facebook will no
longer be used only for socialization, but also for increasing business and
marketing.
Energy and labour-intensive industries are expected to move towards
energy efficient operations and service industry will show maximum potential of
expansion. Meetings will be done more virtually hence reducing travel times and
costs as well as savings on fuel. Industries with less demand of their products
are expected to decline and there will be a shift towards services with
increased demand. Food water and energy nexus still has its implications and
close impact on most of the SDGs.
Covid-19 has a mortality
rate of 1.4-2% as reported by WHO (May 2020), however, hunger annually kills
around 3 million children around the world (as reported in 2020) while 135
million are expected to face death due to water borne diseases during
2020-2022. These statistics clearly indicate that this is the time we need to
start planning for the next decade.
Targets of SDGs and their priorities must
be redesigned keeping in consideration the losses caused by this pandemic.
Learning to adapt will help us survive and in any time of crisis, what we know,
save our lives.
Wishing the world a quick
recovery soon.
Author: Rtr. Sajida Khalid
Rotaract Club of Karachi Innovators
RID 3271
0 Comments