This document discusses the process of developing a post-2015 global development agenda to replace the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). It outlines the UN task team established to guide the process, fundamental principles of human rights, equality and sustainability, and challenges around goal setting, implementation, and monitoring. Opportunities for broad consultation, youth engagement, and input from civil society organizations are also presented. Asian countries' experiences with the MDGs and their role in shaping a new framework are highlighted.

1. Challenges and Opportunities of the Post
2015 Global Development Agenda
Artemy Izmestiev, UNDP Seoul Policy Centre
Seoul, September 2012

2. Content
• Preparatory Process for developing the new Global
development framework
• Role of the UN system & Fundamental principles
• Challenges
• Opportunities
• Asian approaches on post-2015

3. Preparatory Process for the new Global
development framework
• The Report by the Secretary General: June 2012
Accelerating progress towards the Millennium
Development Goals: options for sustained and
inclusive growth and issues for advancing the
United Nations development agenda beyond 2015
• High Level Panel on post-2015 development
framework established August 2012
• 50+ national consultations and 9 thematically
focused meetings by March 2013
• HPL report presentation at GA Sept 2013

4. UN Task Team on Post-2015
Prepared the report for the SG
Macro questions it raised:
•What should be the purpose of the post-2015
agenda: advocacy, guidepost, instrument for policy
coherence?
•Was a 15-year timeframe realistic to bring about
transformative change?
•Should the post-2015 agenda be prescriptive and
if so, how far can it go without constraining policy
space at country level?

5. Fundamental principles
G Report: “The
world cannot
continue on its
current course.
There is a need for
an agenda aimed at
transformative
change leading to a
shared, secure and
sustainable future
for all”.
undamental
principles for future
agenda:
Human rights
•
Equality
•
Sustainability
•

6. Challenges

7. Challenges of Post-2015: process
• Reaching agreement is increasingly difficult;
• How ambitious should the goals be and where to
draw a line?
• How should the global goals be linked to the
national processes?
• What should be the international governance of
post-2015 agenda including the monitoring?

8. Challenges of Post-2015: Format
• How to make sure that the goals are simple and
can be easily communicated?
• How to ensure measurability and robustness of
data?
• To which extent the current MDGs should be
taken used in formulation of the new framework?

9. Opportunities

10. UN Task Team on Post-2015 (cont.)
Role for the UN system:
•Putting the concept of sustainable development at
the heart of the post-2015 agenda
•How to build on MDGs
•Expanding the scope beyond MDGs
•Designing the future goals to address both local
and global development challenges
•Incorporating measurability and accountability

11. Consultations
• 50+ consultations in developing countries in
2012-2013
National consultations will not focus on goal setting and
universality, but on how people see their future.
• Global and regional thematic meetings;
• Social media discussions and other forms of
outreach.
Web platform to foster outreach.
Consensus & buy in- participation

12. Themes of Global Meetings
• Inequalities (across all dimensions):
• Health (MDGs 4, 5, 6 + non communicable
diseases)
• Education (at all levels)
• Growth and employment
• Environmental sustainability
• Food security and nutrition
• Governance (at all levels)
• Conflict and fragility
• Population dynamics

13. Youth Engagement
• Giving regional youth a voice in the global consultations
• Follows an UNDP initiative in the Pacific Islands
• 40 students. Korea, Japan, China, Mongolia.
• 3 days of debates and workshops
- Did the MDGs work?
- Do we need another framework?
- What is the world we want to see post-2015?
• Declaration to be fed into global consultations.

14. Opportunities for CSOs
• UN-CSO Dialogue
• Country and thematic consultations
• CSO Platforms (e.g. Beyond 2015)
• Promote awareness and creativity
• Link with other areas of global agenda

15. Asian Approaches to Post-2015
• Asia’s experience with the implementation of the
MDGs holds valuable lessons for the formulation
of the new global development agenda
• Asia is the only developing region that has
successfully narrowed the gap with advanced
economies over the past half century
• Investment in human capital and the creation of
enabling conditions for its development were
important to Asian countries’ progress

16. Asian Approaches to Post-2015 (cont.)
• World today is very different from the world
when the MDGs were formulated (poverty is
increasingly an MIC phenomenon, rise of
emerging countries)
• Asia is on the forefront of changing global
dynamics, being home to many of the world’s
“emerging” nations
• Merit of “creative chaos” that may be present at
the initial stages of the consultations
• Keep the global ambition high in the formulation
of the future goals

17. Thank you!
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