Reverting to Pre-pandemic World ‘Simply Not an Option’, Deputy Secretary-General Stresses, in Remarks at Virtual Launch of Global Development Hub
Following are UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed’s remarks, as prepared for delivery, at the virtual launch of the Global Development Hub at Imperial College, London, today:
It is a privilege to join you today for the launch of the Global Development Hub.
In adopting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015, leaders made a bold promise to transform our world by 2030. To end poverty and hunger. To provide quality health care and education for all. To achieve gender equality and eliminate discrimination in all its forms. To combat climate change and power prosperity through a cleaner, greener economy. And to secure peace, justice and freedom from violence for all.
In the past six years, we have seen the SDGs gain traction in institutions and organizations, in schools and city councils like no international agenda has done before. And yet, today, when it comes to the promise that matters most — improving the lives of people and the health of the planet — we are far from where we need to be.
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the world was not on track to achieve the SDGs — with hunger and displacement on the rise, poverty alleviation slowing, emissions rising to unacceptable levels, women facing old and new barriers to equality, and biodiversity loss advancing at an alarming rate. And make no mistake about it, the pandemic has made our 2030 task even more difficult.
We are witnessing the first rise in extreme poverty in two decades. Schooling disruptions are jeopardizing hard-fought gains in learning. Progress towards gender equality could be pushed back a generation. In a number of countries, we’ve seen the pandemic used as a pretext for introducing further restrictions on human rights. And despite a temporary fall in emissions due to lockdowns, the world is still heading for a catastrophic temperature rise in excess of 3 °C this century.
The challenge before each and every one of us today, therefore, whether in the Global South or the Global North, whether in the Imperial College or the United Nations, in parliaments or boardrooms, is to decide where we go from here.
On a personal level, many of us long for a return to some kind of “normal”, to see family, friends or colleagues in person; to engage socially without fear of harming others. But from the perspective of achieving the SDGs, reverting to the world as it existed before the pandemic is simply not an option. Another way is both necessary and possible.
In the decisions that are being taken around global and local recovery efforts, we have a unique opportunity to fundamentally change course. A recovery that lives up to the 2030 Agenda’s principle of leaving no one behind will strengthen our health, education and social protection systems, sharpen our focus on vulnerable communities, empower women in all settings and build resilience.
A recovery that is grounded in advancing a just transition — in areas such as energy, food, digitalization and infrastructure — will help reduce emissions, support those who are shifting from the brown economy and create new and better jobs. And a recovery that is built on the Agenda’s commitment to partnerships and universality will ensure we move forward together, as one humanity, with a whole- of-society approach.
In all of this, science, technology and innovation are absolutely key. Allow me to highlight four areas where your support and that of your peers can prove a gamechanger.
First, in the area of health, we’ve all witnessed with immense admiration the incredible collaboration that developed and delivered COVID-19 testing kits, vaccines and treatments in truly record time. Yet we also see that a great deal remains to be done, including within the science and technology sector, to address their vastly unequal distribution and to make similarly transformative breakthroughs in other less high-profile areas of global health, such as finding a malaria vaccine, addressing non-communicable diseases and tackling neglected tropical diseases.
Second, in the area of energy, the last 20 years have brought major advances in renewable energy, bringing the cost of wind and solar energy down below that of fossil fuels. The energy transition is just beginning to reach the scale that is required to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement, we need the full capacities of science, technology and innovation to tackle the challenge of decarbonization, particularly in the Global North, while also ensuring access to affordable, reliable and sustainable modern energy, sustainable infrastructure and connectivity in the Global South. We need this same ingenuity to drive solutions like green hydrogen and other zero-emission fuels to support heavy-emitting sectors globally to decarbonize.
Third, in the area of food, we’ve seen how the green revolution transformed agriculture and nutrition in some parts of the world in the middle of the twentieth century. But now, in the face of a perfect storm of rising global hunger, increasing demand, an obesity crisis and a seriously degraded natural environment, we need another revolution, one that looks beyond yields to transform the way the world produces, consumes and thinks about food.
Fourth, in terms of digital connectivity, the massive shift online during the pandemic has opened up incredible new opportunities. But we also know that change has not benefitted people equally — not in the United Kingdom and not across the world, thereby compounding existing inequalities — in wealth, gender, education, opportunities and health.
If science and technology can find a way to connect us here this evening, then so too can it find a way to address the gaps and connect the 50 per cent of the world that is not online and the millions for whom digital learning during the crisis has proven all but impossible, especially for women or young people.
In the United Kingdom, for instance, female students and faculty continue to be vastly underrepresented in STEM [science, technology, engineering and mathematics] subjects and even further excluded in the workforce with one in four jobs in STEM going to women. Underpinning the ability of the science and technology community to support the world to take this great leap forward is the degree to which it lives up to the spirit of the 2030 Agenda itself. If science and technology is to make the maximum contribution to the 2030 Agenda, then it simply must address glaring disparities such as these.
The solutions we need in areas such as these require the availability of data, an area where much needs to be done and where the science, technology and innovation field has much to offer. They will not come from working in silos, but from working collaboratively across sectors and disciplines, by co-creating knowledge.
That is why I am so encouraged by the launch of the Global Development Hub. The Hub speaks to the need to conduct multi-disciplinary research, capacity-building, peer learning and knowledge exchange that brings together institutions and partners from across the world can help us move decisively towards sustainability and equity.
Universities and centres like the Global Development Hub can help not just by committing to the SDGs, but also by mainstreaming them in their curriculums, conducting research, producing statistics, and intensifying our efforts to support science, technology and innovation in developing countries.
Through North-South, South-South and triangular cooperation and innovative partnerships, we can strengthen the collaboration and exchange between policymakers and scientific and technological communities working on the SDGs. The SDGs are our guide, and the United Nations stands ready to work with academia through our various initiatives and through our resident coordinator offices in over 131 countries across the world.
In fostering such cooperation, we have much to learn from you — the generation that is on the front lines of the rapid advances in science and creating our increasingly networked world. I challenge you all to co-create solutions at scale that allow you to think creatively and act big, to think globally and act locally.
I look forward to hearing from you this evening — about your hopes for the Global Development Hub, and what you believe, will break through the invisible walls between research, policy, and practice.