Background
Workshop on Building Capacity and Exploring Resources for implementing STI4SDGs Roadmaps, October 08-09, 2024, at UNCC, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The theme of the workshop is on “harnessing the potential of STI to deliver on the SDGs”, with a focus on “building partnerships and STI capacity in developing countries”. It is jointly organized by UN DESA and ECA.
Science and evidence-based actions are indispensable for eradicating poverty, ending hunger, tackling climate change, reversing biodiversity loss, and reducing inequality. Science is the key, and our best hope, for accelerating progress across the Sustainable Development Goals. Achieving this requires shared expertise from all disciplines. This was evident at the SDG Summit in September 2023, where the role of Science, Technology, and Innovation (STI) and the importance of closing STI gaps were central to discussions. In their political declaration at the Summit, Member States committed to bridging the science, technology, and innovation divides, responsibly using STI as drivers of sustainable development, and building the capacities necessary for sustainable transformations.
The Global Sustainable Development Report (GSDR) 2023, written at the request of UN Member States by the Independent Group of Scientists (IGS), revealed a general lack of progress in reaching the SDGs—whether on national, regional, or global scales. GSDR provides a framework for integrated action on the SDGs, working through six entry points for transformation employing levers capable of bringing about substantial change including science and technology and capacity building.
Aligning the framework of entry points and levers with evidence from ambitious global scenarios, the UN Sustainable Development Group (UNSDG) identified six systems or "Transitions" where policy interventions and strategic investments can have compounding benefits across the SDGs. UNSDG has also identified four "engine room actions": transforming policy and regulatory frameworks, developing pipelines of bankable and market-ready national projects, attracting the necessary financing mix including through innovative instruments, and investing in capacity-building for public institutions and civil society.
Under this framework of a systems approach, a UN-supported global collaboration program and platform uses the STI for SDGs roadmaps to design cross-sectoral, interconnected development strategies. These strategies can accelerate and sustain progress across entire development systems and planning cycles, serving as the basis for tackling complex and persistent development challenges. The STI for SDG roadmaps are a tool for enhancing actions to accelerate the six transitions.
The workshop will frame the discussion around roadmaps as a catalyst for sustainable development and the SDGs. In order to ensure strong and sustainable roadmaps, inclusive processes and voluntary funding models/mechanisms need to be established. In this connection, the workshop could discuss how to mobilize youth, the Diaspora, innovators, the private sector and others to engage in the development of STI roadmaps. The STI roadmap workshop will also inform the development of the Guidebook for the Development and Implementation of Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) for SDGs Roadmap for the Six Transitions. It will discuss the following key challenges and issues that the STI roadmaps are aiming to address:
• Mapping national STI stakeholders, skills, capacities, and activities in transition areas;
• Identifying opportunities for strengthening STI networks and partnerships and fostering interdisciplinary collaboration to support national priority transitions;
• Assessing initiatives and investments to build STI capacities to accelerate priority transitions, including capacity to analyse and address SDG synergies and trade-offs;
• Identifying impediments to the application of scientific knowledge in SDG policy-making, and defining the roles of stakeholders such as funders, publishers, policymakers, and research infrastructure providers to leveraging STI for the SDGs;
• Ensuring adequate funding for R&D, identifying voluntary funding models on STI for the SDGs, and channeling resources to empower women and girls in science.
The Workshop will interrogate some of the complex issues, and explore potential collaboration among participants and beyond.