Sorry, you need to enable JavaScript to visit this website.
United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs Sustainable Development

Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC)

1. What decisions or new strategies has the governing body of your organization taken to guide the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs? Please provide a brief summary below, including the overarching vision of your governing body for the Decade of Action on the SDGs.

With regards to the 2030 Agenda, the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) has identified in close consultation and dialogue with its Member States and associate members, a multidisciplinary response to their development needs which includes the following key strategic areas:

  • articulating strategies for development, including the design and follow-up of means of implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development at the regional level and analyzing key policy interlinkages, on topics related to trade, financing for development, technology transfer, wider application of ICTs for development, rules of engagement with the private sector, among
  • promoting sound fiscal management and market diversification;
  • enhancing social inclusive development, with a gender perspective;
  • promoting the integration of the SDGs and disaster risk reduction measures into national and territorial planning, budgeting and investment schemes in collaboration with the UN-system at the regional and national levels;
  • strengthening the statistical capacity of countries to support more effective evidence-based policymaking and measurement of SDGs and refining the monitoring mechanism for measuring progress in the implementation of the SDGs;

Implementing these priorities requires close coordination with UN entities at the regional and sub- regional levels.

In the context of the “Decade of action”, ECLAC has continued its focus on the principle of “leaving no one behind”, by conducting analytical work in order to identify some of the most important factors (socio- economic status, gender, age, territory, migratory and disability status and race and ethnicity) contributing to social inequality (SDG 10) in all realms and how they interact and often reinforce each other, in what has been described as a “Social inequality matrix” in several ECLAC publications and reports.

Further, a systematic effort has continued to be carried out in order to visualize the socio-economic situation of specific population groups, such as people of African descent, persons with disabilities, youth, children, indigenous peoples, older adults, women and migrants. Also, ECLAC has worked on identifying how multiple forms of discrimination interact among each other, by using an intersectional approach, and reflecting them in its data production.

In the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, ECLAC has quickly adapted to assess the socioeconomic impact in the region and to produce analysis in this respect.

Also, ECLAC Caribbean’s programme of work is linked to the work of the General Assembly relevant to the development priorities of the Caribbean and built around the Small Island Development States (SIDS) development agenda. In this context, the Financing for Development Agenda, the SAMOA pathway, the Paris Agenda and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction are essential platforms for the Caribbean and also guide ECLAC’s work programme.

2. At the secretariat level, what steps has your organization taken (or will it take) in the follow-up to the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs? Please specify actions, including but not limited to the following areas:

2.1 SDG-specific strategies, plans or work programmes;

ECLAC has aligned its work programme to respond to the challenge to assist in the implementation of SDGs. ECLAC works in this realm in three main ways: first, by producing information and data, second, by providing technical assistance to Governments and third by the planning and organizing intergovernmental meetings in which findings and experiences are discussed. The work of the Commission on SDG 5 as well as the work to mainstream a gender equality approach on the implementation of the 2030 Agenda throughout ECLAC’s work programme, with the production of the substantive reports, the convening of the Regional Conference of Women and with ECLAC’s online Gender Observatory is an example of this.

ECLAC has also adapted its workplan to advance the sustainable development agenda of SIDS and pursued in synergy with the Sustainable Development Goals, by promoting the institutionalization of integrated, long-term sustainable development planning that is evidence-based and participatory. This includes support to member States on SDG 17, in areas such as fiscal management —with support to conduct public expenditure reviews, as well as revenue planning and forecasting— and finance, trade and investment, to help reduce risk and build the region’s resilience. In this regard, the strategy of debt swaps for climate change and investment in adaptation projects and green industries is one of the key areas of work in support to SDG implementation in the Caribbean.

2.2 Aligning the structure of the organization with the SDGs and the transformative features of the 2030 Agenda, including any challenges and lessons learned in doing so;

ECLAC has mainstreamed the 2030 Agenda and its follow-up, particularly in the context of its subsidiary bodies. Some recent examples include:

  • The Statistical Conference of the Americas celebrated 19 years after its creation and has become a crucial pillar for the statistical development of Latin American and Caribbean countries due to its countless roles, which includes representing the region’s countries in the global mechanisms involved in the Sustainable Development Goals process. During its tenth meeting (19-21 November 2019) in Santiago, Chile countries agreed on the need to seek a collaborative regional response to the demand for official statistics that support the formulation of policies with an empirical basis that contributes to improving the organization and management of national statistical systems, within the framework of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable
  • During the Fourth Meeting of the Presiding Officers of the Regional Conference on Population and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean (October 2019, Chile) member States renewed their commitment to human rights and the well-being of those most vulnerable, and called to intensify the fight against inequality and the eradication of poverty, in the framework of the commitments adopted in the Montevideo Consensus. Indeed, the Montevideo Consensus on Population and Development constitutes a true navigational chart that outlines the regional commitments whose advancement contributes, in a critical way, to the fulfillment of the 2030 Agenda’s Sustainable Development Goals and helps us make the principle of leaving no one behind a
  • At the Nineteenth meeting of the Monitoring Committee of the Caribbean Development and Cooperation Committee (May 2019, Trinidad and Tobago), senior government representatives, economists, statisticians, non-governmental organization officials and civil society leaders discussed the importance of building stronger synergies between the agendas of SIDS and SDG implementation. At the Twenty-seventh session of the Caribbean Development and Cooperation Committee (CDCC), in which the annual report and programme of work is presented and submitted to its Member states and associate members, the Committee adopted resolution 100 (XXVII), “Ensuring synergy in the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Small Island Developing States Accelerated Modalities of Action in the Caribbean subregion”. Furthermore, the Committee welcomed the strengthening the Regional Coordinating Mechanism (RCM) for the implementation of the Small

Island Developing States’ (SIDS) development agenda in the Caribbean, an initiative explicitly aimed at accelerating policy response and implementation of the 2030 Development Agenda. In this sense, ECLAC’s “Review of the Regional Coordinating Mechanism for the implementation of the sustainable development agenda in the small island developing States of the Caribbean” examines the continued relevance of the RCM in light of the changing multilateral framework for SIDS development and the Proposal for a revitalized CDCC-RCM, repositioned as the mechanism for sustainable development in Caribbean SIDS.

  • The XIV Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean was a key space for discussion on the interlinkages across SDG goals and targets, in particular, between SDGs 5, 8, 9,10, 13 and The programme of the XIV Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean is available at: https://conferenciamujer.cepal.org/14/en/programme. During this event, it was the occasion to discuss on women’s autonomy in changing economic scenarios and how some trends like the economic and financial globalization, the digital revolution, the demographic change and the climate change are affecting gender equality and women’s autonomy. This implied a work of analysis and discussion on the interlinkages between SDGs 5, 8, 9, 11, 13, 17, that has been expounded by ECLAC with the elaboration of the Position Paper, Women’s autonomy in changing economic scenarios, where these debates and interlinkages are deeply examined.
  • The Regional Council for Planning is ECLAC’s intergovernmental subsidiary body that guides the activities of the Latin American and Caribbean Institute for Economic and Social Planning (ILPES). During the XVII Meeting of the Regional Council for Planning (RCP), which was held in Uruguay in August 2019, and brought together ministers, deputy ministers and heads of planning from 24 Latin American and Caribbean countries, participants recognized the importance of the coherence of public policies for strengthening the processes and instruments of planning for development and public administration, with a view to implementing the 2030 Agenda in the In the

framework of this meeting, ECLAC presented the position document Planning for sustainableterritorial development in Latin America and the Caribbean, which analyzes 153 territorial policies from the region, their multiple approaches and thematic focuses, and proposes a working model to address them in a systemic fashion.

2.3 Readjusting or updating results-based budgeting and management, including performance indicators;

The programme of work and activities of ECLAC have gradually been adapted to meet the 2030 Development Agenda’s main priorities. This entails framing topics previously developed (such as poverty, inequality, social protection, decent work, education, institutional analysis, youth, infancy, and disability among others) from the perspective of specific SDG’s.

Also new extra-budgetary projects have been designed in reference to the main priorities emerging from the 2030 Agenda. In addition, ECLAC has done an effort to identify the main links between the SDGs and the programme of work of the institution, by subprogramme. This has been reflected in the Programme of work for 2020 and in the Draft Programme of Work for 2021 of the Commission, which was approved by member States at the 34th Session of the Committee of the Whole of ECLAC.

ECLAC is a department of the UN Secretariat and therefore follows the guidelines and structure of the Secretariat wide planning and budgeting processes, which includes the preparation of annual Proposed Programme Budgets as its main planning documents.

2.4 Action to enhance support to the principle of "leaving no one behind" and to integrated policy approaches;

In relation to advancing in “leaving no one behind” and to integrated policy approaches, ECLAC has continued to conduct important analytical work in order to identify some of the most important factors (socio-economic status, gender, age, territory, migratory and disability status and race and ethnicity) contributing to social inequality (SDG 10) in all realms and how they interact and often reinforce each other, in what has been described as a “Social inequality matrix” in several publications and reports. Two regional reports have continued developing this analytical work, namely the Social Panorama of LatinAmerica 2019 and the Position Document Critical obstacles to inclusive social development in LatinAmerica and the Caribbean presented to governments in October 2019 at the III Meeting of the RegionalConference on Social Development in Latin America and the Caribbean (Mexico). Furthermore, ECLAC published the book “Social programmes, poverty eradication and labour inclusion: Lessons from LatinAmerica and the Caribbean” which promotes a comprehensive approach to social programmes such as

conditional cash transfer programmes, labour and production inclusion programmes and social pensions. The book also analyses ongoing debates regarding the possible incentives and disincentives these programmes create in terms of the labour supply, formalization and child labour.

A systematic effort has continued to visualizing the socio-economic situation of specific population groups, such as people of African descent, a group that is often overlooked by public policies in Latin America. In that regard, the ECLAC has developed policy and institutional recommendations that were recently summarized in the publication “Protección social y migración. El desafío de la inclusión sinracismo ni xenofobia”. Another example is a document that is being prepared by the ECLAC in conjunction with UNFPA on Afrodescendents that will be presented in 2020 at the ECLAC Session. Similar efforts are being carried out in relation to other population groups such as persons with disabilities, youth (Identidades juveniles y actitudes en torno a la discriminación y tolerancia), children (particularly in relation to child labour, social protection systems that have a child-sensitive perspective and digital inclusion in the publication “Childhood and Adolescence in the Digital Age. A Comparative Report of theKids Online Surveys on Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica and Uruguay”), indigenous peoples (“Educaciónintercultural bilingüe y enfoque de interculturalidad en los sistemas educativos latinoamericanos. Avancesy desafíos”), older adults (Older adults in the digital age in Latin America: bridging the digital age divideand research carried out on pension systems) and migrants (Políticas migratórias em nível local: Análisesobre a institucionalização da política municipal para a população imigrante de São Paulo).

The study “People of African descent in Latin America and the Caribbean: Developing indicators to measure and counter inequalities” responded to an urgent need to end the statistical invisibility of populations of African descent, which is an example of structural racism. Information is thus a fundamental tool for policies and for actions undertaken by Afrodescendent organizations, as well as for monitoring regional and international agreements. Within this context, this publication contains a set of indicators, the purpose of which is to measure ethnic and racial inequalities and gaps between Afrodescendent and non-Afrodescendent populations in line with international and regional commitments, including SDGs, the Programme of activities for the implementation of the International Decade for People of African Descent and the Montevideo Consensus on Population and Development.

ECLAC made efforts to identify how multiple forms of discrimination interact among them, by using an intersectional approach, and to reflect them in the data production. The second chapter of the ECLAC’s Position Paper Women’s autonomy in changing economic scenarios is called Regional heterogeneity: intersectionality poses a challenge to gender equality in Latin America and the Caribbean and shows the necessity of implying the intersectional approach to analyze the different situations of oppression women are facing. ECLAC is also contributing to a document on Afrodescendant population in Latina America incorporating the special situation of afrodecendant-women by processing data with an intersectional perspective.

Older persons: Latin American and Caribbean countries are in a process of a demographic transition which will lead to a dramatic shift in the age structure of the population, with sharp declines in the proportion of children and increases in the proportion of older persons. Since people’s economic activities are strongly linked to their stage in the life cycle, changes in population age structure have an important impact on economic development. Equally profound is the transformation in traditional gender roles which is accompanying the region’s demographic transition, evident in the rising participation of women in formal labour markets. Both transformations are occurring in the context of high and persistent inequality in the region. Strengthening countries capacities to address ageing and demographic transition was the objective of several lines of work including research, data analysis, seminars, training activities, among others. The International Seminar on Population Ageing and Public Policies on the Elderly held in Asunción (September 2019), with 100 participants from the government, civil society and academia and regional experts from Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica and Uruguay, is an example of activities to increase the capacity to analyze the economic and social impact of demographic changes and public policies linked to the elderly, in order to raise awareness of the need for different policy approaches that contribute to the welfare of the older persons and encourage their participation in decision-making. It was organized by the Ministry of Public Health and Social Welfare (MSPyBS) of Paraguay and ECLAC, within the framework of the Regional Intergovernmental Conference on Aging and Rights of the Elderly in Latin America and the Caribbean, whose presidency is exercised by Paraguay during the period 2017-2022, and the Technical Secretariat by ECLAC.

The demographic transition process requires forward-looking policies which take into account population dynamics. Progress toward achievement of SDG targets is inseparably linked to population trends. ECLAC lead the Development Account project Demographic transition: opportunities and challenges to achieve the SDGs in Latin America and the Caribbean to improve the capacity of policymakers in selected Latin American and Caribbean countries to assess the opportunities and challenges brought by the demographic transition to advance towards the SDGs. National Transfer Accounts (NTA) measure the flow of economic resources between age groups, providing a framework for understanding the impact of changing age structures on national economies and allowing the integration of population dynamics into sustainable development planning. During 2019 ECLAC organized 4 country-level National Transfer Accounts (NTA) results dissemination workshops, 3 NTA capacity-building trainings and 2 NTA sensitization workshop. By the end of the project in 2019, the technical capacities to produce NTAs strengthened in nine countries (Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Jamaica, Mexico, and Peru) and generated in two others (Bolivia and Paraguay), including ten national studies.

With regards to migrants, Latin American and Caribbean countries are undergoing a period of intense international migration, with flows towards outside the region, and flows between countries within the region, including those of returning migrants. This drastic change in the regional migration scenario with new and more complex dynamics poses the need to review and adapt the production of information on

migratory flows in the region and in countries and therefore, the content of ECLAC’s technical assistance. Traditional sources of information (censuses) still need to be strengthened while finding or developing robust complementary sources which may serve to monitor the most changing and dynamic nature of contemporary migratory flows and stocks. The generation of better-quality information could facilitate the evidence of the multiple contributions of migration to the development of the countries of the region. In this context ECLAC participates in the project “Collection and use of international migration data in the context of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants” to strengthen national capacity in collecting and compiling comprehensive and internationally comparable migration data, to enhance understanding of its uses and limitations for policy purposes and for the monitoring of the migration related goals and targets in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. During 2019, national assessments were carried out in two countries (Perú and Paraguay) to tailor technical capacity building to produce migration statistics.

Although migrants can significantly contribute to sustainable development, these may be undermined by a lack of social inclusion. Many migrants, particularly children, adolescents and women, face adversities in various migratory corridors, such as discrimination, exploitation and violence, which lead to increasing poverty and inequality. In 2020 ECLAC started the project “Harnessing the contribution of intra-region migration to socio-economic development in Latin American and Caribbean countries” to strengthen the capacities of national authorities to formulate evidence-based public policies and development plans that fully harness the contributions of migrants for sustainable development, through the improvement of their understanding of the social, economic and cultural benefits of international migration. The first activities are directed to generate new methodologies to identify the contributions of migrants as well as to monitor their situation for public policy purposes and the promotion of their human rights.

Further, ECLAC, in close collaboration with OIM has contributed to the Regional Review Process of the implementation of the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration (GCM) in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Moreover, a new regional study on indigenous peoples that addresses the situation regarding territorial rights (legal protection, experiences of consultations for free, prior, informed consent), forests and climate change, territorial inequalities, poverty and employment, was developed in collaboration with the Social Development Division and the Sustainable Development Division of ECLAC.

Finally, ECLAC has supported the development of the Regional Agenda for Social Inclusive Development (RAISD) in the Caribbean. Based on the 2030 Agenda, and with the objective of deepening the implementation of its social pillar in the region, the RAISD was approved by the Ministers and High Authorities of social development during the Third Session of the Regional Conference on Social Development in October 2019, stating the need to promote a new generation of social policies anchored in a rights- and equality-based approach and guided by the principle of universalism that is sensitive to

differences; to strengthen the social institutional framework, including countries’ capacity to invest in social matters; to provide sufficient, guaranteed resources for social policies; and to bolster multilateral action. In this regard, and aiming at enhancing effective implementation at Caribbean level, a subregional workshop is programmed on “Leaving No One Behind in the Caribbean: towards universal social protection” which will place focus on the poorest and most vulnerable in policy responses, including particular attention to the poor, rural and indigenous communities, all children, youth, persons with disabilities, people living with HIV/AIDS, older persons, refugees and internally displaced persons and migrants.

2.5 Action to address the interlinkages across SDG goals and targets;

The XIV Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean was a key space for discussion on the interlinkages across SDG goals and targets, in particular, between SDGs 5, 8, 9,10, 13 and 17. The programme of the XIV Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean is available at: https://conferenciamujer.cepal.org/14/en/programme. During this event, it was the occasion to discuss on women’s autonomy in changing economic scenarios and how some trends like the economic and financial globalization, the digital revolution, the demographic change and the climate change are affecting gender equality and women’s autonomy. This implied a work of analysis and discussion on the interlinkages between SDGs 5, 8, 9, 11, 13, 17, that has been expounded by ECLAC with the elaboration of the Position Paper, Women’s autonomy in changing economic scenarios, where these debates and interlinkages are deeply examined.

Moreover, in order to analyze further elements on the interlinkages between SDGs 5 and SDGs 8, 9 and 13, a meeting with feminist economists was organized in June 2019.

Several activities were also organized in the Caribbean to address the interlinkages across SDG goals and targets. These include, among others:

  • The twenty-seventh Session of the CDCC and the fifth Caribbean Development Roundtable (CDR) discussed the issues of climate resilience and sustainable economic growth, and a broader outlook on sustainable development in the
  • Learning Conference on Implementing the 2030 Agenda in the Caribbean Region, in collaboration with UNITAR and
  • Regional Workshop on Integrated Policies and Policy Coherence for the SDGs, in collaboration with UNITAR and
  • Symposium on Mainstreaming Gender in Water Resources Management, Climate Change and Disaster Risk Reduction Policies in the Caribbean held in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, in collaboration with UNDESA and
  • The Caribbean Forum on Population, Youth and Development was held to take stock of progress towards the implementation of the commitments under the Lisbon Declaration on Youth Policies and Programmes, 20 years after its adoption, and the Montevideo Consensus on Population and Development, five years after its adoption, addressing the role of youth in Agenda 2030 implementation.
  • Subregional Review and Evaluation of the Implementation of the Montevideo Consensus on Population and Development in the
  • Preparation of the SAMOA Pathway mid-term review for the Caribbean
  • ECLAC Caribbean’s flagship publication, the “Caribbean Outlook”, provided a comprehensive assessment of the critical challenges facing the Caribbean, and their impact on the development trajectory of these countries. Its 2020 edition will focus on recommendations to address sustainable development common priorities in the Caribbean
  • Also, in collaboration with UNITAR, and DESA, ECLAC convened a Regional Workshop on Integrated Policies and Policy Coherence for the SDGs. The workshop was conducted for 13 SIDS countries, including 10 CDCC Members - Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Belize, Grenada, Dominica, Jamaica, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago - and 3 CDCC Associate Members - Aruba, British Virgin Islands, Sint

2.6 Others.

3. What normative, analytical, technical assistance or capacity building activities is your organization providing to support the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs? Please provide a brief account of the activities you have organized or intend to undertake, including but not limited to the following areas:

3.1 Enhancing national implementation including by supporting the mainstreaming of the SDGs in development plans and policies or through national sustainable development plans/strategies;

In 2018-2019 ECLAC implemented both analytical and knowledge sharing events aimed at mainstreaming the advancement towards universal social protection systems as stated by target 1.3 of SDG 1. The Social Development Ministries and High Authorities on Social Development in Latin America and the Caribbean are the main counterparts of ECLAC in the context of the Regional Conference on Social Development.

Such entities need substantive technical and political support to fulfil complex tasks involving poverty eradication and the reduction of inequality. They also often have a mandate of implementing policies to improve the wellbeing and rights of specific population groups such as children, youth, the elderly, and persons with disabilities, among others. In this context ECLAC has developed an extensive analysis of the programmatic and institutional framework of social policies (and in particular of social protection systems) in order to promote their consolidation and coherence as key to improving the effectiveness of social development policies.

ECLAC has also been requested by governments of the region to further develop the analysis of the multiple manifestations of inequality and its effects. More specifically, several publications have addressed these aspects (The social inequality matrix in Latin America, and Institutional frameworks forsocial policy in Latin America and the Caribbean are examples from recent years). Also, several databases have been developed to provide stakeholders with extensive information on these aspects (socialpensions,conditional cash transfers,productive and employment inclusion programmes, socialinstitutions and a Youth Observatory). These information resources are available to governments and the general public through the Social Development Observatory of Latina America, which was launched in the context of the III Meeting of the Regional Conference on Social Development in Latin America and the Caribbean (October 2019).

Since 2016, ECLAC has been supporting the governments of the region in the application of the Montevideo Strategy for the Implementation of the Regional Gender Agenda within the Sustainable Development Framework by 2030 approved at the XIII Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean. The Montevideo Strategy is a tool that allows countries to move from the commitments of the Regional Gender Agenda to action and seeks to accelerate the implementation of the 2030 Agenda from a perspective of human rights and women's autonomy. It complements the means of implementation of the 2030 Agenda with commitments at the national, regional and international levels in terms of financing, cooperation, technology, institutional architecture, among others.

Moreover, ECLAC has offered technical assistance to the Government of Costa Rica in the elaboration of the National Bioeconomy Strategy, which provides a framework for the implementation of SDGs and supports Costa Rica’s National Decarbonization Plan.

Furthermore, ECLAC has implemented several activities to support the mainstreaming of the SDGs, in particular SDG 7 to support the development of policies and plans based on evidence. These activities were implemented under the umbrella of the Regional Observatory on Sustainable Energy project, a Development account initiative. The activities took the form of workshops, trainings, capacity building activities and technical assistance. A regional workshop was held in Panama to this effect in which more than 15 official member states representatives participated. The main goal was to create awareness about the importance to track SDG 7 and how the different SDG 7 indicators can be used to develop better plans

and policies. Furthermore, national trainings and capacity building activities in Argentina, Bolivia, Cuba, Guyana, Panama, and Uruguay were also focus on supporting the mainstreaming of the SDG 7.

Moreover, ECLAC is implementing a Development Account project on “Strengthening institutional frameworks in the Caribbean for an integrative approach to implement the 2030 Agenda and the SIDS Sustainable Development Agenda”. Through this project, beneficiary countries are receiving support to improve their capacities to design and implement evidence-based development planning and be better positioned to review and follow-up on the implementation of the 2030 Agenda. Proposed activities include technical assessments and a series of training workshops on evidence-based approaches to national development planning and monitoring and evaluation methodologies. The project is currently being implemented through a stakeholders’ engagement strategy that puts national ownership as the basis of project implementation and that focuses on policymakers, development planners and statisticians as key stakeholders. The project is being implemented by ECLAC, in collaboration with the Small Island Developing States (SIDS) Unit of Division of Sustainable Development (DSD), Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA).

In this context, several initiatives have been undertaken:

  • Dominica received technical assistance in the integration and alignment of the country’s Sectoral Strategic Plans with the long-term national development plan (The National Resilient Development Strategy 2018-2030) and the Sensitization workshops were conducted on the 2030 Agenda and the SIDS Agenda, as well as on the status of SDG implementation in Dominica. The workshops were held in collaboration with the Ministry of Planning, Economic Development and Investment, Commonwealth of Dominica and was attended by all Government Ministries.
  • ECLAC, in collaboration with other UN agencies, held a MAPS (Mainstreaming, Acceleration, and Policy Support) mission in Saint Lucia in May 2019, which contributed to the preparation of an SDG Roadmap for Saint Lucia. Technical Assistance was also provided in the preparation of the country’s first VNR to the High-level Political Forum on Sustainable

Finally, progress is recorded in the region in the formalization of institutional arrangements for SDG implementation, mainstreaming the SDGs, and in building national ownership of the global agenda. This was largely facilitated by a German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ)- German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ) funded project on “Planning for the Implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in Latin America and the Caribbean.” Through this project, Aruba, the Bahamas, the British Virgin Islands, Grenada, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Sint Maarten received technical assistance in the establishment of an institutional framework for SDG implementation and the integration of the SDGs in their national development planning processes. ECLAC’s support to Member States in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda is provided through capacity development, with particular regard for strengthening statistical capacities to support the follow-up and review process of the 2030 Agenda, strengthening ICT, knowledge

management and exchange, the development of tools, including the development of a template for implementing an institutional framework for SDG implementation, and technical cooperation support to mainstream the 2030 Agenda into national planning instruments, policies, strategies and financial frameworks, in collaboration with the wider UN system.

3.2 Mainstreaming the SDGs in sectoral strategies, including specific SDG/target strategies;

Social Development (SDGs 1, 8 and 10)

ECLAC provides technical assistance in social matters, as requested by governments, on a number of topics directly linked to the achievement of the 2030 Agenda, especially the SDG’s 1, 8 and 10. Currently the main subjects addressed are social protection (Chile, Dominican Republic, Haiti, and Paraguay), malnutrition, child labour (Chile, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Jamaica, Mexico) and the rights of persons with disabilities (Argentina, Ecuador and Peru). An overview of ECLAC’s contribution to the analysis and policy recommendations regarding social protection particularly relevant to SDG’s 1 and 10 can be found in the publication Universal Social Protection in Latin America and the Caribbean: selected texts 2006-2019. Some specific topics in which ECLAC conducts technical assistance and data capacity building related to the SDGs are education (Educação e capacitação técnica e profissional no Brasil), disability, child labour, and child poverty. A recent example is the synthesis document of the First Regional Discussion session In the path toward equality: 30 years on after the Convention on the Rights of the Child (En la Ruta de la

 Igualdad”: 30 años de la Convención sobre los Derechos del Niño).

Quality education (SDG 4)

A document was also published on “Financiamiento de la enseñanza y la educación y formación técnica y profesional en América Latina y el Caribe” (2019) which is related to the SDGs 4 within the framework of the cooperation program between ECLAC and the Government of Norway on vocational education and training for greater equality in Latin America and the Caribbean (Vocational Education and Training for Greater Equality in Latin America and the Caribbean). The purpose of this document is to examine the initial financing for education and technical and vocational education and training in Latin America and the Caribbean —which is defined as the resources derived directly from governments, households, and businesses— in order to support the formulation of a financing framework for technical and vocational education and training for the region.

Gender Equality (SDG 5)

ECLAC is working on mainstreaming the gender equality perspective in financial and trade policies with different countries in Latin America and the Caribbean. In the area of gender gaps in the financial system, ECLAC supports the production of data to identify gender gaps in access and use of products and services

of the financial system in Chile, Guatemala and Costa Rica (targets 5.a, 8.10). In the area of gender and trade, several technical assistances were held in different countries including Chile, Peru, El Salvador and Uruguay. In addition, ECLAC made available every year the Course "Development planning with a gender perspective” and organized the subregional preparatory meeting for the XIV Regional Conference on Women and a workshop on mainstreaming the gender perspective in planning for sustainable development (June 2019, Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago). A document on planning with a gender perspective in the Caribbean was also produced.

Clean Water and Sanitation (SDG 6)

During the Regional Forum on Sustainable Development (2019) ECLAC co-organized with UNESCO a side- event on SDG 6 to highlight the multi-sectoral importance of water management mainstreaming the problems that countries in Latin America and the Caribbean would face.

A Symposium on Mainstreaming Gender in Water Resources Management, Climate Change and Disaster Risk Reduction Policies in the Caribbean was organized by ECLAC in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, in November 2019, in collaboration with UNDESA and CARICOM, where research on the topic was presented and discussed. The meeting served as an opportunity to provide support to address environmental issues, including in CARICOM’s draft gender equality strategy.

Affordable and Clean Energy (SDG7)

All the activities carried out under the umbrella of the Regional Observatory on Sustainable Energy (ROSE) project aim the promotion and mainstreaming of the SDG 7 for the entire energy sector, meaning the transportation, electricity, industry and commerce. ECLAC stress the urgency for the adoption of Energy Efficiency measurements as the first steps towards a decarbonization of our global economy. Furthermore, ECLAC through the Regional Observatory on Sustainable Energy is continuously including specific strategies to speed up the adoption of renewable and sustainable energy technologies in the LAC region. With this objective, a series of regional workshops have been held in Panama and Peru, along with technical assistance in different countries of the region (Argentina, Bolivia, Cuba, Guyana, Panama and Uruguay). Finally, a series of technical trainings on energy efficiency were held in the Caribbean region, the countries developed their own baseline and a national report for each country (Barbados, Guyana, St. Lucia, and Trinidad and Tobago). These activities were kindly supported by a Development Account project ROSE, GIZ and French Cooperation.

Decent work and economic growth (SDG 8)

In 2019 ECLAC launched the Economic Survey of Latin America and the Caribbean 2019 which examines the changes in the international financial system following the global financial crisis of 2007–2008. The changes observed are in response to, inter alia, the impact this crisis had on the structure and functioning of the global financial system, as well as quantitative easing policies implemented in developed countries

to address the effects of the crisis on the financial and real sectors of their economies. It is posited that the mechanisms of global financial intermediation have changed, leading to adjustments in the mechanisms by which financial impulses are transmitted from developed countries to developing economies, including the economies of Latin America and the Caribbean. Consequently, traditional macroeconomic indicators may prove insufficient when analysing possible external financial vulnerabilities to which the region is exposed. This outcome document is in line with SDGs 8, 9, and 10 regarding particularly targets 8.10, 9.3, 10.5 among others.

In the context of slow economic growth in Latin America, a key challenge for meeting the SDGs is the recovery of investment and growth. To that end, ECLAC has created knowledge and understanding among the region’s policymakers analysis of the cyclical behaviour of investment and its determinants at the macroeconomic and microeconomic levels with the aim to achieve sustainable and inclusive growth in line with the 2030 Agenda.

The 2018 Economic Survey of Latin America and the Caribbean analyses the dynamics of investment and its determinants, with a view to identifying the different variables on which public policy can act to influence the trajectory of investment. In line with SDGs 8 y 9, it provides an analysis of the cyclical behaviour of investment and its determinants at the macroeconomic and microeconomic levels, looking at economic activity, the domestic monetary policy rate, the external interest rate, commodity prices, the real exchange rate and a risk indicator. In addition, it offers a study of investment patterns in four countries in the region: Argentina, Chile, Colombia and Mexico and concludes that, for very open economies such as those of Latin America and the Caribbean, the performance of investment and growth is highly dependent on external conditions.

ECLAC is also mainstreaming the SDGs through initiatives related to financial inclusion, a project that focuses on analyzing the linkages between regional and national development banks in order to coordinate actions, strategies and financing mechanisms to target resources towards investments in projects related to an environmental big push; and a project focused on Costa Rica on the impact of replacing the current public transportation bus system with electric buses. This project has as gender component.

A book was published in 2018 on “La inclusión financiera para la inserción productiva y el papel de la banca de desarrollo”. The conception of financial inclusion as a productive development policy and the role of development banks in promoting financial inclusion through financial innovation are the two central ideas around which the different chapters of this article are articulated. book, which presents the results of the project of ECLAC "Financial inclusion of SMEs and innovation policies of development banking" (2016-2018). The different chapters of this book focus on the capacity of development banks to prepare instruments aimed at SMEs, something fundamental in Latin America and the Caribbean, since these firms are key actors in job creation and the productive structure of the region.

ECLAC has also worked extensively on issues related to SDG 8, specifically in aspects related to the future of work such informality, automatization and identification and anticipation of skills needs and publishes jointly with ILO bi-annual reports on key labour market topics for the region: recent editions examined the women labour market participation, the future of work, environmental sustainability and employment, labour market participation of older workers and the integration of migrants into labor markets, among others.

The ECLAC-ILO report on “Employment Situation in Latin America and the Caribbean: Evolution of and prospects for women’s labour participation in Latin America” (2019) is related to Gender equality as one of the most important elements of the SDGs that guide the work of all institutions of the United Nations system. As recognized by SDG 5 (achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls), gender equality is not only a fundamental human right, but a necessary foundation for a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable world. In particular, as discussed in this edition of the report prepared jointly by ECLAC and the International Labour Organization (ILO), equal access to the labour market by men and women does not necessarily mean equal rates of participation; rather, if rates of female labour participation are lower, it means ensuring that this is the result of genuine preferences and not of cultural conditions, expressions of unequal power among household members, market restrictions or other limiting factors.

The ECLAC-ILO report on “Employment Situation in Latin America and the Caribbean. The future of work in Latin America and the Caribbean: old and new forms of employment and challenges for labour regulation” (2019) analyses a specific issue that is extremely relevant to the relationship between new technologies and decent work. Digital platforms create new job opportunities both locally and in global digital markets. However, these new forms of work are often performed outside existing regulations, denying these workers legally established labour and social rights. A key question is this regard is whether these new forms of work are a new form of wage employment or independent work, or whether the regulatory framework should be adapted, since neither the rules on wage employment nor those on self- employment adequately reflect the characteristics of these jobs.

Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure (SDG 9)

Other activity carried out by ECLAC to mainstream the SDGs in sectoral strategies was a technical assistance to the Office of Environmental and Social Affairs (OAAS) of the Ministry of Mines and Energy of Colombia, during July-August 2019, with the aim of contributing with inputs, experiences and good practices for the preparation of the diagnosis and design of the gender mainstreaming strategy for the country's mining and energy sector, which is part of the “National Strategy for Human Rights and International Humanitarian Law 2014-2034” of Colombia, and it is focused on support the efforts to reach SDG 5. The assistance included a presentation (webinar) from Santiago (Chile) and a series of interviews and meetings with key actors, from all sectors at the national level in Bogotá (Colombia). Based on these activities, a report was prepared and delivered to the counterpart (OAAS). It is noteworthy that this

technical assistance was carried out in close collaboration between GIZ and ECLAC, highlighting the support of GIZ for the hiring of an expert consultant on the subject.

Life on Land (SDG 15)

Also, ECLAC has been carrying out technical assistance missions on the design of the national strategy of Bioeconomy in Costa Rica, Uruguay and Argentina. The bioeconomy is an ongoing process in Latin America and the Caribbean. There are legal, institutional and policy frameworks linked to the bioeconomy, as well as pioneering business experiences in areas such as bioenergy, biotechnology and the sustainable use of biodiversity. Despite these advances, currently no country in the region has a dedicated strategy for the promotion and development of the bioeconomy. Routes have been identified for the development of the bioeconomy with a regional vision, and there are ongoing processes in several countries aimed at the design of national and sub-national strategies, for example, in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador and Uruguay. The document “Towards a sustainable bioeconomy in Latin America and theCaribbean” prepared by ECLAC serves as a frame of reference to guide the development of national strategies of Bioeconomy in countries of the region. A strategic framework is proposed based on four pillars: a) the 2030 Agenda; b) the Paris Agreement on Climate Change and individual country commitments expressed in their nationally determined contributions; c) social inclusion and territorial development; and d) innovation and productive diversification for decarbonization. The document identifies key structural factors for the development of bioeconomy strategies, with the common goal of moving towards sustainability. The document also identifies limitations, needs, opportunities and precautions to be considered in the development of such strategies.

Partnerships for the goals (SDG 17)

To overcome the shortcomings of the income per capita as an ODA allocation approach, ECLAC has proposed a new perspective that can be complementary which we call the Structural Gap Approach. This approach identifies key structural obstacles that are holding back sustained, equitable and inclusive growth for middle income countries. It includes 12 additional indicators in terms of inequality and poverty, investment and saving, productivity and innovation, infrastructure, education, health, taxation, gender and the environment. In this context, ECLAC provided technical assistance to Costa Rica and worked with several of its ministries to draft the report Structural gap Approach. An analysis of the case of Costa Rica (LC/L.42765) was presented at a formal launch with key government officials. The document was coordinated by ECLAC and the Ministries of Planning and Foreign Relations of Costa Rica. ECLAC is still working on this approach in order to produce new evidence on the evolution of structural gaps in the region for middle-income countries, the relationship between per capita income and structural gaps as well as on the impacts on graduation costs and international cooperation.

ECLAC’s Debt for Climate Adaptation Swap initiative and the proposal for the creation of a Caribbean Resilience Fund is also part of the efforts ECLAC is conducting as part of a debt alleviation strategy which

may support small island economies in the Caribbean in leveraging resources to finance sustainable development;

3.3 Supporting the strengthening of national institutions for more integrated solutions;

ECLAC continues to support capacity development to its member states and associate members to better address interlinkages, synergies and trade-offs between the SDGs and targets through a whole-of- government approach that can bring about transformative change in governance and public policy and ensure policy coherence for sustainable development. In addition, ECLAC promotes integrated national development planning to support the implementation of the SDGs, through technical cooperation support in mainstreaming the SDGs in national development planning and consideration of a coordinated approach to planning, implementation, follow-up and review of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in the region, including through the strengthening of national institutional infrastructure and by establishing a common statistical platform for measuring progress in SDG implementation across the region.

At the III Meeting of the Regional Conference on Social Development in Latin America and the Caribbean held in October 2019, governments adopted the Regional Agenda for Inclusive Social Development (RAISD), whose main objective is to accelerate progress towards the achievement of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Previously, ECLAC had conducted a number of consultations and debates with governments through their Social Development Ministries (or other equivalent entities) in order to define a Regional Agenda adapted to the specific poverty, inequality and social development challenges in the region. Such technical and policy instrument seeks to orient social policy design to align with the 2030 Agenda and the principle of leaving no one behind through the adoption of normative principles such as that of “universalism sensitive to differences”. It also takes into account the regional agreements and commitments related to social development already adopted by countries at the regional and subregional levels. The RAISD encompasses four main axis (universal and comprehensive social protection systems, social and labour inclusion, a strengthened social institutional framework and regional cooperation), all of which are closely related to the SDGs, as analysed on the reference document “Proposed regionalagenda for inclusive social development: linkages with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development”. Each axis includes specific lines of action to orient policy design.

During the preparatory process (2019) for the XIV Session of the Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean, various activities were carried out with the Governments, civil society and the Agencies, Funds and Programs of the United Nations System to align efforts in the implementation of the Regional Agenda Gender and the SDGs. In the first half of 2019, ECLAC accompanied governments in

the preparation of their national reports on the implementation of the Montevideo Strategy and the review of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (Beijing + 25):

With regards to SDG 7, ECLAC has also implemented technical assistance activities in Argentina, Bolivia, Cuba, Guyana, Panama, Barbados, Guyana, St. Lucia, Trinidad and Tobago and Uruguay, aiming the strengthening of the Energy and Energy Efficiency National agencies. The activities were implemented under the Regional Observatory on Sustainable Energy umbrella in alliance with the French Environment and Energy Management Agency as the main technical partner.

In the Caribbean, ECLAC has implemented a series of activities to support policy coherence and the integration of SDGs in development plans, which include:

  • A Learning Conference on Implementing the 2030 Agenda in the Caribbean Region, in collaboration with UNITAR and UNDESA, held in May 2019 in Trinidad and
  • A Regional Workshop on Integrated Policies and Policy Coherence for the SDGs, in collaboration with UNITAR and UNDESA, held in November 2019 in Trinidad and
  • A Development Account project on “Strengthening institutional frameworks in the Caribbean for an integrative approach to implement the 2030 Agenda and the SIDS Sustainable Development Agenda”.

3.4 Data and statistical capacity building;

ECLAC is also leveraging its close partnerships with countries, international organizations, regional organizations and donors to create regional statistical goods to support countries in mainstreaming of SDGs in their sectoral strategies.

The Statistical Conference of the Americas celebrated 19 years after its creation and has become a crucial pillar for the statistical development of Latin American and Caribbean countries due to its countless roles, which includes to be the proper institutional space to define the region representatives at the global mechanisms involved in the Sustainable Development Goals statistical monitoring process like the Inter- agency Expert Group on SDG indicators (IAEG-SDG) and the High Level Group on Partnership, Coordination

and Capacity-Building for statistics for the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (HLG-PCCB) . These ten countries who represents the region at global level, constitute the Statistical Coordination Group for the 2030 Agenda in Latin America and the Caribbean with ECLAC as Technical Secretary. The aim of this Group is to coordinate the process of preparing and implementing regional indicators and to build relevant capacities, as part of the follow-up to the Sustainable Development Goals in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The established of the Group responds to the request of the Member States of the Statistical Conference of the Americas of ECLAC to define a new governance scheme for generate a regional plan of implementation to permit gradually cover the information requirements derived from the 2030 Agenda in the region.

During these years the Group focused its work on the diagnosis of national statistical capacities to produce the SDG indicators of the global framework and on the identification of a prioritized set of indicators for the monitoring of the SDG in Latin America and the Caribbean.

In 2019 the Statistical Conference of the Americas approved the results of the review of the prioritized indicators for the region done by the Group1 regarding the methodological refinements requested by the Executive Committee in 2018. This process resulted in a set of 150 prioritized indicators which constitutes the regional perspective for the statistical monitoring processes in Latin America and the Caribbean. This approach considered several current statistical monitoring schemes defined at other regional, subregional and sectoral instances which operates in the regional.

Also, during its tenth meeting (19-21 November 2019) in Santiago, Chile countries agreed on the need to seek a collaborative regional response to the demand for official statistics that support the formulation of policies with an empirical basis that contributes to improving the organization and management of national statistical systems, within the framework of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. This meeting included a joint working session with the Regional Committee of the United Nations Global Geospatial Information Management for the Americas (UN-GGIM: Americas), which led to the adoption of the “Declaration on the integration of geospatial and statistical information”, to support mechanisms and initiatives to strengthen cooperation, the exchange of good practices and the transfer of knowledge for the integration of statistical and geospatial information for SDGs.

One of the most relevant achievements in data and statistics for SDGs was the development of the statistical section of the Regional Knowledge Management Platform, the SDG Gateway, which offers a lot of information about institutional aspects, data, metadata and methodological documents on the three

1 (2019) Tenth meeting of the Statistical Conference of the Americas of the ECLAC, Santiago, Report on the activities of the Statistical Coordination Group on the 2030 Agenda for Latin America and the Caribbean https://repositorio.cepal.org/bitstream/handle/11362/44933/S1900923_en.pdf.

dimensions of the Agenda: global, regional and national. Institutional architecture, statistical data banks, dashboards to facilitate data access, regional and national statistical profiles, statistical reports and national statistical SDG platforms are available for the audience in an easy- friendly and graphical way.

One specific component that is very important to note is the information system on the support and technical cooperation activities done by the UN System organisms in the region to improve statistical capacities at national level.

This Information System is a planning and reporting tool on the activities carried out by the international organizations to support National Statistical Systems on SDG indicators monitoring and reporting in Latin America and the Caribbean region. It was developed by ECLAC, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UNWomen) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) as representatives of the regional statistical coordination mechanism for Latin America and the Caribbean for the United Nations funds, programmes and specialized agencies. The system provides three types of information:

  • Activities aiming at improving the measurement, use and dissemination of the SDG indicators (by country, indicator or international organization).
  • Activities aiming at improving and implementing data collection operations (by country, operation or international organization).
  • Activities aiming at implementing or improving different mechanisms for institutional strengthening of National Statistical Systems (by country, area and international organization).

The information available allows the user to consult reports by indictor, UN entity, country or statistical operation on activities carried out in the region. This tool is very relevant to plan any capacity building action to be implemented in the region because it allows seeing in a quick and visual way which are the goals or areas which need more attention or improvement to cooperate.

In the area of environment statistics, several countries committed to preparing national plans for the development of their environmental statistics that allow the construction of indicators related to water, energy, natural resources, biodiversity, oceans, climate change and disasters, and thus provide evidence- based monitoring of important aspects of the environmental pillar of the Agenda 2030 and its national policies. Further to its launch in December 2017, the Regional Network of Environmental Statistics for Latin America and the Caribbean gathers now more than 150 practitioners and plays an important role of informal collaborative space for integration and institutional and technical strengthening in the region through the delivery of three regional webinars. Also, through the collaboration with several counterparts, actions have been taken to help the region build relevant disaster indicators to address climate change adaptation and achieve sustainable development.

The Division published a methodological guideline on the measurement of income, as a reference for national statistical offices and the academic community. It also put forward a new protocol for access to databases of household surveys, allowing a better use of one of the main sources of information available for research and analysis by within ECLAC. Technical assistance missions to several countries led to specific improvements in their household surveys, in areas such as stratification of survey sampling frames, imputation of survey non-response and redesign of household survey systems which facilitate the production of SDG indicators.

Efforts have been undertaken by the Division to expand the thematic areas and increase the availability of methodological tools, to provide better support to the countries of the region. Examples of this are the activities undertaken in the area of legal frameworks for the production of official statistics, as well as on “small-area estimation techniques", to help meet the demands for data disaggregation for SDGs.

In addition, the Division has focused on the integration of statistical and geospatial information. A diagnostic of the state of integration at the national level was produced and presented at the Forum of the Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean on Sustainable Development, and technical assistance

has been provided to several countries, resulting in a better articulation among the relevant national counterparts.

Several activities were carried out by ECLAC at national level to improve the production of SDG indicators. Technical missions on the calculation of the indicators but also on the review and improvement of the statistical operations to produce the basic data por its calculation are part of the permanent and current activities implemented during 2019. These activities include especial emphasis on household surveys, small area estimation technic to produced disaggregated data, use of administrative records for official statistics production, use of geospatial information and satellite images for specific SDG indicators, mainly referred to the environmental ones, among others.

Workshops have been implemented in the strengthening of statistical institutions around the generation of SDG indicators at the national level, providing a comprehensive regional perspective of the statistical monitoring of the 2030 Agenda. National, subregional and regional workshops on selected topics or goals, institutional arrangements to implement national data strategy, geospatial infrastructure to support the monitoring and new technological approaches and uses of international standards like SDMX, were prioritized for the support of the Member States in the production of data for SDGs.

Most of these activities were implemented in cooperation with UN Statistics Division and with statistical counterparts of the UN Agencies, Funds and Programmes in the region.

Furthermore, ECLAC works in a sustained manner in three areas to mainstream the gender approach in official statistical production to monitor the 2030 Agenda and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals:

  • At the country level: through technical assistance as well as by face-to-face and virtual courses. In addition, by producing analysis documents on the capacity of the indicators proposed at the global, regional and local levels to measure the goals set out in the SDGs, and the strengths and weaknesses that countries have in the production of indicators that allow informing public to ensure that “no one is left behind”.
  • At the regional level: by participating in the Statistical Conference of the Americas as the technical secretariat of the Gender Statistics Working Group (now a community of practice) guaranteeing the incorporation of a gender perspective in the regional follow-up of the 2030 Agenda, in synergy with the commitments of the Regional Gender
  • At the global level: with active participation in the IAEG-GS (Inter-agency and Expert Group on Gender Statistics).

As for the production of gender statistics and indicators, ECLAC calculates the globally defined indicator for monitoring target 5.4 (5.4.1 Proportion of time spent on unpaid domestic and care work, disaggregated by sex, age and location) and delivers it to the United Nations Statistics Division (custodians

of this indicator) for dissemination in the global database. In addition, ECLAC in synergy with UN Women (Custodian Agency) compiles at the regional level indicator 5.5.1 Proportion of seats held by women in local governments for dissemination in the global database. In addition, the Gender Equality Observatory compiles and disseminates the indicator of femicide, which is part of the regional framework for monitoring.

Concerning to the support for member countries of the region in data and statistical capacity building, the main core of the Regional Observatory on Sustainable Energy (ROSE) project is to support the entire region in the development of new energy data and strengthen the national capabilities to implement new indicators and develop policies based on evidence. Currently, a new set of regional and national energy efficiency indicator per sector has been developed. In addition, under the ROSE project and in partnership with OLADE, IDB and ECLAC, several indicators to assess the impact of access to energy services in the population of the region are being investigated. Furthermore, ECLAC is leading the Energy Poverty analysis and the development of new data and indicators, creating new capacities for the entire region.

Also, the South-South Cooperation between Chile and Peru that is being facilitated through the technical assistance of the Chilean Copper Commission (COCHILCO) to the Ministry of Energy and Mines (MINEM) of Peru for the methodological exchange of statistics on the use of water and energy in the exploitation of copper, which can be the basis for the construction of sustainability indicators in mining. This technical assistance has consisted of workshops in both countries and it is still in course. In parallel, based on the Peruvian experience in gold exploitation, the cooperation aims to adapt the methodology for this metal in Chile (SDGs 6 and 7).

A "Workshop on sustainability indicators in mining" was held on June 2019, in Santiago (Chile), with the aim of learning, sharing and discussing international and regional experiences in the development of sustainability indicators in mining and, through the exchange, providing inputs for research, technical assistance and south-south cooperation, on the implementation of sustainability indicators in mining policy and management programs (SDG 12). Officials from the following institutions participated: Secretariat of Mining Policy of Argentina, IRMA, IISD, Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment, CODELCO of Chile, NRGI, COCHILCO of Chile, Universidad del Valle de Colombia, Vice-Ministry of Mining of Ecuador, Ministry of Energy and Mines of Peru, Catholic University of Peru, Ministry of Mining and Metallurgy of Bolivia (Pl. St. of), CIS of Bolivia (Pl. St. of), expert consultants on the subject, GIZ, BGR and ECLAC.

ECLAC has a long-term relationship with the OECD, CIAT and the IADB that produces the definitive collection of tax revenue statistics in the region (Revenue Statistics in Latin America and the Caribbean). This database, and its accompanying annual report, provide countries with internationally comparable statistics. This multi-stakeholder partnership has also worked closely with countries to improve data dissemination and classification (particularly in tax instruments related to income).

ECLAC’s work is also ongoing in the area of public expenditure statistics in the region in the framework of the Facility for Development in Transition financed by the European Union. ECLAC is constructing a unique regional database of functional public expenditure, using internationally adopted statistical conventions. This database will allow policymakers to conduct cross-country analysis of the intentionality of public spending in the region with the aim of supporting the formulation of national strategies to achieve the SDGs.

As part of the same collaboration, ECLAC and the OECD are piloting a methodology developed by the OECD (SOCX) to measure social expenditure at the programmatic level in Latin America and the Caribbean. Ten countries were included in the first wave of this project: Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Peru, Trinidad and Tobago and Uruguay. Officials from the Federal Treasury of Brazil and of the National Statistics Institute of Colombia received capacity building support as part of this project and will publish SOCX data on an ongoing basis.

Moreover, ECLAC has sought to provide policymakers with data, cross-country/regional analysis, and policy options to tackle aspects of SDGs 10 and 17. ECLAC has also produced estimates of illicit financial flows (IFFs) due to the manipulation of international trade prices for the region, in line with the mandate included in the Addis Ababa Action Agenda. ECLAC’s analysis and policy advocacy for improving the region’s tax structure to achieve greater equality has resonated in the region and has become a leitmotif in recent reforms.

Furthermore, it is necessary to provide resources for improving the quality of census, surveys and vital statistics, as well as for training on the use and analysis of these information sources. In response to the demands of the countries of the region, and using new technologies, a new training course on demography (Extension Course in Demographic Analysis) was developed by ECLAC to strengthen the theoretical-technical capacities for the production and analysis of demographic information in the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, with special attention to the processes of evaluation of population data, estimates and projections. This course follows a strategy to expand demographic training, and includes nine thematic modules considering elements linked to the 2030 Agenda. It will be offered for the first time in 2020.

Also, the timeframe of the 2030 Agenda coincides with the beginning of the 2020 round of census. Therefore, the censuses constitute a main source to define the baselines for monitoring the indicators and recording the progress towards the implementation of the 2030 Agenda, as well as the Montevideo Consensus. It is key to increase the efforts to maximize the benefits of census operations. Given the central role of technological innovations for improving census coverage, quality and opportunity, this topic has been at the center of the activities, both through technical assistance to countries and regional meetings with broad participation. In addition, a working agenda have been developed with the countries for the discussion of emerging census contents to be considered in the 2020 round, in line with the new realities

and social demands of the region such as new types of family arrangements, citizenship, information and communication technologies, disability, indigenous peoples, afro-descendants populations, daily mobility and sexual orientation and gender identity. ECLAC has provided training in demographic analysis, support for census taking and technical assistance on population subjects, including population estimates and projections. These actions have included gender and ethnic perspective, for example, training courses to indigenous women and technical assistance for the inclusion of gender perspective in population census and persons with disabilities. Technical assistance activities regarding population and housing censuses were carried out mainly in Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Panama and Paraguay. These covered different areas of the census process, including cartography, definition of the questionnaire and dialogue with users, processing, evaluation, training in the use and analysis of information, and as a derivative, the preparation of estimates and population projections. In particular, with more than 10 face-to-face missions in 2019 and systematic distance support, Guatemala successfully completed its census after 16 years.

Moreover, ECLAC in partnership with national universities, governmental agencies and regional organizations, has conducted training activities focused on several topics including indirect methods of fertility and mortality estimation, production and use of indicators for policies and programmes, including capacity-building for indigenous and afro-descendants’ organizations, care and ageing, migration, use of REDATAM, adolescent maternity, population prospects and national transfers accounts.

Support to strengthen Caribbean countries’ statistical capacities includes subregional cooperation with research, and support to statistical capacity-building in Caribbean SIDS, to address the gaps in data on the SDGs in order to allow countries to provide high-quality, timely, reliable, disaggregated data and statistics and to fully integrate the SDGs in monitoring and reporting systems. Recent examples of such activities include the review of Caribbean national statistical legislation, research on Caribbean census microdata dissemination, as well as support to Caribbean SIDS in the development of relevant climate change and disasters indicators for evidence-based policies.

In addition, ECLAC’s support to the countries in the Caribbean includes census support, capacity building, research, technical cooperation and knowledge exchange. For example, in preparation for the 2020 round of censuses, ECLAC collaborated with UNFPA and CARICOM to organize a regional workshop on strengthening statistical capacity for census and SDGs in the Caribbean. The event was attended by participants from over 20 Caribbean countries and territories. In addition, ECLAC provided technical assistance to the governments of Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, in census data dissemination online using REDATAM, a friendly and interactive computer system that facilitates the processing, analysis and web dissemination of information from population censuses, surveys, administrative records, national/regional indicators and any other sources. Furthermore, a workshop on national statistical systems was organized for public sector officials in

support of the planned transformation of the Central Statistical Office to the National Statistical Institute of Trinidad and Tobago.

ECLAC is currently implementing two key projects in this area:

  • “Strengthening institutional frameworks in the Caribbean for an integrative approach to implement the 2030 Agenda and the SIDS Sustainable Development Agenda”, in six Caribbean countries (Aruba, the Bahamas, British Virgin Islands, Grenada, Guyana, and Sint Maarten). This project addresses the institutional and capacity needs of the beneficiary countries’ National Statistical System to produce data to support evidence-based policy planning and for the SDG indicators. Activities under this project include assessment of the legal, institutional and organizational environment for the production of official statistics in beneficiary countries, meetings of data producers in each country to address obstacles to the production and dissemination of official statistics, and meetings of stakeholders in the public and private sectors, including civil society, youth and women organizations, to address the production of data for SDG indicators in each
  • “Caribbean SIDS relevant climate change and disasters indicators for evidence-based policies” is being implemented in partnership with UNDRR, UNEP, FAO and UNSD. The project aims to promote improved capacity among national climate change and disaster risk reduction stakeholders to produce, sustain, disseminate and use relevant internationally agreed climate change and disaster risk reduction indicators and its underlying

ECLAC has also participated in the United Nations System-DANE (Colombia’s National Statistics Directorate) working group on SDG, since its creation in 2016, and ECLAC members actively participate in the committee currently revising the multidimensional poverty index.

3.5 Harnessing science, technology and innovation for the SDGs;

ECLAC continues to place a central role in ICT and knowledge management solutions for the region through research, capacity-building initiatives, support to innovation and technologies towards advancing the Sustainable Development Goals, having provided specific initiatives aiming at leaving no one behind, targeting youth, women and persons with disabilities. With the Cartagena Declaration adopted in the framework of the Sixth Ministerial Conference on the Information Society of Latin America and the Caribbean (April 2018 in Colombia), the countries of the region approved the eLAC 2020 Digital Agenda, which seeks regional cooperation to continue moving forward on inclusion, the digitalization of production, skills development among the population, as well the promotion of open government and governance that stimulates collaboration between countries. In 2020, the Preparatory Meeting leading up to the Seventh Ministerial Conference will take place. Also, ECLAC has conducted research on “Strengthening ICT and knowledge management capacity in support of the sustainable development of multi-island Caribbean SIDS”. Issues related to oceans, marine resources management and Science, Technology and Innovation are being gradually more central into the subprogramme of work. The latest edition of the Caribbean Outlook provides focus on the topic, which will also be key to the discussions at the CDCC upcoming meetings. The areas of gender, education and blue economies have been given special attention. Capacity development was promoted through a training session on increasing access to technology for Persons with Disabilities. Participants included Universal service funds (USFs) administrators and organisations working with PWDs in English-speaking CDCC Member Countries with USFs, namely Dominica, Grenada, Jamaica, Saint Lucia, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and Trinidad and Tobago.

3.6 Multi-stakeholder partnerships;

During the first day dedicated to agriculture, livestock and forestry at COP 25, on December 5th 2019, ECLAC and the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) participated in the launch of the Platform for Climate Action in Agriculture (PLACA). The initiative, led by the Government of Chile, is a platform for voluntary adherence that the Ministers of Agriculture of Argentina, Bahamas, Brazil, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Peru and Uruguay already signed at COP 25. The governments of Ecuador, Mexico and the Dominican Republic also joined and the remaining countries are expected to respond shortly to the invitation to join the Platform. ECLAC and FAO are part of the Technical Secretariat of the Platform, and have the role of support and technical assistance to countries that require it, especially in enhancing the positive links between sustainable agriculture, food security and climate action, and its centrality in achieving the SDGs.

The objective of PLACA is to coordinate and promote actions aimed at the formulation and implementation of joint solutions in the agriculture sector, to act in line with the new climate scenario. Climate action in agriculture means solutions based on nature, bioeconomy, articulation with the agendas of other related conventions such as the biological diversity and desertification conventions, and science- policy dialogue. Bringing these and other emerging issues to PLACA is a task in which ECLAC and FAO have been acting as part of their role as Technical Secretariat.

Furthermore, ECLAC serves at Secretariat of the Regional Agreement on Access to Information, Public Participation and Justice in Environmental Matters in Latin America and the Caribbean, known as the Escazú Agreement. Adopted on 4 March 2018, at Escazú, Costa Rica, the Agreement is the first binding treaty on environmental matters of the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, the only one stemming from the Rio Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20) and the only in the world to include specific provisions to ensure a safe and enabling environment for environmental human rights

defenders. The Agreement also puts an emphasis on persons and groups in vulnerable situations with specific obligations to overcome barriers in the exercise of their rights.

The Escazú Agreement puts Principle 10 of the Rio Declaration into practice and offers an unparalleled platform to strengthen the implementation of Multilateral Environmental Agreements in the region (for example, article 6 of UNFCCC and 12 of the Paris Agreement). It is also crucial to pool efforts for engaging the public effectively in decision making on environmental matters and respond to the many challenges faced by our region, from the degradation of the environment and ecosystems and the plundering of natural resources associated with today’s production and consumption dynamics, compounded by urban concentration, to social inclusion and equality and eradicating poverty. These challenges are being exacerbated by global challenges such as climate change that greatly impact the Latin America and the Caribbean region, particularly its vulnerable persons and groups. The Escazú Agreement was one of the four environmental treaties highlighted by the United Nations Secretary-General in 2019 in support of the 2030 Agenda on Sustainable Development.

The Escazú Agreement is embodied in all Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), contributing to the fulfilment of the United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda. In particular, SDG 16 promotes peaceful and inclusive societies, requires guaranteeing equal access to justice, effective, reliable and transparent institutions and the adoption of inclusive, participatory and representative decisions. It also calls to ensure public access to information and promote non-discriminatory laws and policies for sustainable development. Environmental democracy links human rights, the right to a healthy environment and public policy, making it fundamental to achieve the SDGs.

The process which concluded with the adoption of the binding Regional Agreement is an example of how the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean can, under a dialogue, progressive realization, cooperation and capacity-building, tackle common challenges and strengthen environmental governance to favour social and economic progress as well as environmental sustainability. Latin America and the Caribbean is writing a new chapter in the strengthening of environmental democracy.

The Agreement was open for signature of the 33 countries of Latin America and the Caribbean on 27 September 2018 at United Nations headquarters in New York, coinciding with the high-level segment of the General Assembly (moment after which it can also be ratified). To date it has been signed by 22 countries and ratified by 8. The Agreement will enter into force once ratified by at least 11 countries.

To showcase the link between the Escazú Agreement and the 2030 Agenda, a poster was produced and is available at: https://www.cepal.org/sites/default/files/infographic/files/19-00258d-afiche-ddsah_escazu_web.pdf

Furthermore, a regional assessment on the implementation of access rights and their role towards the achievement of sustainable development and the 2030 Agenda was also produced by ECLAC:

https://www.cepal.org/en/publications/43302-access-information-participation-and-justice-environmental-matters-latin-america

Specific training on environmental access rights and the relationship between Principle 10 and the SDGs and other international agreements (i.e. Paris Agreement on Climate Change and SDG 13) have been carried out during 2019 in Costa Rica, Saint Lucia and Guyana, at the request of their respective governments. During those technical sessions, government officials and representatives of civil society organizations were in participation, including members of women, youth and indigenous groups.

ECLAC is also the technical secretariat of the Caribbean Development and Cooperation Committee- Regional Coordination Mechanism (CDCC-RCM), established to promote effective implementation of the SIDS programme of action for sustainable development through enhanced regional engagement by the sharing of information and experiences among member States; and by shaping common positions and strategies on Caribbean SIDS sustainable development priorities.

In light of the firm commitment of the Caribbean countries to the implementation of Agenda 2030, ECLAC has made recommendations for a repositioned and revitalized CDCC-RCM. This proposed new mechanism would work to provide broad support for the implementation of both the Agenda 2030 and the SIDS sustainable development agenda. It is envisaged that the revised architecture and mandate of the CDCC- RCM will ensure that SIDS specific priorities are entrenched and consistently addressed within the national and regional sustainable development platforms of relevance to the Caribbean.

Finally, ECLAC supported the establishment of the Civil Society Participation Mechanism in the SustainableDevelopment Agenda and the Forum of the Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean on SustainableDevelopment, which aims at- among other things- to facilitate the participation of civil society in the Forum, as well as in other processes and agendas related to sustainable development and the 2030 Agenda; and coordinate the delivery of civil society inputs for political processes related to the sustainable development agenda in the region.

3.7 Bolstering local action and supporting sub-national plans/strategies and implementation for the SDGs;

Some of the main challenges faced by urban management in Latin American and the Caribbean come from the profound changes in urban population composition, the impact of urbanization on city-dwellers’ health and environment, the relationships between urban and rural areas and the increasingly important role of cities in wealth creation at the national level. In this context, ECLAC studies and offers recommendations for achieving sustainable development in urban areas and in areas of belonging, with a focus on sustainability, inclusivity and quality, aiming to promote constant improvement of urban infrastructure and equipment for the production, distribution and consumption of goods and services.

Within the framework of SDG 11 and the Subregional Action Plan for implementation of the NUA in the Caribbean, ECLAC and the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) agreed on a roadmap towards a Caribbean Strategy for Informal Settlements upgrading and inclusive urbanization, aiming to integrate coherent action for increased knowledge exchange and financing for sustainable urbanization.

In partnership with UN-Habitat, ECLAC jointly organized a roundtable debate entitled "Roadmap towards coherent regional strategies for knowledge exchange and financing upscaled slum upgrading in Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific", a virtual Caribbean dialogue session in April 2019, and a subregional policy dialogue workshop in June 2019, focusing on the implementation of SDG 11 in the Caribbean, “Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable”. Furthermore, research and study cases provided background material for a chapter published in 2019 on “Planning for Resilience in the Caribbean”, a contribution to the publication on “Planificación para el desarrollo sostenible territorial en América Latina y el Caribe”, as well as a policy brief on the same topic.

Also, ECLAC, in partnership with UN-Habitat, is preparing a training module on “Planning for resilience in the Caribbean” as part of the “Leaving No One Behind in the Caribbean” subregional workshop, focusing on policies on planning for sustainable territorial development, land markets, and access to affordable housing as an element of the ‘right to the city’ and as a practical way to address urbanisation in the context of small island developing States. This module will address the impacts of the absence of sustainable physical/territorial development planning on social inclusion in particular for the lowest-income and most vulnerable groups. Specific Caribbean disaster response and resilience building efforts will be debated, linking community resilience to DRR, climate change adaptation and adaptive social protection.

ECLAC is providing technical assistance to Saint Lucia in community development – in Castries - and a capacity building project targeting at-risk youth and local community development is underway.

ECLAC supports the implementation of the SDG 11 and the New Urban Agenda (NUA) in the Caribbean, including the follow-up of its Subregional Action Plan for implementation of the NUA in the Caribbean, notably through several activities in support to the development of a Caribbean strategy on informal settlements and the right to adequate housing, in collaboration with UN-Habitat. Further support to cities, local authorities and communities in pursuing the 2030 Agenda, included the collaboration to the launch of the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy in the Caribbean as well as technical cooperation in the area of community development;

ECLAC has conducted the project “Rural-Urban linkages for inclusive development in Colombia” in 2019 which seeks to strengthen and make public policy more inclusive through the identification and analysis of rural-urban linkages. This project relates directly to SDG 11, by contributing to the consolidation of

rural-urban dynamics that promote sustainable and balanced growth for both rural and urban areas, and in a tangential way it contributes to the following SDGs:

  • To end poverty (SDG 1): By fostering initiatives of rural-urban linkages that increase the income level of the population and improve their
  • Zero hunger (SDG 2): By nurturing rural-urban linkages that increase the efficiency of the production, distribution and consumption of food around the
  • Gender equality (SDG 5): By specifically involving women associations into the discussions around how to better built linkages that benefit everyone as well as recognizing and promoting women’s role to do
  • Clean water (SDG 6): By specifically involving organizations that fight to preserve water rights in the country into the discussion on how to better built linkages that benefit
  • Reduction of inequalities (SDG 10): By identifying the rural-urban inequalities in the territories and promoting rural-urban linkages as mechanisms to reduce these inequalities through public
  • Responsible consumption (SDG 12): By emphasizing sustainability as a key factor to be promoted through urban-rural
  • Climate action (SDG 13): By specifically involving organizations that fight to preserve the environment into the discussion on how to better built linkages that benefit everyone. Also, by identifying and strengthening environmental rural-urban linkages in the
  • Alliances (SDG 17): By opening spaces for meeting and discussion among national and local authorities, NGO representatives, scholars, experts, among others within the

ECLAC continues to support subnational governments in the region in the management of their fiscal accounts. Recent work has focused on means by which these governments can mobilize additional resources to finance sustainable development. In particular, ECLAC is working to strengthen taxation of property in the region through comparative policy analysis and the provision of technical assistance. For example, in December 2019 the Economic Development Division published “Options for retooling property taxation in Latin America”. In the same year, ECLAC provided technical assistance to the Ministry of Administration and Finance of the government of Mexico City to provide local authorities with a menu of policy options to bolster revenue mobilization. In particular, this work identified best practices in administrative processes and normative procedures in the region that could be implemented in the short- and medium-term.

Finally, ECLAC is working with some countries in the region to incorporate the gender approach for territorializing national development plans.

3.8 Leveraging interlinkages across SDG goals and targets;

ECLAC’s Institute for Economic and Social Planning (ILPES) works with governments of Latin America and the Caribbean to improve development plans and strategies in the region, makes available knowledge products such as the Regional Observatory on Planning for Development that facilitates the review and monitoring of progress made by countries in terms of integrating the 2030 Agenda into their planning systems. The Institute had also been tasked with producing a document on territorial development to address the challenges posed by the linkaging of policies, plans and processes regarding implementation and follow-up at different territorial scales and levels of government.

Regarding the work of the Regional Conference on Population and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean (a subsidiary body of ECLAC), the Montevideo Consensus, the most significant intergovernmental agreement in this sphere, complemented the 2030 Agenda on topics not sufficiently covered in the SDGs, such as ageing, international migration and indigenous and Afrodescendent populations. Accordingly, the indicators of the Consensus are instrumental for the follow-up to the 2030 Agenda through a regional lens. During the last session of the Conference, 25 countries presented voluntary national reports on progress made in this area, which served as a basis to produce the First regional report on the implementation of the Montevideo Consensus on Population and Development.

Moreover, ECLAC organized an internal capacity-building activity on the implications of climate change for gender equality in September 2019 in order to examine the interlinkages between SDG 5 and 13 in depth.

Further, to capacity development on policy coherence and integrated development planning offered to Caribbean Development and Cooperation Committee (CDCC) membership (16 members States and 8 associate members States), ECLAC prepared a generic template of institutional arrangement for Agenda 2030 implementation in the Caribbean aiming to promote a coordinated approach to its implementation.

Also, ECLAC has conducted the project “Rural-Urban linkages for inclusive development in Colombia” in 2019 which seeks to strengthen and make public policy more inclusive through the identification and analysis of rural-urban linkages. This project relates directly to SDG 11, by contributing to the consolidation of rural-urban dynamics that promote sustainable and balanced growth for both rural and urban areas, and in a tangential way it contributes to the following SDGs:

  • To end poverty (SDG 1): By fostering initiatives of rural-urban linkages that increase the income level of the population and improve their
  • Zero hunger (SDG 2): By nurturing rural-urban linkages that increase the efficiency of the production, distribution and consumption of food around the
  • Gender equality (SDG 5): By specifically involving women associations into the discussions around how to better built linkages that benefit everyone as well as recognizing and promoting women’s role to do
  • Clean water (SDG 6): By specifically involving organizations that fight to preserve water rights in the country into the discussion on how to better built linkages that benefit
  • Reduction of inequalities (SDG 10): By identifying the rural-urban inequalities in the territories and promoting rural-urban linkages as mechanisms to reduce these inequalities through public
  • Responsible consumption (SDG 12): By emphasizing sustainability as a key factor to be promoted through urban-rural
  • Climate action (SDG 13): By specifically involving organizations that fight to preserve the environment into the discussion on how to better built linkages that benefit everyone. Also, by identifying and strengthening environmental rural-urban linkages in the
  • Alliances (SDG 17): By opening spaces for meeting and discussion among national and local authorities, NGO representatives, scholars, experts, among others within the

Finally, ECLAC published the document “Towards a sustainable bioeconomy in Latin America andthe Caribbean: Elements for a regional vision”, emphasizing the potential of the bioeconomy as a framework for the implementation of Agenda 2030 and a study (in Spanish) on the linkages between Agenda 2030 and Sustainable Food Systems.

3.9 Supporting policies and strategies to leave no one behind;

ECLAC is working on initiatives related to SDG 8 of “Promoting sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all” through 3 cooperation programs. All activities involved in these programs aims at supporting selected Latin American countries to identify policy options to reduce labour informality, adjust labour regulations in order to cover emerging labour relations; adapt to new skills demands arising from technological change, enhance de

data production in order to cover new forms of work, improve the link between education and formation and labour market needs.

In Colombia, this work focused on supporting the process of the harmonization and unification of two separate occupational classifications that exist in the country, with the aim to improve research and public policies in the fields of identification of skills demand, as well as education and training. In Costa Rica, the government is pursuing a project to develop policies to improve the labour insertion of senior citizens. Costa Rica also received assistance in the analysis and interpretation of statistics generated from surveys of job positions in firms.

In the Dominican Republic ECLAC provided significant support to the Ministry of the Presidency in the formulation of policies aimed at providing universal health care, strengthening social protection of for those involved in accidents and assisting the unemployed. Technical assistance provided to the government of Ecuador resulted in the creation of a data product to analyze labour demand which the government plans to use to design, formulate and evaluate public policies.]

As part of the Facility for Development in Transition financed by the European Union, ECLAC is implementing a regional analysis of pension systems. This project seeks to provide insights into the structure of existing pension systems and their respective financing schemes. This work seeks to provide an analytical underpinning to support the expanding debate on pension reform.

It is also important to highlight again the work that ECLAC is undertaking in collaboration with the OECD in the framework of the Facility to produce comparable cross-country public expenditure statistics. This work seeks to assist countries in designing financing strategies for programmes that seek to ensure that no one is left behind.

ECLAC is also supporting the effective implementation of the Regional Agenda for Social Inclusive Development (RAISD), as an extended pillar for addressing the social dimension of Agenda 2030. The workshop on “Leaving No One Behind in the Caribbean: towards universal social protection” is being programmed, in partnership with ILO, UN-Habitat, CCRIF and Trinidad and Tobago’s MSDFS. To fully integrate the perspective of the Caribbean in the formulation of a RAISD, ECLAC included a review and consultation process in the Caribbean region, as well as Caribbean session at the meeting of the Presiding Officers of the Regional conference on Social Development (RCSD), approved at its Third Meeting in Mexico City (2019).

3.10 Supporting the mobilization of adequate and well-directed financing;

ECLAC has also produced significant analytical work related to the implementation of the 2030 Agenda in Latin America and the Caribbean, creating greater awareness of the Agenda in the region and policy

options for countries to consider in crafting nationally appropriate development strategies. A major topic of concern in recent years as related to the 2030 Agenda has been the challenge of generating sufficient resources to finance sustainable development.

The issue of financing for sustainable development has taken centre stage and, among the alternative funding sources, the accent has been placed on the mobilization of domestic resources. Among other obstacles encountered, the level of funding is below potential in most countries, not only because of flaws in the design and administration of taxes, but more particularly due to high levels of tax evasion —both domestic and international— and the prevalence of voluminous tax expenditures.

The 2018 Fiscal Panorama of Latin America and the Caribbean on public policy challenges in the framework of the 2030 Agenda, explores the debate that has surrounded fiscal policy challenges since the 2008-2009 crisis. The report proposes a new approach to the stabilization role of fiscal policy. In this regard, Latin America and the Caribbean needs to strengthen automatic stabilizers, examines ways to use public borrowing in context of globally low interest rates, and reformulates the role of public spending as a tool to bolster aggregate demand.

The 2019 Fiscal Panorama of Latin America and the Caribbean on tax policies for resource mobilization in the framework of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, examines the role of tax policy as a tool for driving progress towards achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. One way to strengthen collection is to address the challenges of taxing the rapidly growing digital economy. Tax policy can also be used to shift production and consumption patterns to encourage decarbonization of the economy and support improvements in public health. Lastly, the document analyses the constraints on domestic resource mobilization caused by fiscal incentives and how, effectively geared towards investment, these incentives could instead foster sustainable and inclusive development.

In that vein, a document was published in series Macroeconomics for Development on options for retooling property taxation in Latin America (2019) in the framework of the activities of the ECLAC project with the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID), “Territorial inequality, equalization transfers and asymmetric sharing of non-renewable natural resources in Latin America”. There is growing recognition that expanded reliance on property taxation would facilitate the achievement of sustainable development goals, providing adequate funding of local services and access to credit for infrastructure. It would also generate more incentives for more accountable local governance.

Within the cooperation framework between the ECLAC and OXFAM, “Los incentivos fiscales a las empresas en América Latina y el Caribe” was published in Documentos de Proyectos (2019). The objective of this research is to analyze the tax incentive policy for companies in Latin American countries, in order to promote the debate and revision of these instruments in order to configure a tax system that promotes investment, while continuing to provide the resources necessary to meet the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Furthermore, ECLAC has provided extensive assistance regarding the improvement of the measurement of public social spending to all governments, an essential means of implementation of the social dimension of the 2030 Agenda. Data on social spending is available in an online database (https://observatoriosocial.cepal.org/inversion/en) and is analysed in the yearly editions of the Social Panorama of Latin America. The Social Panorama of Latin America 2019 analyses recent trends in social spending by country and by function, including education, health, social protection, housing, recreation, and environmental protection). It also estimates the financing needs for achieving Sustainable Development Goal 1 in the region.

Further, ECLAC has been participating in the Inter-American Task Force on Women’s leadership since this initiative was launched during the VIII Summit of the Americas (Peru, April 2018). The goal of the Task Force is to promote gender equity and women’s leadership through enhanced cooperation and synergies between international and inter-American organizations and to position the region as a leader in achieving SDG 5.

With respect to innovative financing instruments, ECLAC has been monitoring the issuance of green bonds by Latin American and Caribbean issuers in international bond markets, for inclusion in the periodic report “Capital Flows to Latin America and the Caribbean.” A special section on green bond issuance has been added to the report since then.

Finally, ECLAC’s Debt for Climate Adaptation Swap initiative aims to respond to the Caribbean’s vulnerability to climate change and natural disasters and the region’s high level of debt. In order to close the financing gap for the SDGs, ECLAC has called for the creation of a Caribbean Resilience Fund as part of a debt alleviation strategy based on the climate change swap proposal, and for donors to use pledged resources to finance a gradual write-down of the Caribbean SIDS multilateral debt stock held at various multilateral institutions as well as the bilateral debt stock of Member States.

3.11 Reducing disaster risk and building resilience;

ECLAC undertakes research, support to policy design, investment and innovation to reduce disaster risk and build the resilience of Latin American and Caribbean countries. This support includes capacity development, knowledge exchange, and immediate response with post-disaster assessments.

ECLAC has conducted important analytical work in order to identify some of the most important factors contributing to Caribbean SIDS specific vulnerability and how they interact and often reinforce each other.

In that regard, ECLAC has developed research on “Planning for sustainable territorial development” and policy and institutional recommendations to be published in a policy brief on “Planning for resilience: an integrated approach to tackle climate change in the Caribbean”. Other recent key research in this area

includes the energy sector, flooding, gender mainstreaming in disaster risk reduction and Integrated water resource management, as well as policy briefs on disaster risk management strategies for ten Caribbean countries.

Other ECLAC activities in this realm include:

  • A workshop on Climate Change Adaptation, Disaster Risk and Resilience in the Caribbean organized in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago in cooperation with the Ministry of Planning and Development from Trinidad and Tobago. Stakeholders from different governmental agencies reviewed climate change, disaster and risk reduction, and strategies to build resilient societies in the face of increasing extreme weather events and other potential
  • Expert group meeting in November 2018 on “The enhancement of resilience to disasters and climate change in the Caribbean through the modernization of the energy sector”.
  • ECLAC’s publication on “Planning for sustainable territorial development in Latin America and the

Caribbean”, background document for the meeting of the Regional Council of Planning 2019.

Technical support in connection with disaster assessment was also provided to countries of the region and served as an important basis to leverage financing for reconstruction in several Caribbean countries. The damage and loss assessment reports produced by ECLAC for the Government of the Bahamas in 2015, 2016 and 2017 were used to successfully request a contingent disaster loan of US$ 100 million from IDB.

The Government of Anguilla used the ECLAC damage and loss assessment report to appeal for financial resources from the United Kingdom to fund reconstruction of the damage caused by Hurricane Irma in 2017. In addition, ECLAC’s DaLA report in Sint Maarten served as an important basis for the recovery and reconstruction programme initiated by the government. The recovery programme, aimed at ‘building back better’, was consolidated into a National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP) that prioritizes short, medium- and long-term needs for the recovery, reconstruction and resilience of Sint Maarten. Since January 2018, the World Bank has been assisting the Government of Sint Maarten in the implementation of this programme. The NRRP is supported through a Trust Fund for up to 470 million euros, financed by The Netherlands and managed by the World Bank.

3.12 Supporting international cooperation and enhancing the global partnership;

ECLAC provides a regional multilateral and multi-stakeholder space that fosters collaboration, common knowledge generation and sharing, peer learning, policy coherence and advocacy. As a regional convening platform and community of knowledge, ECLAC is open to all entities of the UNDS at regional and national

levels aimed at setting common agendas on development issues to support member States in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs.

ECLAC subsidiary bodies, for which the Commission acts as technical secretariat, are intergovernmental convening platforms around sectoral issues fostering participation of UN Agencies, Funds and Programmes, national governments and other stakeholders, to advance regional and subregional agendas agreed upon by member States. Thus, ECLAC acts as platform to facilitate exchange of experience, good practices and innovative initiatives as well as catalyst for the creation of networks of stakeholders from governments, civil society and the private sector.

Also, ECLAC works to support regional cooperation through capacity development support, technical consulting, research and sharing of the experiences of countries in the development of partnerships for SDG implementation.

In the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, ECLAC has quickly adapted to assess the socioeconomic impact in the region and to produce analysis in this respect. ECLAC has produced special reports and developed a regional COVID-19 Observatory online including the mapping and monitoring of the measures adopted by governments to address the crisis, an effort developed in collaboration with UN Resident Coordinators in the region and the regional Development Coordination Office (DCO). ECLAC will regularly update its special reports to continuously analyze the impacts of the pandemic on several key socio-economic trends and on the overall implementation of the 2030 Agenda and its 17 SDGs. Further, the Observatory will enable to make regularly updated information and data visualization on the impact of the pandemic in the region, publicly and easily accessible to the general public, UN country teams and other regional entities.

The Midterm review meeting of Latin American countries preparatory to the comprehensive high-levelmidterm review of the Vienna Programme of Action for Landlocked Developing Countries for the Decade2014–2024 brought together representatives of the United Nations and of various countries to accelerate progress on the priorities established for supporting, with concrete actions, the implementation of this Programme of Action and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in these nations (Santiago, June 2019). Participants in the meeting discussed a general overview of the progress made on implementation of the Vienna Programme of Action and the SDGs in the Latin American region, highlighting achievements, challenges and opportunities, and suggesting needed measures in areas such as transit policy, infrastructure, information and communications technologies, energy, trade facilitation and regional integration. In the joint document specially prepared for this meeting (“Midterm Review of theimplementation of the Vienna Programme of Action for Landlocked Developing Countries for the Decade

2014-2024 in Latin America and the Caribbean”), ECLAC and UN-OHRLLS highlight six priorities: critical matters regarding transit policy, the development and maintenance of infrastructure and energy services, the promotion of international trade and trade facilitation, the importance of regional cooperation and integration, the economic transformation of the productive structure, and the means of implementation. Convened by the UN General Assembly, the comprehensive high-level midterm review on theimplementation of the Vienna Programme of Action for the Decade 2014–2024 took place in December 2019 in New York.

3.13 Others.

4. The high-level political forum (HLPF) is the central platform for the follow-up and review of the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs. Has your organization participated in or supported the work of the HLPF? If yes, please specify your involvement in the following areas:

4.1 Supporting the intergovernmental body of your organization in contributing to the thematic review of the HLPF;

The annual Forum of the Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, was established in 2016 through resolution 700 XXXVI by ECLAC’s 33 member States as the regional platform for the follow up and review of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the 17 SDGs as well as the Addis Ababa Action Agenda on Financing for Development and the Samao Pathway for SIDS.

In 2019, the Forum was convened for the third time in Santiago, Chile under the presidency of Cuba. In this occasion, more than 1,200 participants from government, civil society, the private sector and other participated in the Forum and in the more than 50 side-events. A Quadrennial report on regional progressand challenges in relation to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in Latin America and theCaribbean was produced by ECLAC in coordination with regional UN entities for this occasion.

The results of this Forum, the Intergovernmentally agreed conclusions and recommendations of the thirdmeeting of the Forum of the Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean on Sustainable Development and the Summary of the Chair where submitted to the ECOSOC Bureau as the region’s contribution to the HLPF.

Furthermore, the flagship publication 2019 Fiscal Panorama of Latin America and the Caribbean was submitted as ECLAC’s contribution to the HLPF’s theme in 2019 “"Empowering people and ensuring inclusiveness and equality”.

In 2020, ECLAC contributed with the publication “The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in thenew global and regional context: Scenarios and projections in the current crisis” to the HLPF theme “Accelerated action and transformative pathways: realizing the decade of action and delivery for sustainable development”

4.2 Contributing to policy/background briefs for the HLPF;

ECLAC contributed to the interagency Special Edition of the Secretary-General’s SDG Progress Report presented during the High- level Political Forum in 2019 under the auspices of the General Assembly, which took stock of progress during the first four years of implementation of the 2030 Agenda.

ECLAC is in charge of preparing Policy Brief on SDG7, which will serve as an input to the HLPF in 2020, as agreed with DESA and other international agencies, entitled “Achieving SDG7 in Latin America and the Caribbean”. The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Sustainable Energy for All (SE4ALL), International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) and the Global Fuel Economy Initiative (GFEI) are peer- reviewers of the document.

4.3 Helping organize SDG-specific events in the preparatory process;

ECLAC, in collaboration with Caribbean Youth organizations, organized a virtual preparatory session of the ECOSOC Youth Forum on how to advance the 2030 Agenda. Some of the areas addressed by the youth leaders and activists included challenges to access to high-quality education, lack of employment, lack of youth participation in society, intergenerational injustice and climate change impacts, as proposed by the ECOSOC, in connection to SDGs 4, 8, 10, 13, 16 and 17. In this regard, participants from across the Caribbean participated in a debate on involving youth in the implementation of Agenda 2030 and looked more specifically at three main topics: 1) how education and decent work serve to promote the empowerment, inclusion and equality among youth in the Caribbean (SDGs 4 and 8); 2) how inequality affects youth empowerment and inclusion in the Caribbean (SDGs 10 and 16); and 3) the roles that youth have and can play in the transition to low emission and climate resilient development in the Caribbean (SDGs 13 and 17).

One youth representative from the “I am a Youth of a Small Island” international competition, organized by ECLAC Caribbean, in partnership with ESCAP and UNDESA, was selected to represent SIDS Youth at the

74th General Assembly High-level meeting to review progress made in addressing the priorities of SIDS through the implementation of the SAMOA Pathway.

4.4 Organizing side events or speaking at the HLPF;

In the margins of the 2019 High Level Political Forum, UN ECLAC jointly with the Government of Costa Rica, the World Resources Institute, The Access Initiative, Namati, CIVICUS-World Alliance for Citizen Participation and DAR-Peru organized the Side Event “Escazú Agreement: Establishing environmental rights for the most vulnerable”. Focusing on the theme of 2019’s HLPF “empowering people and ensuring inclusiveness and equality”, the event discussed how the Regional Agreement on Access to Information, Public Participation and Justice in Environmental Matters in Latin America and the Caribbean (known as the Escazú Agreement) supports the implementation of the 2030 Agenda by devoting specific attention to people and groups in vulnerable situation and including specific mechanisms for the protection of environmental defenders. Special attention was given to highlight the critical role of the Escazú Agreement to mainstream public participation in climate action, to ensure that climates policies and actions are shaped by and benefited from those that are most affected by climate change.

In addition, ECLAC and UNDESA held a Caribbean SIDS side event during the 2019 HLPF titled “Building Back Better: Reckoning with Size in Pursuit of Resilience”. ECLAC Caribbean supported Caribbean countries in the preparation of Voluntary National Reviews (VNRs), to this intergovernmental forum, supported capacity development in the preparation of the VNRs, and encouraged the peer-learning character of the voluntary national reviews.

Further, ECLAC organized the side-event “Beyond July: an integrated support to member States in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda” in collaboration with the governments of St. Lucia, Guyana, Chile and Guatemala, the United Nations Resident Coordinators in said countries and the regional office for Latin America and the Caribbean of the United Nations Development Coordination Office (UNDCO). In this event, participants identified successful collaborations and lessons learned on the implementation of the 2030 Agenda, including preparation and follow-up on VNRs, and reflected on how best the UN system can support member States in Latin America in the Caribbean on their path to sustainable development.

Finally, ECLAC organized in collaboration with the four other Regional Commissions and the President of ECOSOC the ministerial lunch “Translating the 2030 Agenda into national sustainable development realities: Regional perspectives” which brought together the ministers present during the 2019 HLPF.

In the context of the 2019 HLPF, Alicia Bárcena, ECLAC’s Executive Secretary took part in different sessions in which she addressed the importance of local action, combating inequality in the 21st century and the role played by regional commissions in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs. She

inaugurated the session on Local Action for Global Commitments, which convened experts from the public, private and non-governmental sectors, local leaders and UN agency representatives. ECLAC’s Executive Secretary also moderated a United Nations dialogue on inequality in the 21st century and the need for a coordinated effort to measure and understand its multiple dimensions and the potential for change in collaboration with DESA and UNDP. Finally, the ECLAC Executive Secretary, in her capacity as coordinator of the five UN regional commissions, participated in the session on What are regions tellingus about implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs?. During her presentation, Alicia Bárcena underscored that since the adoption of the 2030 Agenda, the UN’s five regional commissions have provided Member States with platforms focused on the SDGs for debate, peer learning and capacity building.

4.5 Supporting the VNR process.

In 2019, ECLAC provided technical assistance to Saint Lucia in the preparation of its VNR and is providing similar support in 2020 to Honduras, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and Trinidad and Tobago. This support includes capacity development in stakeholder engagement and the preparation of the VNRs.

Further, ECLAC organized in 2019 two events to support countries presenting their VNRs or encouraging those who hadn’t presented to do so:

  • Learning Conference on “Implementing the 2030 Agenda in the Caribbean Region”, organized by UNITAR, UNDESA and ECLAC, in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, in May
  • Support in conducting a series of four stakeholder consultations in Trinidad and Tobago with the business sector, youth, NGOs, Government sector institutions and community groups as well as academia, organized by the Ministry of Planning and Development in collaboration with the UN system, conducted in January-February

Finally, ECLAC participated in two global workshops for countries presenting their VNRs (Bonn, February 2019 and Oslo, December 2019) to highlight the contribution of Regional Forums for Sustainable Development as a space for knowledge exchange during the VNR process in collaboration with DESA and all regional commissions.

5. How has your organization cooperated with other UN system organizations to achieve coherence and synergies in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs? In this regard, has your organization launched or intend to launch any joint programmes or projects in collaboration with other UN entities? Are there any results or lessons you would like to highlight that might help improve the design and impact of such efforts? Has your organization participated in any of the following coordination systemwide mechanisms or any other relevant platform - CEB, UNSDG, EC-ESA Plus, regional coordination meetings, UN-Energy, UN-Water, UN-Ocean, IAEG, IATT? Please specify which and indicate any suggestions you may have about improving collaborations within and across these mechanisms/platforms.

ECLAC has established a strong partnership with several UN entities. The following list is not exhaustive but aims at providing a sense of the vast range of topics in which we collaborate:

The measurement of public investment in policies oriented to children and adolescents has been carried out with UNICEF. Work on malnutrition and SDG 2 in the Latin America and the Caribbean and in Africa has been carried out with WFP. Regarding malnutrition (Target 2.1 and 2.2 of SDG 2), ECLAC has kept developing a strong partnership with the WFP in order to inform decision-making about the importance of funding food and nutrition policies not only because of its immediate beneficial effects on the wellbeing of persons, but also because of the high long term costs of not combating malnutrition in terms of productivity and economic growth. With that perspective national case studies are currently underway in Argentina, Bolivia and Peru. Studies have already been carried out in Chile, Ecuador, Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and the Dominican Republic. Technical assistance to the African Union through a partnership with the WFP has allowed to conduct similar studies in several African countries (COHA initiative). In Haiti, ECLAC is collaborating with WFP in order to promote a new social protection and promotion strategy in the country.

ECLAC is also collaborating with the ILO regional office on the prevention and eradication of child labour (SDG target 8.7) and is currently preparing an inter-agency document on youth and the 2030 Agenda in the context of the activities of the regional LAC Task Force on Youth. This document will assess progress in SDG indicators related to youth and will also highlight the positive contributions that youth in the making in fulfilment of the 2030 Agenda in the region. It is expected to highlight the challenges and opportunities to advance the rights and development of young people in the context of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and to generate evidence and arguments that feed discussions and channel actions for decision makers, representatives of civil society and other stakeholders interested in this population.

ECLAC has established a collaboration with UNDP’s IPC-IG, providing the socialprotection.org platform access to the data available on the ECLAC’s Non-contributory social protection programmes in Latin America and the Caribbean. Thanks to this collaboration, ECLAC’s data is showcased in a global database and there is no duplication of data collection efforts.

In January 2020, the XIV Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean was held jointly organized for the first time by ECLAC and UN Women, which is a milestone in the framework of the Reform of the United Nations and establish a new way of working on the gender equality in the region not only in the framework of this regional forum but also at the technical level attending the demands of the countries. This joint organization involved the joint development of the official program and the general agenda of parallel events, as well as the joint facilitation of the negotiations of the final document of the Regional Conference: the Santiago Commitment.

ECLAC is working with UN-Energy, UN-Water, UNDESA, UNODS and UN University. In addition, under the Regional Observatory on Sustainable Energy (ROSE) project there are activities implemented in partnership with UNECE and ESCAP. In the area of biodiversity ECLAC is also developing a broader marine perspective and will participate in the Second Oceans UN- Conference, with a study on SDG 14 y SDG13.

ECLAC cooperates with UN Environment, UNECE and OHCHR, among other UN organizations, to achieve coherence and synergies in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and SDGs at the regional level. UN Environment is one of the main collaborating agencies in Principle 10/Escazu Agreement activities. It is also a strategic partner in the development of the Observatory on Principle 10 in Latin America and the Caribbean, a public platform containing laws, regulations, policies, case law and treaties applicable to the 33 countries of Latin America and the Caribbean (http://observatoriop10.cepal.org). UNECE was a key partner in the negotiations of the Escazú Agreement, having participated in all meetings, and is continuing sharing knowledge and experience in preparation for entering into force. With OHCHR, ECLAC published the book “Climate Change and Human Rights: Contributions by and for Latin America and the Caribbean” (https://www.cepal.org/en/publications/44971-climate-change-and-human-rights-contributions-and- latin-america-and-caribbean).

ECLAC, UN Environment and UNECE, have been working to develop an online course under INFORMEA: Introductory course on SDG 16 and access rights: The Aarhus Convention and the Escazú Agreement. The course was launched at COP 25 in Madrid.

ECLAC is also leading two Development Account projects with direct relevance to Agenda 2030 implementation in the Caribbean, “Strengthening institutional frameworks in the Caribbean for an integrative approach to implement the 2030 Agenda and the SIDS Sustainable Development Agenda”, and “Caribbean SIDS relevant climate change and disasters indicators for evidence-based policies”. Co- operating Entities within the UN system are the Small Island Developing States (SIDS) Unit of Division of Sustainable Development (DSD/DESA); UNDRR; UNEP; FAO and UNSD.

Furthermore, ECLAC is actively participating in the Mainstreaming, Acceleration and Policy Support (MAPS) Missions of the UNDG in the Caribbean. In particular, ECLAC has conducted assessments of Data and Statistics for SDG implementation and monitoring in Aruba, Saint Lucia and Trinidad and Tobago that formed part of the SDG Roadmap for these countries. The mechanism of assigning specific task areas to different UN agencies participating in the MAPS mission is a good template for inter-agency collaboration and has facilitated the successful conduct of MAPS mission in the Caribbean.

Together with UNITAR and UNDESA, ECLAC co-organized two regional capacity development initiatives on the Integrated implementation of the 2030 Development Agenda in the Caribbean. The Learning Conference on “Implementing the 2030 Agenda in the Caribbean region”, and the Regional Workshop on "Integrated policies and policy coherence for SDGs" provided a forum for discussing challenges and potential solutions on the implementation of the 2030 Agenda at the national and local levels. Furthermore, the meeting sought to learn on the different and existent tools and methodologies as well as good practices to promote the “whole of the government and whole of society” approach in the planning, monitoring, evaluating and financing the achievement of the SDGs at the national and local levels. The activities involved the active participation of the United Nations Resident Coordinator Offices (UNRCO) from Barbados, Guyana, and Trinidad and Tobago.

The Caribbean Forum on Population, Youth and Development has contributed to create synergies between youth policies and broader development frameworks, including the Montevideo Consensus on Population and Development, the SAMOA Pathway, the SDGs as well as sectoral plans at national level. It was jointly convened by ECLAC, UNFPA and other external partners such as CARICOM, the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), the Commonwealth, with the collaboration of the CARICOM Youth Ambassador Corps (CYAs), the Caribbean Regional Youth Council (CRYC) and the University of the West Indies’ Students Today, Alumni Tomorrow (UWI STAT), and received the active contribution of ILO, UNICEF, UNESCO cluster Office for the Caribbean, UN Women Multi-Country Office, among other partners.

ECLAC has collaborated with UN-Habitat in different activities in relation to SDG 11 in the Caribbean, “Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable”, including research and collaboration in the organization of a roundtable debate entitled "Roadmap towards coherent regional strategies for knowledge exchange and financing upscaled slum upgrading in Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific" in November 2018; a virtual Caribbean dialogue session in April 2019; and a subregional policy dialogue workshop held in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, in June 2019.

ECLAC has been an active member of UNESCO Education Working Group in the Caribbean since its inception. In this area cooperation has been consolidated with the OECS, with the review of the "OECS Education Sector Strategy" and ongoing advisory support to its implementation.

Finally, ECLAC’s Executive Secretary participates regularly in all meetings of the CEB, UNSDG, and EC-ESA Plus. Regional coordination meetings are currently convened jointly by ECLAC and the regional office of UNDG in Latin America and the Caribbean, under the chairmanship of the Deputy Secretary-General.

6. How has your organization engaged with stakeholder groups, both in supporting implementation at the country, regional and global levels, and within your own organization? If yes, please provide main highlights, including any lessons learned. If your organization has established any multi-stakeholder partnerships to support the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs, please describe them and how their performances are being monitored and reviewed.

The negotiation of the Escazú Agreement, for which ECLAC serves as Secretariat, has as one of its hallmarks, the significant participation of the public. The negotiations gathered Government delegates, representatives of the public, UN agencies, subregional organizations, experts, academia and other interested stakeholders that actively participated on a collaborative basis and an equal footing. The transparent and participatory negotiating process has been applauded and recognized world-wide. Open to the 33 LAC countries, the agreement has the potential to benefit over 500 million people in accessing information, participating in decision-making that affect their lives and accessing justice. During negotiations, as requested by countries, ECLAC created a Regional Public Mechanism (currently having more than 5000 participants) to disseminate relevant information and channel public participation on environmental access rights. In addition, after an electoral process, six representatives of the public were elected through the Regional Public Mechanism.

ECLAC has accompanied and advised a regional initiative “LAC in the face of climate change: biodiversity and gender”, that included the participation of 23 organizations, mostly from academia, NGO’s and also some governmental sectors belonging to Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador and Mexico.

Also, ECLAC is currently implementing two projects, “Strengthening institutional frameworks in the Caribbean for an integrative approach to implement the 2030 Agenda and the SIDS Sustainable Development Agenda”, and “Caribbean SIDS relevant climate change and disasters indicators for evidence- based policies” benefiting eight Caribbean countries (Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Saint Lucia, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Sint Maarten, and Suriname). Activities under these projects focus on stakeholder engagement in the implementation and follow-up and review of the SDGs in beneficiary countries.

In addition, ECLAC provided support to VNR process in Trinidad and Tobago, which included a series of four stakeholder consultations, with the business sector, youth, NGOs, Government sector institutions and community groups as well as academia, conducted in January-February 2020.

Finally, ECLAC supported the establishment of the Civil Society Participation Mechanism in the SustainableDevelopment Agenda and the Forum of the Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean on SustainableDevelopment, which aims at- among other things- to facilitate the participation of civil society in the Forum, as well as in other processes and agendas related to sustainable development and the 2030 Agenda; and coordinate the delivery of civil society inputs for political processes related to the sustainable development agenda in the region.

In the implementation of the rural-urban linkages project, ECLAC made efforts to include different stakeholder groups to build a more integrated understanding of rural-urban linkages and its relevance for public policy. National and local governmental entities, NGOs, universities, rural leaders, among others, assisted to the different meetings and events organized by the office. Representatives of different interests’ groups – environmental, institutional, cultural, corporate, among others – shared their views in these spaces.

ECLAC has been also participating in the regular meetings of the Inter-American Task Force on Women’s leadership, a Task Force which is composed of key Inter-American and international organizations, which have recognized expertise and programming related to women’s leadership. In addition to ECLAC, the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB), the Inter-American Commission of Women (CIM) and the Inter- American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) of the Organization of American States (OAS), the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), ParlAmericas, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), UN Women, the Development Bank of Latin America (CAF), Caribbean Women in Leadership (CIWiL), and the Latin American and Caribbean Committee for the Defense of Women’s Rights (CLADEM) are member organizations of the Task-Force. The Task Force members have had dialogues with governments and other stakeholders, looking to define a roadmap enhancing the commitment of key actors to engage women in decision-making throughout the Americas.

Other key stakeholder engagement initiatives include:

  • Regular engagement with the different network of women NGOs on issues related to gender mainstreaming, including the preparatory processes for the Regional Conference on Women
  • Spearheading the Caribbean Working Group on the New Urban Agenda / SDG11
  • Collaboration, as member of the Reference Group on CDB’s Youth Policy and Operational Strategy for the Caribbean, participating in the Technical Review and Regional Stakeholder Workshops
  • Regular collaboration with the the Eastern Caribbean Development Partner Group, Education WG, including in the Mid-term review of the OECS Education Sector Strategy (OESS).

7. Has your organization organized any conferences, forums or events designed to facilitate exchange of experience, peer and mutual learning in connection with the SDGs? If yes, please provide a brief summary, below and include lessons learned and gaps identified based on the outcomes of these events. Please also include any events you want to organize in the coming years.

SDG 2

  • In October 2019, at the Inter-American Board of Ministers of Agriculture, held in San Jose (Costa Rica), ECLAC, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO ) and the Inter- American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) launched the new edition of the report Perspectives on agriculture and rural development in the Americas: a look towards Latin America and the Caribbean 2019-2020 (https://repositorio.cepal.org/bitstream/handle/11362/45111/1/CEPAL- FAO2019-2020_es.pdf). The publication is the result of a collaboration between the three institutions that has lasted more than ten This report points out that rural development is essential to face the increase in hunger, poverty and the impact of climate change in the region, all fundamental objectives of the 2030 Agenda. The highlights presented at the conference by ECLAC, FAO and IICA revealed the complex agricultural and rural panorama of the region. One of its main conclusions is the urgency of promoting rural development due to its multidimensional scope: it offers agricultural, food and productive opportunities, as well as possibilities for new energy development and to face poverty, hunger and climate change.

SDG 4

  • ECLAC organized an international seminar called “Technical and Vocational Education and Training for labour inclusion and greater equality in Latin America and the Caribbean” (March 2019, Santiago, Chile). The Economic Development Division organized 5 out of 8 sessions: Session 1: The present and the future of work: inclusion challenges; Session 5: Identification and anticipation of skills demand. Experiences in the developed world; Session 6: Identification and anticipation of skills demand: experiences in Latin America; Session 7: Labour market information systems; Session 8: Financing Technical and Vocational Education and
  • ECLAC with the Ministry of Education organized a workshop to develop a national plan of Education and Vocational Training (December 2018, Quito, Ecuador).
  • ECLAC with the Ministry of Planning, Economy and Development organized a workshop to improve social and productive inclusion for young Dominicans, through education, vocational training and the link between education and employment (May 2018, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic)
  • ECLAC organized a regional Virtual Session under the topic “Confronting the Social Issues Impacting Education for an Economically Sustainable Region”, on occasion of Caribbean Youth Day, 2019

SDG 5: Gender Equality

The XIV Session of the Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean (January 27- 31, 2020, Santiago) was a space to account for the progress made and the challenges faced to advance the rights of women to through the fulfilment of regional and international commitments on gender equality contemplated in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, the Regional Gender Agenda, and the Montevideo Strategy. In addition to thematic sessions to special panels were dedicated to the progress on achieving gender equality in the region:

  • A high-level panel to assess progress in the implementation of the Montevideo Strategy: For this occasion, ECLAC prepared a Regional Report on progress in the application of the Montevideo Strategy based on national reports and other available information. This report identifies areas of progress and persistent challenges to achieve gender equality by 2030 and was presented as the basis for discussions and
  • A special session was dedicated to the review of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (Beijing + 25) for Latin America and the Caribbean with a view to
  • ECLAC together with UN Women prepared a Regional Report on Beijing + 25 based on the national reports.
  • During the XIV Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean, a special session was dedicated to the application of the Montevideo Strategy in the
  • At this Conference, also a special session dedicated to the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action after 25 years was organized. During this presentation, a Special session: Generation Equality: outlook and challenges for Beijing+25 in Latin America and the Caribbean, the Regional report on the review of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action in Latin American and Caribbean countries, 25 years on was presented, and it appears that 15 countries in the region incorporated gender in the framework of national climate change and environmental policies, strategies or plans, by reinforcing the interlinkage between SDGs 5 and
  • At the end of the Conference, Governments approved the Santiago Commitment, which ratifies the commitments assumed by the States in the Declaration and Platform for Action of the Fourth World Conference on Women and the Strategy of Montevideo, and their linkages with the 2030 Agenda. For example, the paragraph 16 establishes a linkage between SDG 4 and

A regional progress report on the Montevideo Strategy for implementation of the Regional GenderAgenda within the sustainable development framework by 2030 was presented, on the basis of the analysis made by the governments on how this tool contributed to the implementation of the Gender Regional Agenda and the achievement of the SDGs. For instance, since 2016, at least 8 countries in the region (Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Paraguay, Peru and Uruguay) have adopted national gender equality instruments in line with the Montevideo Strategy and the 2030 Agenda. ECLAC also produced a diagram showing the synergy between the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, the Regional Gender Agenda and the 2030 Agenda, in order to provide specific tools to Governments to advance comprehensive public policies. This diagram is available in the second chapter of the Regional progress report on the Montevideo Strategy for implementation of the Regional Gender Agenda within the sustainable development framework by 2030.

In the Caribbean, ECLAC organized the following activities:

  • Workshop on Gender Mainstreaming in National Sustainable Development Planning, Trinidad and Tobago, 2019
  • Subregional preparatory meeting of the XIV session of the Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean, Trinidad and Tobago, 2019
  • Symposium on Mainstreaming Gender in Water Resources Management, Climate Change and Disaster Risk Reduction Policies in the Caribbean, Trinidad and Tobago, 2019

Finally, ECLAC supported through the Inter-American Task Force on Women’s leadership the organization of fourteen regular meetings and two events:

  • “Women’s leadership in the national agendas of the Americas and Caribbean” during the 63rd Session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women on March 13th, 2019 in New York and
  • “Investing in women's leadership to change economic scenarios: lessons and cooperation with the private sector" during the XIV Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean, on January 30th, 2020, in Santiago,

SDG 6

  • A workshop on lessons learned on water and sanitation in Latin America and the Caribbean: The objective of this meeting was to share the regional progress regarding SDG 6 on drinking water and sanitation in the region and the lessons learned in recent decades about the legal reforms in drinking water and sanitation in the region, with special emphasis on the cases of Brazil and

SDG7

Further activities and events of ECLAC with regards to SDG7 encompass:

  • 4 forums in the Caribbean aiming the exchange of best practices on data processing and the development on SDG 7.3. The main topic was EE indicators. The forums were held in Saint Lucia, Barbados, Guyana, and Trinidad and As a result, every country developed their own EE base- line and a national EE status reports and policies.
  • 4 conferences in Latin America aiming to strength the national capacity to develop a comprehensive energy data base and new SDG7 indicators. The conferences were held in Argentina, Bolivia, Cuba, and Panama. As a result of these activities, the countries adopted new data processing techniques and new SDG7 indicators.
  • 2 Regional events on Energy Efficiency and Energy Planning for Renewables. In May 2019 a Regional meeting was held in Panama, in partnership with the national Secretariat of Energy of Panama. The main objective of this meeting was to discuss EE and Renewables status in the region and secure the endorsement of the region on the Regional Observatory on Sustainable Energy (ROSE) Core The meeting was attended by more that 15 official representatives, and also partners (IDB, OLADE, and IRENA).
  • In October 2019, a regional meeting was held in Peru, in partnership with OSINERGMIN. The main objective of the meeting was to define the technical needs and challenges faced by ECALC member states to deploy The meeting was attended by more than 14 official representatives and partners (IDB, OLADE, IRENA, CIER, WB, SICA). As a result a regional work plan was agreed on technical studies carried out by ECLAC and partners. A report on Mapping the Energy Planning in LAC was the first outcome.
  • Conference on "Lithium and its potential contribution to the energy transition and electromobility" on April 23rd, 2019, in Santiago (Chile). This activity, held as a side event of the Third Meeting of the Forum of the Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean on Sustainable Development 2019, had the aim of promoting multi-stakeholder regional dialogue between government, civil society and the private sector on the potentialities and challenges of lithium as a strategic resource for the energy transition towards sustainable and low-carbon renewable energy, electromobility, and developing supply-chains and creating linkages with local and regional economies and productive diversification, within the framework of the 2030 Agenda (SDGs 7 and 9). Officials from the following institutions participated: ICMM, ENEL of Chile, CORFO of Chile, Secretariat of Mining Policy of Argentina, Ministry of Mining of Chile, Terram Foundation of Chile, Environment and Natural Resources Foundation, CIDES-UMSA of Bolivia (Pl. St. of), GIZ, BGR and CEPAL. The activity, that was open to multi-sectoral and multi-level stakeholders, provided the space for discussion of some main issues concerning the exploitation and processing of lithium in the region, offering crucial elements that should be studied to assess the real potential of the Several interesting subjects were put on the table but there was a gap in properly guiding the exchanges in order to better manage the time assigned to each

speaker or participant. The interest and participation brought on by the debate on the issues that they make and derive from the exploitation of lithium would indicate the need for both a space for intergovernmental coordination and one for multi-stakeholder dialogue among the countries of the so-called "Lithium Triangle" (Argentina, Bolivia and Chile), which allow, on the one hand, to articulate policies, and, on the other, to share knowledge and experiences.

SDG 11

  • In the implementation of rural-urban linkages project, ECLAC organized three meetings – one national and two sub-national- intended to increase awareness about rural-urban linkages (its relationship with the ODS is explained above). In each seminar, national and sub-national stakeholders presented their personal vision and expectations of territorial policies and territorial The seminars included a discussion session were all assistants had the opportunity to propose public policy ideas. In 2020, two new regional seminaries are planned in order to expand upon the discoveries made so far, as well as two capacity-building meetings with specific stakeholders and policymakers in the two territories prioritize by the project.
  • ECLAC also organized the Caribbean dialogue session on Caribbean Strategy on Informal Settlements, and Subregional policy dialogue workshop on Caribbean Strategy on Informal Settlements (Trinidad and Tobago, 2019)

SDG 12

  • Two Regional High-Level Political Meetings for a new governance of extractive natural resources were held within the framework of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (SDGs 12 and 16), which have allowed the discussion about the main issues and challenges about the subject and the exchange of knowledge and experiences and good practices among stakeholders from a variety sectors. The first Regional Meeting, “Mining in Latin America and the Caribbean: interdependencies, challenges and opportunities for sustainable development”, was held on November 19th, 2018, in Lima (Peru), within the framework and in close collaboration with the Conference of Ministers of Mining of the Americas (CAMMA), with the aim of promoting a high-level regional dialogue on mining that contributes to an inclusive and more sustainable development within the framework of the 2030 Agenda and, at the same time, seeking to systematize messages and lessons from the multi- stakeholder discussion on how mining can be an element that supports the achievement of the Officials from the following institutions participated: Ministry of Energy and Mines of Peru, Secretariat of Mining Policy of Argentina, CAMMA, Embassy of Germany in Peru, NGRI, ACM of Colombia, IDB, Ministry of Environment of Peru, Red Muqui, CODELCO of Chile , Newcrest Mining Limited, Vice Ministry of Mining of Ecuador, Andean Community, CIES of Peru, COCHILCO of Chile, Compañía de

Minas Buenaventura, Ministry of Mining of Chile, Umicore, WEF, expert consultants on the subject, GIZ, BGR and ECLAC.

  • The second Regional Meeting, “Governance for mining in the 21st century in the Andean countries”, was held on September 5th, 2019, in Santiago (Chile), with the aim of promoting a multi-stakeholder dialogue on the central aspects for a more sustainable management of mining resources in the Andean countries, in order to face the traditional challenges of the sector and take advantage of the opportunities of the transition to low carbon economies, moving towards a new governance for the sector, and, in parallel, identify the needs of technical assistance in these matters for the Andean countries. Officials from the following institutions participated: Embassy of Germany in Chile, Vice- Ministry of Mining of Ecuador, Ministry of the Environment of Ecuador, Ministry of Environment of Peru, Ministry of Energy and Mining of Peru, Ministry of Environment and Water of Bolivia (Pl St. of), Ministry of Mining and Metallurgy of Bolivia (Pl. St. of), CIES, CooperAcción, DAR of Peru, NRGI, CIGIDEN, COCHILCO and EBP of Chile, Fundación Chile, CEDLA, CIDES-UMSA, Cumbre del Sajama and the Bolivian SBDA (Pl. St. of), expert consultants on the subject, GIZ, BGR and
  • The multi-stakeholder regional dialogues have been of great interest to the participants, since they are spaces where they can express and exchange their points of view on the various dimensions of mining sustainability and where depending on the conditions it might be initiated workings groups for topics that require shared vision and coordination for common action. It is not only necessary, for example, to provide greater support and visibility to the CAMMA, since it is one of the few regional intergovernmental spaces where the role of mining for sustainable development can be discussed within the political arena, but it is also essential to make available formal spaces for multi-stakeholder dialogue. Finally, these meetings have also served to identify subjects of interest in the region for future work and technical assistance such as the governance and transparency of mining clusters and value chains to foster production diversification and development of linkages with local and regional economies.

SDG 15

  • Latin American and Caribbean perspectives on the post-2020 global biodiversity framework, a high- level workshop for experts with national CDB negotiators, knowledge and management institutions, think tanks and regional and global agencies of UN. The aim was to identify lessons from positive experiences, as well as setbacks, to allow a better understanding of conditions that enable change in favor of biodiversity and propose ways to enhance the implementation of post-2020 biodiversity goals. Lessons learned: More stability and intervention time (of incentives or programs) are required for scalability, in LAC region institutions and polices are not stable through governmental changes. The number of plans and programs developed has greatly increased, but there is very little

implementation of those plans. On another level the international framework has a lot of fragmentation and dispersion there is a need to simplify to make their application easier.

SDG 16

As Secretariat of the Escazú Agreement, ECLAC has co-organized with national governments and other partners several capacity building activities on the effective and coherent implementation of the environmental dimension of the 2030 Agenda through the Escazú Agreement. Events has allowed participants to share experiences and lessons learned. Examples included:

  • November 11, 2019, Saint Lucia: Seminar for public officials and civil society representatives on the Escazú Agreement and the 2030 Agenda. Seminar organized by the Government of Saint Lucia, the Saint Lucia National Trust and the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (UN ECLAC). The objectives of the Seminar were: (i) to raise awareness on the Escazú Agreement and its synergies with the 2030 Agenda and other international processes; (ii) to examine the state of the art of implementation of access rights in the region with a particular focus on the Caribbean sub-region; (iii) to review the Saint Lucian internal framework in the context of the Regional Agreement to support the ratification
  • August 14, 2019, Georgetown, Guyana: Workshop The effective and coherent implementation of the environmental dimension of the 2030 Agenda in Guyana through the Escazú Agreement. Organized by the Government of Guyana and ECLAC. The workshop analized how the Escazú Agreement contributes to the implementation of the environmental dimension of the 2030 Agenda in an effective and coherent manner in Guyana. To that end, specifically reviewed key provisions of the Escazú Agreement and analyzed national strengths, weaknesses and opportunities considering the current legislative and policy framework. It also identified gaps, needs and priorities and set the stage for national strategies and plans of action to more effectively implement the Escazú Agreement in the context of the environmental dimension of the 2030
  • April 26, Santiago, Chile, Side Event in the margins of the Forum of the Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean on Sustainable Development: Improve accountability and involve National Human Rights Institutions in the 2030 Agenda. Organized by ECLAC´s Sustainable Development and Human Settlements Division, The Danish Institute for Human Rights and the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, the event aimed at exchange experiences and goods practices between National Institutes for Human Rights, discussed challenges and achievements with regard to human rights and sustainable development; identified regional trends; and exchanged tools and strategies to promote a human rights-based approach to sustainable
  • April 25, Santiago, Chile. Regional Meeting on progress and challenges in the implementation of the Escazú Agreement in Latin America and the Caribbean: towards an early entry into Event

organized by ECLAC and the Government of Costa Rica. The aim of the meeting was to exchange experiences and good practices between countries, with the support of civil society, international organizations and other stakeholders, in the effective implementation of environmental access rights and discuss progress and challenges in the implementation of the Escazú Agreement, with a view to accelerate entry into force.

  • February 5-7, 2019. San Jose, Costa Rica. Regional Workshop: Instruments for the effective and coherent implementation of the environmental dimension of the development Organized by ECLAC and the Government of Costa Rica. The activity was aimed at government officials seeking to strengthen capacities in various aspects of environmental economics, through lectures, case studies and practical theoretical work to facilitate the exchange of experiences among participants.
  • April 24, 2019, Santiago, Chile. Side Event in the margins of the RFSD 2019: The Escazú Agreement: Tool to empower people and ensure inclusion and equality. Organized jointly by ECLAC, the Government of Costa Rica and civil society organizations. The event discussed how the Regional Agreement on Access to Information, Public Participation and Access to Justice in Environmental Affairs in Latin America and the Caribbean (known as the Escazú Agreement) supports the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and presented successful cases of civil society-government alliances and other actors that have allowed the promotion of peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development , facilitate access to justice for all and improve

SDG 17

Recent events conducted by ECLAC linked with Domestic Resource Mobilization and Fiscal Policies for Sustainable Development:

  • XXX Regional Fiscal Policy Seminar held in Santiago (26-27 March 2018). This event brought together a wide range of policy makers (including several ministers and vice-ministers) and experts to explore fiscal policy challenges in a slow growth environment, public revenue and spending trends, and the possibility for countries of the region to implement a “new” fiscal policy framework based on strengthened counter-cyclical
  • XXXI Regional Fiscal Policy Seminar held in Santiago (25-26 March 2019). This event brought together finance ministers and vice-ministers from the region, representatives of international organizations, academics and members of civil society organizations to explore the challenges for fiscal policymaking in the region within the current global, regional and national macroeconomic The event also featured sessions on topics such as: taxation of the digital economy, public expenditure and the demographic and epidemiological transition, green and health taxes and the fiscal situation of subnational governments.
  • Seminar entitled “Fiscal Challenges in Latin America: Policy Measures for Sustainable & Inclusive

Growth” that was held in Washington D.C. (27 June 2019). This event brought together experts from

international organizations, academics and policy analysts to discuss the fiscal policy challenges the region faces, with an aim at identifying a menu of potential measures to reactivate sustainable development.

  • Expert meeting entitled “Social Expenditure (SOCX)” held in Santiago, Chile (23-24 July 2019). This event served to build the capacity of participating government authorities and country experts to implemented the Social Expenditure methodology (SOCX). This workshop was held within the framework of the Facility for Development in Transition financed by the European
  • Expert meeting entitled “Regional Technical Workshop on Fiscal Incentives” held in La Antigua, Guatemala (10-11 September 2019). This sought to establish a dialogue between national authorities, international organizations and civil society organizations on tax incentives and provide tools to analyze their design, estimate their costs and benefits and strengthen their As part of the activities of the workshop ECLAC and OXFAM presented a report on tax incentives for companies in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Recent events conducted by ECLAC with regards to Financing for Development include:

  • Seminars and workshops relate to the development account project: Promoting inclusive finance through development banking innovation practices to support social, productive development and structural change”.
  • Regional Consultation of Latin America and the Caribbean on Financing for Development held in New York (5-6 April 2018). The objective of the conference was to analyze and discuss relevant financing for development issues from the perspective of Latin America and the Caribbean. The event brought together a wide range of participants including delegates from the countries of the region, experts and representatives of civil
  • ECLAC jointly with the Latin American Association of Development Financing Institutions (ALIDE) organized the seminar “Promoting the articulation of development banks to finance projects for an Environmental Big Push in Latin America and the Caribbean” which took place at ALIDE´s headquarters in Lima, Perú on the 16th and 17th of October. The objective of the seminar was to analyze the linkages between regional and national development banks in order to coordinate actions, strategies and financing mechanisms to target resources towards investments in projects related to an Environmental Big Push. The Environmental Big Push (EBP). An EBP is green growth strategy combining economic growth, technological innovation, employment generation with the reduction of carbon emissions and the preservation and sustainable use of natural
  • With regards to data and statistics, ECLAC organized a Regional Workshop: Strengthening Statistical Capacity for Census and SDGs In the Caribbean (in collaboration with UNFPA and CARICOM), Jamaica, 2019

8. Is there any other information you would like to share, including annual reports of your organization and any impact assessment or evaluation reports? If yes, please use the space below and attach the document(s). Please also use this space to provide any other information, comments or remarks you deem necessary.

  • COVID-19 Observatory in Latin America and the Caribbean: Economic and social impact- ECLAC has built this Observatory to support review and follow-up over the medium and long terms. The Observatory tracks the public policies that the 33 countries of the Latin America and Caribbean region are implementing to limit the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, and offers analyses of the economic and social impacts that these policies will have at the national and sectoral
  • The Caribbean Outlook. The Caribbean Outlook not only offers perspective on the threats and challenges faced by the Caribbean, but also proposes a rich body of innovative solutions to issues which must be confronted resolutely if the subregion is to achieve these sustainable development paths.
  • Report of the Learning Conference on Implementing the Sustainable Development Agenda in the Caribbean Region. Caribbean countries face severe challenges and constraints in implementing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Significant among these are the limited capacities to develop evidence-based integrated development plans that mainstream the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the Small Island Developing States Accelerated Modalities of Action (SAMOA) Pathway and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, among others. There is also limited capacity to implement, monitor and evaluate progress in the achievement of national and internationally-agreed development goals. Despite these challenges, experiences of Caribbean countries indicate that the subregion is making progress in localizing the 2030 Countries have established inter- ministerial working groups and held consultations to improve national ownership of the global Agenda. Several countries have also benefitted from mainstreaming, acceleration and

policy support (MAPS) missions to help advance their implementation of the SDGs. It was emphasized that policy coherence should focus on increasing synergies between policies to reduce trade-offs and to ensure internal consistency among policies. The Forum of the Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean provides an excellent regional platform for peer-learning in addressing the challenges to sustainable development.

9. In your view, what should strategic directions look like for the UN system in support of the 2030 Agenda and SDGs in the Decade of Action? What key elements should they include and what major challenges should they address?

One of the biggest challenges faced by all countries is to strengthen the statistical capacity of countries to measure and monitor progress towards the SDGs. In this line, it is necessary to continue to provide resources for improving the quality of census, surveys and vital statistics, as well as for training on the use and analysis of these information sources. Alliances with the private sector, civil society and research institutions could accelerate action – support to promote such coalitions is critical, both in form of guidance and capacity development to staff and beneficiary countries.

Also, greater support to local level engagement and decentralization efforts is a key area for localizing the SDGs. In addition, e-governance and investment in technology and innovation should form part of a strategic direction for countries in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The UN system also needs to consider the specificities of small economies and multi-country offices in submitting proposals to funding opportunities, including the SDG Fund.

10. Please suggest one or two endeavours or initiatives that the UN system organizations could undertake together to support the implementation of the SDGs between now and 2030.

The highly uneven progress made thus far towards the SDGs is severely at odds with the comprehensive spirit of the 2030 Agenda and places it in jeopardy. For that reason, ECLAC calls upon the member countries to accelerate action at all levels to realize the decade of action and delivery for sustainable development. Dealing with pending tasks —an effort in which governments, civil society, the private sector and other stakeholders must all engage— will take more than just policy formulation. Above all, it will require “accelerating action to address systemic gaps in implementation, as we embark on a decisive decade for the 2030 Agenda,” as

demanded in the Political declaration of the high-level political forum on sustainable development convened under the auspices of the General Assembly in 2019 (A/HLPF/2019/L.1.)

Only by mobilizing resources to finance the achievement of the SDGs, enhancing implementation at the national and local levels, institution-building, problem-solving via international cooperation and the uptake of science, innovation and technology can we concentrate on the poorest and most vulnerable to leave no one behind. What is more, these are the only means to avoid slipping back onto pathways that lead us to a situation in which the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic will not only be devastating in the short term but could also poison the context for recovery and development. ECLAC stands ready to accompany member States in addressing the short- and long-term challenges that the pandemic has posed to sustainable development and the achievement of the 2030 Agenda.

ECESA Plus Member
ECLAC
Year of submission: 2020