The “high-level political forum” underway at the U.N. in New York is reviewing progress toward seven of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals.
Goal №11, for sustainable urbanization, has been tabled until next year’s forum. But with 60% of the global population expected to live in cities by 2030, more urgency is required to bring local governments into effort to meet the global goals.
The Global Taskforce on Local and Regional Governments, in partnership with the U.N. Development Programme and U.N. Habitat, has published a toolkit to promote local government engagement with the 2030 Agenda.
The toolkit starts as the basics of awareness-raising in cities and regions where the SDGs are little known, to monitoring implementation in cities like Cape Town, South Africa, where a strong local government positions the city as an effective enforcer.
“Local spaces are ultimately the key site of delivery and development and, as such, local government is central to the success of sustainable development,” the report notes. The toolkit is available here.
