High Level Political forum – 05-15 July, New York

The meeting of the HLPF in 2022 was held from Tuesday, 5 July, to Thursday, 7 July, and from Monday, 11 July, to Friday, 15 July 2022 , under the auspices of the Economic and Social Council. This includes the three-day ministerial segment of the forum from Wednesday, 13 July, to Friday, 15 July 2022. The high-level segment of the Council concluded with a final day on Monday, 18 July 2022.
The theme for the 2022 HLPF is “Building back better from the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) while advancing the full implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development ”.
 
HLPF Reviews SDGs 4, 5, 14, and 15, and  VNRs
Thematic sessions held alongside SDG reviews and VNR presentations discussed local action, equal access to vaccines, work towards the 2023 SDG Summit, building back better in SIDS, and civil society’s perspectives. Read

ADA in High-Level Political Forum

This High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF) 2022  after two long years of Pandemic has been an amazing two weeks experience for both in-person and virtual participants. Though, the challenges of participation and process were still very much there, they were further aggravated by the Covid-19 pandemic. Many of our members and allies could not be physically present with us due to several political and logistical reasons. While there were many challenges for participation and significant delays with visas, nevertheless we worked within the NGO Major Group and with UN DESA to ensure that a wide range of community representatives was able to share their views at the UN.
 
We were very happy to work with many partners in Asia-Pacific and across the globe and got engaged via the Major Groups & Other Stakeholders, Asia Pacific Regional CSO Mechanism, and other ADA members and partners. We made sure to raise the diverse voices of the communities from the global south who are most affected by the converging crises of climate, Covid, and conflict heard at the UN!
However, we were still ready to demand and advocate for system change. There is still much work needed to ensure that we move towards a more accountable and effective Agenda 2030, for a peaceful, sustainable and equitable future for all, and to recover from the pandemic to a system centered on human rights and care. It uplifts us, however, to know that we’ll work together to bring this transformative change, and to bring to reality this system that we, envisioned collectively.
 
During the 2022 HLPF, 45 countries presented a Voluntary National Review (VNR), and four countries from Asia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Philippines and Kazakhstan presented the VNR. We coordinated with our members and partners in these countries along with APRCEM by being part of the VNR Task team and came up with some strong CSO statements. As part of the VNR task team, we ensured the participation of a new and strong voice to represent the countries in the UN.
 
Excerpts from CSO statement of Sri Lanka- ‘We believe that we owe it to the citizens of Sri Lanka, whose daily existence has now become a challenge, to report the truth| our systems, processes and everyday lives are far from the envisioned 2030 sustainable development transformation.
The Sri Lankan government, non-state stakeholders and the public citizens must take collective ownership of the transformation and its localization; to make sustainable development a daily commitment rather than a beautiful mirage of idealistic change we strive to experience.’

Excerpts from CSO statement from Pakistan

How is the government addressing regressions and stagnation on critical goals including inequalities, hunger, justice, education, SRHR, gender equality, and climate change? What steps has the government taken to ensure inclusion of the poorest, women & girls, transgender, religious & sexual minorities, farmers, laborers, and persons with disabilities in public sector programs? How is the government ensuring the protection of human rights defenders, journalists, and environmental activists facing persecution, cyber harassment, and forced disappearances?CSOs observe that: Despite COVID 19 recovery measures, the country faces vaccine apartheid with fragile health systems further weakened by IFI conditionalities.

ADA Side Events
 

Powerpoint Presentation here
Recording here
Agenda here
 

Event information: This side event focused on different approaches to aligning the Paris Agreements and the 2030 Agenda in national policy frameworks. To address the lack of policy coherence with these two international frameworks, this side event encourages recognized and active efforts to pursue policy coherence in order to achieve the objectives of the Paris Agreements and the 2030 Agenda. This side event was jointly organized by ADA (Asia Development Alliance), in partnership with Forus, PIANGO, JANIC, APRN, CECODECON, and Roots for Equity.
Recording here
Report here
 
Planning Dialog- 2023 Mid Revie of SDGs
This meeting was organized for all the CSOs to share key priorities and to discuss joint campaign work in September 2022 and 2023.


 

Meeting with UNESCAP ES and a few members states on side-lines of HLPF

Some of us, as part of the APRCEM, met the executive secretary of the UN ESCAP and discussed how ESCAP could facilitate dialogue between civil society and member states, especially during the political forums, preparation for the SDG summit- how CSOs could be facilitated, that will lead to the SDG summit and HLPF, next year which is also going to be the mid-term review of the SDGs implementation in 2023. We also discussed CSO's engagement in the forthcoming SDGs sub-regional forums in Asia.

We also met the member states and missions of Malaysia, Pakistan, Philippines, Finland, and Sri Lanka, Pakistan and emphasize n the greater role of CSOs played in SDGs implementation and how to strengthen and maximize CSOs' presence
 

Unmute Civil Society towards a Recovery for All CSO Day

Co-hosted by the Governments of Denmark and Costa Rica and co-organized by UN Foundation, Action for Sustainable Development, CIVICUS, GCAP, and Forus as a follow-up to the UNmute Civil Society initiative

Watch the recording here

The day long event was co-hosted by UN HLPF, along with A4SD, GCAP, Forus and CIVICUS in the Ford Foundation building and was supported by the UN Foundation. The purpose of the day was to explore the ways in which civil society engagement with the UN system could be significantly strengthened

Official Major Groups & Other Stakeholders session

You can watch the official sessions again on UN WebTV if you search by date, in particular, you may like to watch the main Major Group & Other Stakeholder plenary session, which took place on the morning of 12 July: ‘Vision of civil society: Leaving no one behind in recovering better’

C20- Policy Dialog – 27-28 July, Jakarta

On 27-28 July 2022, Civil-20 (C20) as part of the G20 engagement group successfully held a C20 Policy Dialogue Forum; an agenda to ensure a transparent, inclusive, and democratic dialogue space between the C20 and the G20 Working Groups in order to accommodate the recommendations of civil society as a commitment of the G20 Leaders.
The C20 Policy Dialogue Forum in Jakarta reached 315 participants from 13 countries worldwide who participated online and offline, involving around a hundred CSOs and 10 G20 Working Groups on Finance and Sherpa Track, also attended by 5 embassies and 5 G20 Engagement Groups. The G20 Co-Sherpa Mr Edi Prio Pambudi and the G20 Finance Deputy Mr Wempi Saputra also actively participated in the forum.
Each of the seven working groups from C20 had provided policy recommendations to their respective counterparts (G20 Working Groups) on the issue of vaccines access and global health; gender equality and disability; environment, climate justice, and energy transition; tax and sustainable finance; education, digitalization, and civic space; anti-corruption; sustainable development goals and humanitarian. Each WG has presented the summary of the policy recommendations to the G20 Co-Sherpa Mr Edi Prio Pambudi who was attending in-person. The forum concluded with supporting statements from Mr Pambudi ensuring that he considers the recommendations seriously.
You can read the Summary of C20 Working Group Dialogue here and the press release here.
We would like to thank all those involved in the success of this agenda, for all the C20 members who have worked hard to produce policy recommendations that can represent the voice of the people. Let us together hand in hand, continue to succeed the G20 Indonesia's presidency through inclusive and democratic participation! 
Keep yourself updated about the C20 agenda and news by following us through our social media, instagram/facebook @civilsociety20, twitter @C20EG, and our website on https://civil-20.org/

Interesting Readings!!

• Statement of the Asia Pacific Regional CSO Engagement Mechanism (APRCEM) on the 2022 HLPF Ministerial Declaration
• The NGO Major Group Statements can be found in our website: https://www.ngomg.org/reports Scroll down to the section 'NGO MG Interventions HLPF 2022' and you will access to them by clicking on each document hyperlink. 
• The Ministerial Declaration was adopted at the HLPF 2022. An Advance copy can be found here.
• Measuring Progress Through Numbers: Pakistan’s First SDG Status Report
• Secretary-General’s Report Presents Pathway to Reach SDGs
•  Pakistan Civic Space, democracy and human rights

HLPF Declaration Reaffirms SDGs as Blueprint for Accelerating Action
HLPF 2022 began planning for the 2023 SDG Summit, with the architects of the SDGs challenging Member States to be “disruptive” in their planning for the session to get the 2030 Agenda back on track. Read

Action!!
 
GAELA -Asia- 1-4 November

Webinar on HLPF 2022- Outcome and Follow up- August 29 (Monday), 2022

NGO MG Global and Regional Organizing Partners ‘contact details

 
Global Organizing Partners (ngomajorgroupopny@gmail.com):
Jessica Bridgers (jessica.bridgers@wfa.org)
Lani Anaya  (lani@myworldmexico.org)
Oli Henman (oli.henman@action4sd.org)
 
Regional Organizing Partners:
Central Africa: Bernard Lutete Di Lutete (bernlutete@yahoo.fr)
Eastern Africa: Henry Oriokot (henrycidc@gmail.com)
Northern Africa: Hagar Monsif (h.monsif@maatpeace.org)
Southern Africa: Joseph Mihaye (aminiac15@gmail.com)
Western Africa: Kofi Kankam (eri@eri.kabissa.org)
 
Caribbean: Donovan McLaren (kevoy1@yahoo.com) and Joseph Severe (unascadhaiti@gmail.com)
North America: Kehkashan Basu (kehkashanbasu@greenhopefoundation.com)
South America: Rosario Diaz Garavito (r.garavito@themillennialsmovement.org)
 
Asia: Jyotsna Mohan (jyotsna@ada2030.org)
Central Asia: Artem Stepanenko (a.stepanenko@eca-ces.ru)
 
Europe: Lara-Zuzan Golesorkhi (golesorkhiwow@gmail.com)
 
Middle East/North Africa: Anis Brik (anisdago@gmail.com)
 
Pacific: Emeline Siale (siale@piango.org)

• ADA's official website has been renewed. All the information related to the implementation of SDGs in Asia and actions conducted by Asian CSOs will be accumulated on this website. Please visit www.ada2030.org
• ADA's Facebook page has been activated! The page will channel useful information among civil society actors in Asia. Feel free to tag @Asia Development Alliance in future collaboration. The page is accessible with this web address: https://www.facebook.com/ada2030/ 
• ADA Twitter account @alliance_asia