Schwarzelühr-Sutter: UN Sustainable Development Goals need to be verifiable

The Federal Environment Ministry is canvasing for international support for an effective review mechanism for the UN post-2015 agenda for sustainable development. "We want to make sure from an early stage that the new SDGs are actually being met worldwide" said Parliamentary State Secretary Rita Schwarzelühr-Sutter, who will hold talks on this issue in New York this week. Over the coming days, the preparations for negotiating the post-2015 agenda for sustainable development enter their decisive phase. The post-2015 agenda will include globally applicable Sustainable Development Goals.

The UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is currently developing a synthesis report which will summarise the latest results and reports and make recommendations for the ongoing process. The report, which is expected to be published in December, will form the basis for the intergovernmental negotiations due to commence in January 2015. The post-2015 agenda will be adopted by the heads of state and government at a UN summit in New York in September 2015. Schwarzelühr-Sutter and the State Secretary at the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, Friedrich Kitschelt, will attend talks and events in New York to seek support for an ambitious result, including an effective review mechanism for the post-2015 agenda. Schwarzelühr-Sutter: "We need an ambitious and transformative post-2015 agenda. We want to achieve, as quickly as possible, the paradigm shift to an economic development that finally respects the ecological boundaries of our planet and at the same time eliminates poverty and hunger."