To achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), civil society representatives at a consultation session have called for accelerated efforts to meet these goals within the stipulated timeframe to ensure sustainable progress. They highlighted and discussed the bottlenecks, lacunas and challenges in the budgets, policies and strategies for achieving the SDGs.
The consultation, organized jointly by Awaz CDS and UGOOD in Islamabad, was to review the progress of the government’s official Voluntary National Review (VNR) through the Peoples Scorecard and collect input from the civil society organizations on the subject.
The event was part of a series of consultations organized countrywide to gather information from informed civil society about the government’s performance in achieving the SDGs.
Around 35 members from civil society organizations (CSOs) participated in the consultation, mostly from organizations led by women, youth, transgender, people living with disabilities and minority groups. Sightsavers Pakistan, VSO and A4SD supported the talk.
In his opening remarks, CEO UGOOD Syed Ishtiaq Gilani appreciated the participants for attending the consultation and hoped their valuable findings would help shape the accurate SDGs database. Participating in the talks, Country Director Sightsavers Munazza Gillani praised Awaz CDS-PDA and UGOOD for arranging such an inclusive event representing all PLWDs, trans genders, youth and men and women.
She shared Sightsavers’ initiatives and collaborations with CSOs and the government to make the entire SDGs process inclusive. She emphasized inclusion and the availability of PLWDs, and disaggregated data for all goals.
Chief Executive Awaz CDS Pakistan Zia ur Rehman gave a detailed orientation about the event’s objectives and deliberations. He informed the participants that AwazCDS and Pakistan Development Alliance (PDA), on behalf of civil society, are developing a spotlight report on SDGs parallel to the government’s official VNR report, which it intends to present to the UN.
Similarly, the spotlight report will be developed by gathering information from people and depicting real, on-ground situations about the performance and progress of Pakistan on SDGs at the same forum, he said.
Zia ur Rehman also apprised the audience that the data collection process was a two-pronged activity, an online survey uploaded on the PDA website and a series of consultations in provincial capitals and regions, i.e. AJK and GB.
He shared that AwazCDS is engaging with civil society through people’s scorecards to reach out to informed citizens who cannot contribute to the national or official VNR report process. The spotlight
report will collect citizens’ voices to achieve SDGs, whereas the official process relies on secondary data. He expressed concern over the delay by the government in making the VNR public and called for speedy completion of this process.
He gave a quick rundown of the online survey and the indicators used to assess specific goals CSOs are working on. He also shared the link and urged the audience to fill out the online survey.
Hour-long group work was also conducted where the discussants’ findings, views and assessments were presented. Overall they depicted a dismal picture of the government’s performance on the SDGs they are working on. The information gathered in this consultation will be combined with the findings of planned consultations, and a consolidated spotlight report will be developed