The Ministry of Planning, Development, and Special Initiatives hosted a one-day National SDGs Conference 2024 in Islamabad, bringing together experts, parliamentarians, national and international stakeholders, UN representatives, civil societies, academia, and specialists from diverse fields. The conference aimed to develop effective implementation strategies and policies to achieve the SDGs by 2030. Addressing the conference, Federal Minister for Planning, Development & Special Initiatives Ahsan Iqbal emphasized the importance of aligning Pakistan's developmental trajectory with the SDGs. He highlighted the need for sustainable practices, private sector involvement, and media engagement to raise public awareness about the SDGs. Minister Iqbal stressed that Pakistan's ambition to become one of the top ten global economies by 2047 requires concerted efforts to eliminate dissenting voices and rally behind a unified agenda of economic prosperity. He reiterated the government's commitment to inclusive development, prioritizing citizens' well-being and safeguarding future generations' interests. Secretary Planning Awais Manzur Sumra acknowledged the national imperative of reporting progress on the SDGs and urged stakeholders to prioritize initiatives fostering sustainable development. He called for a critical reevaluation of implementation strategies to ensure alignment with the core principles of the SDGs, emphasizing the need for multi-stakeholder engagement to accelerate progress towards a sustainable future. The conference deliberations focused on environment, economic, and social aspects of sustainable development. The environment session emphasized the need for effective implementation of environmental policies with clear milestones, sharing data sets on environmental indicators, adopting carbon credit policies to boost exports, and establishing technical and apex committees on environment. The session also highlighted the importance of smart urbanization, renewable energy, and inclusion of marginalized communities in policies and plans. The economic session stressed the need for inclusive development, enhancing women's role in labor participation, focusing on the 20 poorest districts, and allocating resources to address poverty. The session also emphasized the importance of efficient energy use, protecting labor by ensuring minimum wages, and formalizing informal labor. The social session focused on the need for inclusive education policies, implementing behavior change communication strategies for family planning, achieving universal health coverage targets by 2030, and decreasing social and income inequalities for women in agriculture. The conference reiterated Pakistan's ownership of the SDGs, emphasizing their integration into the national development vision and the need for multi-stakeholder engagement to accelerate progress towards a sustainable future.
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