They made the call in the virtual programme organised by Citizen’s Platform for SDGs, Bangladesh on “What have we learned after five years of Voluntary National Reviews?”
The keynote paper of the event was delivered by Irena Zubcevic, Chief of Intergovernmental Policy and Review Branch, Office of Intergovernmental Support and Coordination for Sustainable Development, United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA), New York.
The session was chaired by Dr Debapriya Bhattacharya, Convenor, Citizen’s Platform and Distinguished Fellow of Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD).
Irena Zubcevic mentioned challenges behind VNRs--- insufficient time and resources for more robust capacity building, insufficient coordination and integration at the government level, local level and supported by the UN system.
“Insufficient and ad hoc engagement of stakeholders, not enough data to monitor and evaluate processes, and lack of comparability among reports due to different approaches and methods used are other challenges for VNRs,” she also said.
Dr Debapriya said all national and global bodies have to strengthen the place of accountability and transparency for the VNRs process.
“We should accelerate the spread of work which is needed now. We all have to involve in work and strengthen capacity to this end,” he also said.
The VNRs aim to facilitate the sharing of experiences, including successes, challenges and lessons learned, with a view to accelerating the implementation of the 2030 Agenda.
It also seeks to strengthen policies and institutions of governments and to mobilize multi-stakeholder support and partnerships for the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals.
Saber Hossain Chowdhury, MP, Chairman, Parliamentary Standing Committee on Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change and Honorary President of Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and Mia Seppo, UN Resident Coordinator in Bangladesh also spoke there.
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