In the late 1990’s the world looked a really quite different place to the way it looks now. In 1992, Francis Fukuyama had brought out his book The End of History, the premise of which was that with the recent fall of the Berlin Wall and communism, history had indeed come to an end and globalisation and neo-liberalism would be the wave of the future forever. It doesn’t look that way now, as the reverberations of the 2008 crash still echo around the world 17 years later.
Another change that has happened, sadly, is that there is less optimism or determination regarding humanity dealing with its major issues, such as poverty and the Climate Crisis. Around the year 2000, 191 countries and at least 22 international organisations signed up to the Millenium Development Goals. There was much optimism that real change was at hand, in a more stable world and that the Millenium Development Goals would see real progress towards eradicating many of the real scourges of humanity, such as infant mortality, the incidence of tuberculosis and dirty water which so many millions were forced to drink.
Happily, in February 2018, the World Health Organisation (WHO), were able to announce that real progress had been made in a number of areas. The number of children across the world dying under 5 years of age had fallen from 12.7 million in 1990 to 6.3 million in 2013. Meanwhile, in developing countries, the percentage of underweight children under 5 years old dropped to 17% in 2013, down from 28% in 1990.
There had been a 38% fall in HIV infections across the world between 2001 and 2013, while existing cases of tuberculosis were said to be declining, along with deaths among HIV-negative tuberculosis cases. The WHO was also able to announce that “in 2010, the world met the United Nations Millennium Development Goals target on access to safe drinking-water, as measured by the proxy indicator of access to improved drinking-water sources, but more needs to be done to achieve the sanitation target”.
That is not to say that there had been sufficient progress in all areas, but there was still optimism that things were going forward. Since the mid-2010’s the Millenium Development Goals have been superseded by the Sustainable Development Goals. Again, 191 countries have signed up to these, which consist of 17 goals and 169 targets in all.
G20 Summit in South Africa
These development goals will be under scrutiny again in November this year at the next G20 summit, hosted by South Africa
Environmental organisation Green Christian has noted four particular areas of concern that South Africa, as hosts of the G20, want delegates to concentrate on.
Firstly, they want the G20 to take action to strengthen disaster response and resilience. More and more countries around the world are being affected by the increasing rate of climate-induced natural disasters. These are having a devastating impact on less wealthy countries that cannot afford the costs of recovery and rebuilding. South Africa will call for the global community, including development banks, the private sector and international financial institutions, to step up and provide better post-disaster reconstruction.
Secondly, South Africa intends to take action to ensure that low-income countries have better debt sustainability. An unsustainable level of debt which limits the ability to invest in infrastructure, healthcare, education and other development needs is a key obstacle to inclusive growth in developing economies, including many in Africa. South Africa will seek to build upon initiatives undertaken in recent years, to put forward sustainable solutions to extend debt relief to developing economies and so tackle high structural deficits and liquidity challenges. It will also be seen as important that the sovereign credit ratings for all countries are fair and transparent and that they address high risk premiums for developing economies. Green Christian believe that the G20 has the capacity to address the key debt question of dealing with the cost of capital in a comprehensive manner.
Thirdly, Green Christian points out that a just energy transition is needed and the finance needs to be put in place for this. They go on to say that, “South Africa will seek to secure agreement on increasing the quality and quantity of climate finance flows to developing countries. This would include strengthening multilateral development banks, enhancing and streamlining support for country platforms such as the Just Energy Transition Partnership and more effectively leveraging private capital”.
Fourthly, there needs to be a fairer system in terms of mineral extraction for those resources that will be needed as we move towards a transition to a carbon-free economy. Green Christian states that, “as mineral extraction accelerates to match the needs of the energy transition, it is crucial to ensure that the countries and local communities endowed with these resources are the ones to benefit the most. South Africa will use its G20 Presidency to champion the use of critical minerals as an engine for growth and development in Africa”.
Hope for the future
The first two months of the Trump presidency have perhaps blinded us to the kind of hopeful agendas that are being promoted by South Africa. We must not let Trump’s agenda of selfishness, wilful blindness and lack of compassion become the norm. We have seen drastic cuts to US AID which endanger lives, while sadly we have also seen Keir Starmer following suit with a deadly cut of Foreign Aid from 0.5% of UK GDP to a meagre 0.3%. There can be no doubt that these are difficult days for those of us who believe in building a fairer, kinder, more sustainable world.
With world affairs being increasingly dominated by the two huge oligarchies of Russia and the United States, it can appear that the agenda of ‘might is right’ is the only one in town, but this is simply not the case. Indeed, it is more important than ever to remember aspirations like the Sustainable Development Goals and also to remember times in the past, when things have looked more hopeful.
Let us recover the spirit of hope and have faith that we can still build a fairer world, where everybody is given the chance to flourish, within a sustainable framework, which also other life to do the same. And at the same time, let us wish South Africa well in their attempt to use the G20 summit in November to start to move the most powerful countries in the world back on the track to that fairer world and to raise aspirations again, that we can indeed solve our greatest problems, be it regarding poverty or the Climate, human rights or the ability for all of humanity to be decently fed.
The long night of Trump and Putin will end. Let us build now for the coming of the dawn.
And let us stop the dream of sustainable development from slipping through our fingers, just when we most need to believe in it and work for it.
CLICK HERE TO DONATE TO OUR CROWDFUNDER
HELP US BECOME STRONGER SO THAT WE CAN CONTINUE TO DELIVER POWERFUL CITIZEN JOURNALISM!
