How Can the Asia-Pacific Achieve the SDGs in the COVID-19 Era?: Sectoral Integration and Social Inclusion

On May 18, 2020, the virtual side event for the APFSD was held with a total attendance of 288 people. The Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES) and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) jointly organised this event to share how countries and other stakeholders in the Asia-Pacific can work across sectors and levels, while harnessing the energies of different social groups, to achieve the SDGs in the COVID-19 Era.

The international community agreed on an ambitious set of 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) five years ago. Today most assessments suggest that countries in the Asia-Pacific will need to accelerate progress if they are to achieve the SDGs. While these assessments underline the need to move fast, COVID-19 demonstrates that the quality of development is as important as its speed. A related lesson from COVID-19 is that while human activity adversely affects the natural environment, the natural environment can also constrain human activity. A final take home point is that the SDGs can ensure pandemic stimulus and recovery plans recognise that ecological limits are interrelated with human activities. Leveraging the SDGs to recognise these interrelationships in pandemic recoveries will require governments to become more adept at working across sectors and engaging diverse segments of society. Sectoral integration and social inclusion should therefore feature prominently on development agendas in the Asia-Pacific.