15 May 2014: Participants at the second workshop on ‘Making the High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development Work: How to build an effective “Review Mechanism”‘ addressed five questions: Who is to be reviewed, by whom and how often? What is to be reviewed? What might be the incentives to participate? What is the optimal approach for national and systemic reviews? And how will the review outputs link to other elements of the HLPF/SDG/Post-2015 puzzle, and to the wider geography of sustainable development endeavor?

The workshop took place in New York, US, on 15 May 2014, and was sponsored by the Permanent Missions to the United Nations of Egypt, Liechtenstein, Norway, Peru, Pakistan, the Republic of Korea and Switzerland, and organized by the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD).

The discussion indicated that the following could be important in the eventual review mechanism: the framework provided by the post-2015 development agenda and the SDGs; a focus on implementation, including means of implementation; a thematic basis for the review that also will reinforce integration across the three dimensions of sustainable development and avoid creating ‘silos’; a focus on accountability as a positive, learning-oriented experience for those under review; the central purpose of tracking progress towards achieving the goals; and permitting a review of the goals and targets themselves.

According to Geir Pedersen, Permanent Representative of Norway, in closing remarks, the discussion indicated that the review must not be only theoretical but also have an impact, in order to demonstrate its value to leaders, such as by offering a learning opportunity and identifying bottlenecks. [IISD RS Meeting Coverage]