14 February 2014: The Co-Chairs of the UN General Assembly’s (UNGA) Open Working Group (OWG) on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have circulated a draft progress report of the Group’s stocktaking phase. Member States reportedly have been given until 20 February to request changes to the text.

In the report, Csaba Kőrösi, Permanent Representative of Hungary, and Macharia Kamau, Permanent Representative of Kenya, summarize the Group’s first eight sessions, held between March 2013 and February 2014. The draft document includes summary points from the 18 agenda items discussed by the Group, and also recalls the daily meetings held with Major Groups and stakeholders, an intersessional meeting focused on rights-based SDGs, an Expert Group Meeting on Science and Technology for SDGs and an informal meeting on measuring progress with members of the statistical community.

The OWG’s next phase will focus on consensus building on the goals and targets. In preparation for its next meeting, on 3-5 March 2014, the Co-Chairs will present an “inclusive and representative list/compendium of priority areas of sustainable development and the universal commitments needed to make significant and measurable progress in those areas, based on the expressed opinions and interests during the whole stock-taking phase and guided by the criteria and principles of the Rio+20 Outcome Document,” according to a letter of 17 January 2014.

The Group must report to the UNGA during the 68th Session (by September 2014). [Publication: Progress report of the Open Working Group of the General Assembly on Sustainable Development Goals] [OWG Website] [IISD RS Coverage of OWG 8] [Letter from Co-Chairs] [IISD RS Sources]