11 July 2018: On Wednesday, 11 July 2018, on the sidelines of the High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF), the Global Sustainable Development Report’s (GSDR) Independent Group of Scientists and the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA) convened a briefing during which GSDR scientists reported on the status of the next quadrennial GSDR and engaged in discussions with governments and other interested stakeholders.

During the event, scientists involved in drafting the report, inter alia: described the process of developing the GSDR, which will be finalized in early 2019; noted that more than 50 African countries participated in consultations, focusing on the region’s challenges regarding SDG implementation; and emphasized the report’s focus on technological innovation.

Endah Murniningtyas, Indonesia, and Peter Messerli, Switzerland, who serve as co-chair for the Independent Group of Scientists preparing the GSDR, addressed participants. Murniningtyas highlighted that the side event was the third consultation opportunity for the draft GSDR report. Messerli discussed the process of developing the GSDR report, including work to understand the overall picture of opportunities and challenges for making transformation achievable, identifying how these opportunities and challenges are connected to each other, and consulting with non-scientific actors.

During the discussion, participants raised issues related to, inter alia: whether the political setting compromises the group’s work; whether human psychological dimensions are considered; the potential for report outputs to take the form of a toolbox or plugins to expand usability; promoting the private sector’s role in enhancing achievement of the SDGs; the spatial and temporal dimensions of the report; the fact that no country is on track to meet SDG 13 (climate action) targets; and the need to highlight the science-policy interface at future briefings. [GSDR 2019 Website] [IISD RS Coverage of the Side Event on the GSDR 2019]