24 February 2014: A workshop on ‘Making the High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development Work: How to build an effective “Review Mechanism”’ was sponsored by IISD and seven governments’ permanent missions to the UN: Egypt, Liechtenstein, Norway, Peru, Pakistan, the Republic of Korea and Switzerland. The workshop sought to create an open discussion around the HLPF’s review mechanism that will begin in 2016.

Gathering on 20 February 2014, in New York, US, invited participants from governments, the UN Secretariat and NGOs, as well as two expert commenters, sought to identify potential “landing zones” where consensus on the design of the review mechanism could be detected and strengthened. According to the workshop’s moderator, “integration” and “coherence” were two of the most frequently used words during the workshop, and “the world will apply these yardsticks to the review mechanism.”

The UN General Assembly (UNGA) established the HLPF in 2012 when it adopted the outcome of the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD, or Rio+20). In 2013, the UNGA decided that the HLPF should conduct regular reviews starting in 2016, on the follow-up and implementation of sustainable development commitments and objectives, including those related to the means of implementation, within the context of the post-2015 development agenda. [IISD RS Meeting Coverage]