Following a five-month process, the UN General Assembly (UNGA) adopted resolutions on the review of the arrangements on the strengthening of the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and on the UN High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF) and the follow-up and review of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development at the global level.
The UNGA conducts periodic reviews of the functions of ECOSOC and the HLPF. The outcome of the most recent review in 2024 was the call for a full review during the Assembly’s 80th session.
In a letter dated 15 July 2026, the co-facilitators of the review – Permanent Representative of Barbados François Jackman and Permanent Representative of Malta Natasha Meli – inform UN Member States that the final draft resolutions on ECOSOC and on the HLPF are the result of a process, which produced an elements paper, a zero draft, and a “Rev.1” draft, followed by three full line-by-line readings of the compilation texts.
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Prior to being considered by the UNGA, the draft resolutions underwent two silence procedures on 24 June and 1 July. The silence procedure is a decision-making method where a proposal is treated as approved if no member objects within a set time limit. In both cases, a number of delegations broke silence on paragraphs in the ECOSOC resolution, which resulted in further refinements to the text. In the co-facilitators’ view, the final draft of the ECOSOC resolution “represents the most balanced effort to address the concerns raised by delegations during the negotiations and consultations,” with “all avenues for reaching consensus among delegations [having] been fully explored.”
The UNGA considered and adopted both resolutions at its plenary meeting on 24 July 2026.
By the text, the thematic focus of the 2028 and 2029 sessions of ECOSOC and the HLPF shall be:
- For 2028: ‘Deliver, Turning Promises into Action: Scaling up transformative, just, inclusive, equitable and coordinated action to achieve sustainable development and deliver the 2030 Agenda and its Goals’; and
- For 2029: ‘All In: Eradicating Poverty and Leaving No Goal Behind in the Implementation of the 2030 Agenda.’
The sets of Goals to undergo in-depth reviews by the HLPF are:
- For 2028: SDGs 6, 7, 9, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, and 17; and
- For 2029: SDGs 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, 10, 16, and 17.
In 2027, ECOSOC will carry out a review of its subsidiary bodies.
At the next SDG Summit in September 2027, the UNGA will review the implementation of all 17 Goals and formally launch negotiations on a post-2030 sustainable development agenda.
The next reviews of ECOSOC and the HLPF are planned for the UNGA’s 85th session in 2030. [UNGA Reviews of ECOSOC and HLPF] [Letter from UNGA President Transmitting Final Draft Resolution on ECOSOC/HLPF Reviews]