Dubai Expo 2020 to hold Global Goals Week to promote SDGs

DUBAI: Dubai Expo 2020 is creating a platform to accelerate collective progress of the world towards United Nations Sustainable Development Goals for a better and more equitable future by 2030. It has launched a Global Goals Week from January 15 to January 22. The Global Goal week will be a platform for various players and stakeholders to connect and work towards achieving the SDGs.

With less than nine years to achieve the goals, organisers said that this week of hybrid events will highlight how the world’s fundamental challenges are interconnected and can only be addressed through revitalised multilateralism. The seventh of ten Theme Weeks presented by Expo 2020, Dubai’s Program for People and Planet is Global Goals Week.

Reem Al Hashimy, UAE Minister of State for International Cooperation and Director General of Expo 2020 Dubai, said that Expo 2020 Dubai aims to serve as a launchpad for addressing humanity’s greatest challenges in a spirit of hope, resilience and optimism. The UN Deputy Secretary-General, Amina J Mohammed, stated that at the heart of the 2030 Agenda is the need for immediate action to combat growing poverty and inequality, empower women and girls, and address the climate emergency. The world has yet to embrace the rate and magnitude of change required to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, she added.

On January 15, Global Goals Week will feature events such as an opening speech by Amina J Mohammed and a display of youth from around the world sharing their SDG commitments on the world’s largest 360-degree projection screen at Al Wasl Plaza. The flagship event, ‘Global Goals for All,’ co-curated by Project Everyone, will feature Mariam Hareb Almheiri, UAE Minister of Climate Change and Environment; Jayathma Wickramanayake, UN Secretary-Envoy General’s on Youth; and, virtually, Bill Gates, Co-Chair, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The group will meet on January 16, to explore the facts and solutions that are needed to spur action on the world’s most serious concerns, such as gender inequality and the climate disaster.

On January 18, the Global Goals Business Forum, co-curated by the Dubai Chamber of Commerce (Official Business Integrator of Expo 2020 Dubai), Estonia, and the UN Global Compact, will examine how the global community can foster economic prosperity for all while ensuring the SDGs are met by the 2030 deadline. A trilateral summit titled ‘Coming Full Circle: Water, Food, Energy Summit,’ co-curated by Jordan, the Netherlands, and the UAE, will bring together heads of government and policymakers from January 18-19. Its goal is to increase collective understanding of the interdependence of water, food, and energy security, as well as solutions that integrate the three, in the context of ongoing collaborations between the three co-curating countries.

On January 20, the Global Best Practice Assembly will highlight all 50 Global Best Practice Programme projects from around the world that have provided impactful and sustainable interventions, with the goal of expanding them elsewhere.