ABUJA – (Office of SSAP on SDGs) – The Federal Government is determined to aggressively implement the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for the benefit of all Nigerians. This was disclosed by the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Princess Adejoke Orelope-Adefulire when she received the Task Force Team on the Total Official Support for Sustainable Development (TOSSD) in her office in Abuja recently.
Princess Adefulire, who was represented by the Secretary of Program (SOP), Waziri Laminu hinted that as a prelude to a seamless implementation of the SDGs in Nigeria, the Federal Government has put in place a strong and robust tracking and reporting system as mechanism. She further said that the production of the “MDGs 2015 Endpoint Report” that chronicles the lessons learnt from implementation of the MDGs and the “National Voluntary Review Document” that reviewed the status and experiences so far on the implementation of the SDGs are all clear attestation to the efforts being made to attain the SDGs.
She however stressed the fact that these documents were presented in 2015 and 2016 respectively, where they were applauded by the UN General Sessions as clear indication that Nigeria is on track as far as implementation of the SDGs is concerned.
In the area of partnership, the SSAP explained that the office is partnering with the Ministry of Budget and National Planning to ensure that the core areas of the SDGs such as food security, agriculture, inclusive growth, security, energy and industrialization among others are integrated into the National Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (NERGP). This partnership, she maintained extends to the issues of mapping of the existing SDGs related data and establishing baseline data for benchmarking SDGs progress. Adding, the office is partnering with the National Bureau of Statistics and United Nations Development Program (UNDP) towards achieving these.
The SSAP welcomed the Team and expressed Nigeria’s willingness to cooperate with it in whichever way possible to achieve Sustainable Development. She stressed the fact that Nigeria is both a receiver and giver of international cooperation at all levels.
In his remarks at the occasion, the leader of the Task Force Team, Guillaume Delalande said the purpose of the visit was to conduct a pilot study to track the flow of resources for Sustainable Development. He later mentioned that the pilot study would foster accountability and proper management of development financing as well as help to determine proper use of the resources for the programmes they are meant to achieve.
He stated that the study will be conducted in about 15-20 MDAs, maintaining that the study is critical as it is expected to tell whether the TOSSD instrument is working or not. He added that the outcome of the study will form part of the report that the team will submit to the resource providers in 2020.
He noted that resource mobilization is very key in Sustainable Development issues, stressing that the organization encourages private finance mobilization for the SDGS. He pledged support for Nigeria in areas of training and capacity building, informing that the TOSSD is an emerging mechanism created to track the flow of resources used for the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals. He described it as a component part of the activities of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
