In Berlin, UN SDG Action Campaign Delivers Appeal to Unite to Act
On 9 May, the UN SDG Action Campaign joined UNDP and UNIDO at a special event in Berlin, Germany, to mark 50 years of Germany’s accession to the United Nations and celebrate the opening of a new UNDP-UNIDO shared office in the German capital.
The high-profile event, which included the participation of UNDP Administrator Achim Steiner, UNIDO Executive Director Gerd Müller, State Secretary for Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, Jochen Flasbarth, and the UN SDG Action Campaign Global Director, Marina Ponti, was also an opportunity to highlight the global halfway point in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals ahead of this year’s critical SDG Summit taking place in New York in September.
“The effort ahead of us to ensure a just and green transition may seem daunting. But there is nothing human creativity cannot achieve when we unite, with a clear vision and a sense of urgency,” UN SDG Action Campaign Global Director Marina Ponti told delegates gathered at the event. “For multilateralism to work, it must first and foremost work for “we the peoples,” in all our respective diversity. The people, however, must also be the agents of this multilateralism through more networked and distributed decision-making as we confront today’s challenges and anticipate future threats we may face as a collective humanity.”
In 2022, the UN SDG Action Campaign and its partners mobilized 142 million actions across the globe under the banner of Flip the Script with the targeted goal of inspiring and mobilizing millions towards Agenda 2030. This year, the Campaign has announced the launch of a new effort aimed at increasing engagement and momentum towards the Summit and beyond. In Berlin, Ms. Ponti noted, however, that to amplify the reach of the SDGs, communities, organizations, and individuals across the world must first be inspired, mobilized, and united in action.
In her remarks, Ms. Ponti also made clear that to achieve our sustainable transition to an equitable future for all, the global community would require three critical actors: champions of multilateralism; partners; and visionaries. In all three categories, she added, Germany had been a stalwart achiever.
“Germany has been a major advocate for multilateralism and for the issues and values we share. The Government of Germany is a key donor who is taking its partnership role very seriously, inspiring a movement of actions across the world,” she said.
“Each day, at the UN SDG Action Campaign’s offices at the UN Campus in Bonn, we nurture the belief that what we can imagine we can achieve. And this message of hope is a core message of our Campaign which thrives on the actions of individuals and initiatives that make a difference in bringing about positive change at local and national level to build a more sustainable future for all.”
The UN SDG Action Campaign is a special initiative of the UN Secretary-General, mandated to mobilize, inspire, and connect people and organizations worldwide to take action for the SDGs. It convenes the annual Global Week to #Act4SDGs, which takes place every September during the UN General Assembly, to show world leaders that people around the world are committed, dedicated, and inspired to build a more just, sustainable and peaceful future for all. In 2022, a record +142 million actions in at least 190 countries and territories were registered, proving that together, our collective power can bring positive change in the face of global challenges.
The Campaign is preparing to launch its latest initiative — which will culminate during the 2023 Global Week and UN SDG Summit — with a unique ambition of stimulating dialogue, fostering unity, promoting collective action, and driving transformative changes aligned with the SDGs.
