Giving Compass' Take:
- Kaysie Brown and Krista Rasmussen share five takeaways from the Sustainable Development Goals Report 2020 that acknowledge the challenges posed by COVID-19 and how to take action to avoid lost progress.
- How can donors get involved in helping those who face the most significant consequences in terms of global health?
- Read how to address the COVID-19 crisis by investing in the SDGs.
What is Giving Compass?
We connect donors to learning resources and ways to support community-led solutions. Learn more about us.
The Sustainable Development Goals Report 2020, released at the launch of this year’s major UN SDG event, the High-Level Political Forum, highlights the progress that has been made and areas that must be safeguarded to have any chance of achieving the SDGs by 2030. The report also acknowledges the unprecedented challenges posed by COVID-19, including the need for rapid and ambitious action to avoid a lost decade of progress.
Although the ultimate toll of the pandemic is still unknown, worrying consequences and setbacks for the SDGs are already apparent. The SDG report and its companion, the Secretary-General’s annual SDG progress report, feature the first comprehensive view of the pandemic’s impact on the SDGs.
Who is getting left behind, and where are the greatest consequences from the pandemic occurring?
- People in poverty The pandemic is expected to push 71 million people back into extreme poverty by the end of the year, leading to the first increase in global rates of extreme poverty in more than 20 years.
- Women, girls and children Women are bearing some of the greatest burdens during this pandemic. More than 75 percent of doctors and nurses are women, meaning they are on the frontlines of fighting the pandemic.
- Heightened inequities It is clear that the COVID-19 pandemic is not the great equalizer. It, in fact, has a disproportionate effect on the most vulnerable and marginalized communities. As the UN Secretary-General has said: The virus “has exposed and exacerbated existing inequalities and injustices.”
- Rising tide of hunger By the end of 2020, 270 million people could face acute food insecurity, meaning their lives would be in immediate danger from lack of food.
- Difficult path to a safe climate Around the world, the pandemic is leading to dramatic shifts in human activity that have translated to short-term cleaner air and water and emissions reductions.
Read the full article about key findings from the Sustainable Development Report 2020 by Kaysie Brown and Krista Rasmussen at the United Nations Foundation.