SDGs

Z.B.'s children now walk and play in the woods as he used to when he was young
UNDP Eurasia

‘At risk’ Mediterranean forests make ‘vital contributions’ to development

27 November 2018
Europe

Between 2010 and 2015, forests around the Mediterranean have expanded by two per cent, but that has come at the price of significant degradation and increasing vulnerability to climate change, population pressures, wildfires and water scarcity, warned a new UN report launched on Tuesday.

Secretary-General Guterres looks out at a portion of the Aral Sea, which has now dried completely.
UN Spokesperson

UN launches new fund to advance sustainable development in Aral Sea region

27 November 2018
Asia Pacific

UN Secretary-General António Guterres has urged countries to fund a new initiative designed to reduce vulnerability, advance sustainable development and create decent living conditions for millions of people living around the Aral Sea, whose basin encompasses Uzbekistan, and six other countries in Central Asia.

Field school members in Kenya take agro-ecosystem analysis.
FAO

With field schools in Kenya, UN agriculture agency teaches techniques to combat drought

21 November 2018
Africa

To strengthen resilience in the Horn of Africa against natural hazards like drought, which can lead to cattle losses and increased food insecurity, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) is supporting pastoralists in northeastern Kenya’s Mandera County to grow pasture for livestock.

A village in Rwanda. The new energy framework is expected to benefit many across east Africa.
UNDP Rwanda/Alice Kayibanda

New energy security framework will help meet growing needs in East Africa, sustainably – UN economic wing

21 November 2018
Africa

Backed by the United Nations, countries in eastern Africa have launched a new energy security framework to help tackle growing challenges over energy access and availability in the region.

Rural laborers in Bahia State tend to manioc crop in Brazil's parched Northeast.
World Bank/Scott Wallace

After decade of progress, rural areas of Latin America, Caribbean slide back into poverty – UN report

21 November 2018
Americas

For the first time in a decade, the number of people falling into poverty in rural Latin America and the Caribbean has increased by two million, according to a new United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) report, which called the worrying trend a “historical reversal.”

A Farmer in her FAW-damaged maize field in Namibia.
FAO/Rachael Nandalenga

Farmers on the frontline in battle against drug-resistant microbes: UN health agency

14 November 2018
Global

The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has revealed that as some 700,000 people are dying each year from antimicrobial resistant infections, an untold number of sick animals are also suffering from diseases that do not respond to treatment.

A diver on a reef in the Red Sea.
Cinzia Osele Bismarck / Coral Reef Image Bank

Coral reefs can’t wait for world to take action, urges UN, as Biodiversity Conference gets underway

14 November 2018
Global

Sounding the alarm about the urgent need to protect coral reefs from extinction within decades, a new coalition of organizations, including the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), was launched on Wednesday in Egypt during the UN Biodiversity Conference, to galvanize global leadership before it is too late.

UN Under-Secretary-General for Global Communications Alison Smale (left) and Toshiro Muto, Chief Executive Officer of The Tokyo Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (Tokyo 2020), at the signing ceremony.
UNIC Tokyo/Takashi Okano

UN and Tokyo 2020, leverage power of Olympic Games in global sustainable development race

14 November 2018
Asia Pacific

The United Nations and the organizers of the 2020 Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games have signed an agreement to highlight the important contribution that sport makes in the race to reach the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), by the ambitious deadline of 2030.

Farmers on the Azuero Peninsula in Panama are working to transform the ranching sector by promoting the sustainable agricultural practices. (October 2018)
UNDP SGP Panama/Andrea Egan

CLIMATE CHANGE FOCUS: Cows, coffee and sustainable farming

12 November 2018
Americas

Small-scale farms in Panama are helping to heal land degraded by extensive cattle ranching and extreme rainfall or drought associated with climate change, thanks to a project supported by the UN Development Programme, (UNDP).

Civilians on the streets of Ang Tasom, Cambodia. (file)
WFP/David Longstreath

Civil society groups matter for Cambodia’s sustainable development: UN expert

8 November 2018
Asia Pacific

The Cambodian Government must work in tandem with civil society groups and build its policies around citizens’ human rights, if the country is to see durable peace and sustainable development, a UN expert urged on Friday.