Failure to meet the SDGs is not an option
written by Dr Dennis Rangi, Director General, Development at CABI
Science and politics have inextricably met in recent weeks to send out a stark warning to the international development community that we are failing to meet the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Quite simply the clock is ticking on the need to achieve, what may seem like a long list of ‘pipe dreams,’ the SDGs by 2030 and will be met with failure unless we radically do something to change our way of thinking and plans of action.
The BBC reported at the beginning of March the findings of a new paper in Nature ‘Mapping child growth failure in Africa between 2000 and 2015.’ This paper by Professor Simon Hay et al suggests mixed results.
On the one hand nearly all African countries demonstrated improvements for children under 5 years old for stunting, wasting, and underweight — the core components of child growth failure. The good news is that if current rates of progress are sustained, many areas of Africa will meet the World Health Organization Global Targets 2025 to improve maternal, infant and young child nutrition.
But on the other hand, the bad news is that high levels of growth failure will persist across the Sahel and at these rates, most of the continent fail to meet the Sustainable Development Goal target — to end malnutrition in the next 12 years.
Professor Hay’s team produced a series of 5km by 5km scale maps showing child growth and educational attainment across Africa over the 15-year span of the study. Encouragingly, the maps show that most African countries — including the sub-Saharan Africa and eastern and southern regions — show improvement in malnutrition. But they also show large disparities within individual countries.
Meanwhile this science preceded a frank and honest account of progress being made to meet the SDGs by The Rt Hon Penny Mordaunt — the UK’s Secretary of State for International Development — when at the Bond conference in London she said that ‘on current trajectories, achieving the Global Goals — which we talk about and show our commitment to in the pin badges we wear — is simply out of reach. We have known for some time we are failing.’ The solution Ms Mordaunt argues is to put the beneficiaries of aid first.
I believe that here at CABI we already do just that — the farmer, their families and the wider public who benefit from our help in growing more and losing less are all very much at the heart of our mission. We are dedicated to improving people’s lives by using scientific expertise to solve problems in agriculture and the environment. The recent Nature paper and speech from Ms Mordaunt serve as very useful ‘wake-up calls’ for us not to rest on our laurels but to continue the fight against ‘No Poverty,’ ‘Zero Hunger,’ ‘Quality Education’ and essentially ‘Partnerships for the Goals’ — because we cannot achieve what we need to achieve without continued partnership working and collaboration.
Despite the apparent doom and gloom I am confident that we have our sights firmly set on success and only time will tell if that translates into achieving the SDGs in their entirety. For us failure is not an option. To know that we might be missing the targets now is good because we can realign our sights and refocus our efforts. We are making progress and this is better than no progress at all.
CABI’s science is making a difference. For example, our work in partnership to help improve Ghana phyosanitary systems means vegetable exports worth $15 million a year are continuing once again after the lifting of a Directorate-General for Health and Food Safety of the European Commission ban imposed in 2015.
We also hope our Action on Invasives programme will improve the farming for 50 million poor households by tackling invasive species — such as the Fall Armyworm which we believe could cost just ten of the continent’s major maize producing economies in Africa a total of $2.2bn to $5.5bn a year in lost maize harvests — if the pest is not properly managed.
Not only that but we are also leading the fight against a fruit and nut pest — the brown marmorated stink bug Halyomorpha halys — which in 2016 caused $60m worth of damage to Georgia’s hazelnut (a third of its crop) and in 2010, $37m worth of apples were destroyed in parts of the USA.
Meanwhile, the CABI-led Plantwise programme has so far reached out to more than 12 million farmers, 79 percent of whom reported a yield increase after visiting a plant clinic.
These are just a few examples of where our scientific expertise is making a difference for the 500 million smallholder farmers we support around the world and who rely on their crops for food and income.
We must take note of such warnings that the SDGs are not being met. It is a chance to take stock, see how we can improve, keep challenging ourselves and work harder in partnership to keep striving towards the Global Goals — we owe it to ourselves but most importantly our beneficiaries.
Together we can make a difference and here at CABI we will continue working alongside our partners, including the UK Department for International Development (DFID), Chinese Ministry of Agriculture, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation and many more core funders and member countries, until we play our part in achieving what we set out to do and that is to help achieve the SDGs!
CABI in June 2017 signed an MoU with the Sustainable Development Goals Centre for Africa (SDGC|A) which enables CABI to provide technical support to the delivery of SDGs 1, 2, 4, 12, 15 and 17 in Africa. SDGC/A supports governments, civil society, businesses and academic institutions in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in Africa.
You can find out more about CABI’s work towards the SDGs here.
About Dr Dennis Rangi, Director General, Development at CABI
Dr Rangi started his career at CABI more than 20 years ago as a Project Entomologist. He then became Deputy Regional Representative for Africa before being promoted to Regional Representative for Africa. In 2006 Dr Rangi was promoted to Executive Director for International Development.
Based at CABI’s offices in Nairobi, Kenya, Dr Rangi is responsible for overseeing CABI’s agricultural and environmental projects across all CABI’s three themes (Commodities, Invasive Species and Knowledge for Development) around the world.
CFS blog articles are contributed by different stakeholders and guest writers. All opinions expressed belong solely to the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the Committee on World Food Security (CFS).
