Debapriya Bhattacharya speaks about first year of SDG journey at UNGA side event

The Chair of Southern Voice, Dr Debapriya Bhattacharya delivered the keynote speech at the UNGA side-event where he discussed on the experiences and lessons learned from the first year of the SDG journey. The side-event titled, The SDGs and Country Implementation: Navigating Between International Needs and Local Realities was jointly organised by Southern Voice on Post-MDG International Development Goals (Southern Voice), Partnership in Statistics for Development in the 21st Century (PARIS21) and Centre for International Strategic Thinking (CEPEI) during the 71st United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on September 21, 2016 in New York.

The session was kicked off by an introduction by Dr Johannes Jûtting, Manager of PARIS21. Following the keynote, Dr Claire Melamed, Managing Director, Overseas Development Institute (ODI) moderated a panel discussion that comprised of Mr Philipp Schönrock, Director, CEPEI; Ms Francesca Perucci, Assistant Director, the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) and Mr Philip Thigo, Advisor on Data and Innovation, Legislative & Intergovernmental Liaison Office at the Presidency in Kenya.

Debapriya Bhattacharya, in his keynote drew on the research undertaken by the Southern Voice and highlighted the findings related to data availability and quality, and implementation related challenges in areas of integration of SDGs in national plan and policies. He also underscored the need to address more energetically systemic and coherence related issues of the SDG Agenda.