Sustainable development goals and Agenda 21

BANTAY GOBYERNO 

Ike Señeres

Something happened on the way to the forum, so to speak. The Philippine Council for Sustainable Development (PCSD) was created by an Executive Order for the purpose of planning and coordinating our actions in relation to Agenda 21, a framework that was promoted by the United Nations (UN) that was mainly about the environment.

This year however, the UN launched the new 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), covering not just the environment, but also many other development concerns. All of a sudden, practically overnight, the definition of “sustainable development” was expanded, and as it is now, the environment is just a part of it. Meanwhile, the charter of the PCSD has not yet been revised, and so it follows that as of now, it is practically limited to the environment in general and Agenda 21 in particular.

Perhaps it is just a name, but as of now, the PCSD is the only council of the government that is directly tackling “sustainable development”. Now that the UN has already expanded what that term means, the government now has to decide whether to also expand the scope of the PCSD, or to create a new council altogether.

Just to backtrack a little bit, the 17 SDGs replaced the 8 Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) of the UN that ended this year. As far as I know however, the government did not create or task a council to be on top of the 8 MDGs, not even the PCSD. As it is generally understood however, the National Economic Development Authority (NEDA) is in charge of monitoring and reporting the progress of compliance, but there was no council that was specifically tasked to ensure the compliance.

Based on the practice in the government, we could guess that “lead agencies” were assigned to make sure that our MDG targets would be met. What that means in reality is that one agency will take the lead, but the responsibility to meet the targets would be spread out among the “member agencies”.

This practice in the government is very much different from the practice in the private sector wherein a specific executive is assigned to meet specific objectives, and the buck stops with him or her, so to speak. There is no room for pointing fingers or throwing blame in the private sector because it is very clear who is supposed to get it done, and who should be blamed for it. As we already know it, different officials would attend committee meetings in the government, and that is why there is really no single point of contact and no continuity of action.

Whatever it is that happened in the past that led to our general failure to meet the MDGs should not happen again in the SDGs. How I wish that the government would just adopt the practices of the private sector so that we would really know who is responsible for meeting each and every SDG, but that would be difficult to do without amending certain laws.

Meanwhile, the government could just adopt the practice of assigning the responsibility to meet each target to one particular agency only, instead of fostering shared responsibility among several agencies. In theory, committee work is supposed to be only for ad hoc purposes, if and when there is no specific government agency that could perform specific tasks as part of their normal day to day functions.

If and when necessary, the agency that is assigned could consult with the other agencies, but it should be up to that only. Since we do not have room to discuss how to meet all the 17 goals, let us just tackle the first 4 goals for now.

The first goal is to end poverty in all its forms, or “no poverty” to be exact. In tackling this goal, we should be aware that the original MDG was to cut poverty into half by 2015, a goal that we failed to do.

According to statistics, the poverty rate in the Philippines is about 25%, more or less. If we are going to be serious in meeting the first SDG, we should be able to cut poverty down to 0% by the year 2030. For purposes of discussion, I would say that it is the Department of Trade & Industry (DTI) that should be assigned the specific task of poverty reduction, on the premise that higher disposable incomes could only be achieved by way of earning money from businesses. It would be tempting to think that the Department of Labor & Employment (DOLE) could be assigned the specific task, but it would seem that having a job nowadays would just be enough to meet basic needs, but not to have higher disposable incomes.

The second goal is to end hunger, achieve food security, improve nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture. According to statistics, the self-reported hunger rate in the Philippines is about 18%. Without any doubt, it is the Department of Agriculture (DA) that should be assigned this specific task. For purposes of better coordination however, the National Food Authority (NFA) should be returned to the supervision of the DA. For that matter, it might be a good idea to transfer the Food and Nutrition Research Institute (FNRI) to the DA, from the Department of Science & Technology (DOST). And once and for all, just in case someone would again have bright ideas, the National Irrigation Administration (NIA) should stay with the DA, no matter what. Aside from commercial agriculture, we should again encourage backyard agriculture, even if only for home consumption.

The third goal is to ensure healthy lives and promote well being for all at all ages. Again, without any doubt, it should be the Department of Health (DOH) that should be assigned this specific task. As it is now, the government hospitals that have been turned over by the DOH to the Local Government Units (LGUs) are ill equipped due to the lack of support from the local officials, often citing the lack of funds as a reason.

Rather than expect the LGUs to give funds to these local hospitals by way of their Internal Revenue Allotments (IRAs), it might be better to increase the budgets of the DOH for subsidies to these local hospitals, provided that the DOH would still be on top of monitoring and reporting their performance. As a means to reach remote places that would be difficult to service, the DOH should consider using telemedicine technologies.

The fourth goal is to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all. If we are only talking about basic education, then it would be easy to say that it is the Department of Education (DEPED) that should be given this task.

It appears however that this goal also includes vocational education, and possibly even higher education. Even if we could say that our basic education system is already inclusive because the tuition is free, there are still many students who would not or could not continue going to school because they do not have extra money for transportation, snacks and school projects. I wonder what lifelong learning means, because that seems to be outside the scope of DEPED. Considering the supposed shortage of classrooms, books and teachers, the government should now consider using online learning technologies.

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