Challenges in Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the UN in ASIA: Can the Environmental Goals Be Realized

Abstract

The Asian region is the fastest growing economic region in the world but it has 2.6 billion people in poverty, 490 million people still go hungry, and 1.7 billion lack access to clean water and sanitation. The UN recently proposed the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGS 2030 agenda) to overcome these problems accepted by 193 countries. There are 17 SDG goals including poverty eradication (SDG 1), achieving income equality (SDG 10) and achieve women’s empowerment to sustainably manage natural resources such as water and forests (SDG 15). Developing countries in Asia face many challenges in implementing the SDGs. The lack of reliable and standardised data is a serious issue. Data are often several years old and they are inadequately disaggregated. Another issue is the weak institutional capacity of Asia which has led to poor governance problems and policy incoherence. Policy incoherence means that policies are carried out by ministers without examining conflicts with other Ministries. Unless these issues are properly addressed, Asia may not achieve the SDGs by 2030.