Highlights and images for 1 June 2022

The UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) and partners convened the global launch of the 2022 editions of two publications on Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 7 (affordable and clean energy for all). The half-day event took place on 1 June 2022 in a hybrid format with in-person participation in the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) Chamber at UN Headquarters in New York, as well as virtual participation.

Speakers observed that at the halfway mark of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the world is struggling to make sufficient progress on the SDGs and the Paris Agreement on climate change, as well as grappling with challenges related to COVID-19 and the “triple crisis” for food, energy, and financing caused by the crisis in Ukraine.

The first publication launched at the event, Tracking SDG7: The Energy Progress Report 2022, is a yearly report on progress towards the SDG7 targets, produced by the respective custodian agencies of the targets. The event also launched Policy Briefs in Support of the High-Level Political Forum 2022: Addressing Energy’s Interlinkages, a set of policy briefs on establishing indicators for the interlinkages between energy and other SDGs, which were produced by the SDG7 Technical Advisory Group.

In the opening segment, keynote speaker Anne Beathe Tvinnereim, Minister of International Development, Norway, said the publications underline the need for radical action in the eight years that remain to achieve the SDGs and reduce emissions by 50%. Damilola Ogunbiyi, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Sustainable Energy for All and UN-Energy Co-Chair, said the yearly progress report has become “the gold standard” for tracking the transition to clean energy for all by 2030.

Remarks and messages were also provided by: the moderator, Mohammad Aamir Khan, Permanent Mission of Pakistan to the UN; Yoseph Kassaye Yoseph, Permanent Mission of Ethiopia to the UN, Co-Chair of the Group of Friends of Sustainable Energy; Usha Rao-Monari, Associate Administrator of the UN Development Programme (UNDP); and Liu Zhenmin, UN Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs. Liu said the publications will inform the 2022 session of the UN High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF), and that this work will become even more important in 2023 when the HLPF will focus on the review of SDG7.

The five custodian agencies for the SDG7 indicators gave a joint presentation highlighting key findings of the progress report, including that:

• the pace of electrification has slowed in recent years, with particular challenges in connecting “the last mile” to the grid;
• clean cooking is fundamental to health, as 4 million premature deaths per year result from exposure to air pollution in the household, “where you should be protected”;
• although COVID-19 stalled progress in many areas, the renewable energy sector proved resilient;
• energy efficiency is particularly important amid a global energy crisis to ensure affordability for everyone; and
• the impacts of negative events underscore the need for timely data to understand what is happening to energy right now.

The policy briefs on energy’s interlinkages with other SDGs were launched by the co-facilitators of the SDG7 Technical Advisory Group. Sheila Oparaocha, Executive Coordinator, ENERGIA, said the briefs are the first step in creating a tracking framework on the linkages between energy and other SDG areas. The briefs identify potential indicators for interlinkages between energy and SDGs 4 (quality education), 5 (gender equality), and 15 (life on land). The next edition of the briefs will address the other 13 SDGs. Hans Olav Ibrekk, Special Envoy, Climate and Security, Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said the briefs’ authors have turned to progressively stronger words each year; this year, they are calling to “drastically scale up our efforts.”

Closing the event, Marie-Louise Koch Wegter, Permanent Mission of Denmark to the UN and Co-Chair of Group of Friends of Sustainable Energy, invited everyone listening to read the 2022 publications and after reading them: “I hope you will all act.”

The event was co-hosted by the Co-Chairs of the Group of Friends of Sustainable Energy: Denmark, Ethiopia, Norway and Pakistan. It was convened by DESA in partnership with the custodian agencies of SDG 7: the International Energy Agency (IEA), the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), the UN Statistics Division (UNSD), the World Bank Group and the World Health Organization (WHO).