SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Nov. 21 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The General Director of Research and Coordination of Sustainable Development in the Government of the Canary Islands, David Padrón, took stock this Monday of the first anniversary of the approval of the strategic framework of the Canary Islands Agenda 2030, a milestone that occurred on December 2 in Jameos del Agua (Lanzarote), and assured that the Canary Islands have consolidated in these three years as one of the three autonomous communities that has made the most progress in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda in Spain, thanks to the momentum achieved from the second half of 2019.
In fact, he commented that when the Government of Spain, in 2020, presented the progress report on the 2030 Agenda at the United Nations high-level forum, the archipelago “did not even appear”.
Since then, the general director continued, and always thanks to the collective work that has been carried out in this legislature, the Canary Islands have gone from not being in the report to achieving a presence within the group of the most advanced regions.
This has been one of the main achievements after the actions carried out, together with the milestone of the approval of the strategic framework of the Canary Islands Agenda 2030 on December 2, 2021, which will soon mark the first anniversary of this central objective.
David Padrón also made it clear that the 2030 Canary Islands Agenda must serve above all “to plan projects from the beginning”, at the beginning, and stressed that “more and more organizations, not just public ones, are on all fronts are aligning their strategies to the Agenda”.
All this, he said, will mean that the Canary Islands “will get closer and closer to meeting the sustainable development goals” of the United Nations, collects a note from the Executive.
LINKAGE OF PROJECTS TO THE OBJECTIVES OF THE AGENDA
The general director indicated in the ‘I Sustainable Canary Islands Meeting’ held this Monday that they have been able to see the “first impact” of the Government’s action on the 2030 Canary Islands Agenda and explained that, one year after the Canarian society signed in Jameos del Water the strategic framework of the Island Agenda, the regional Executive has already begun to link its projects to the challenges, action priorities and global and Canary Islands goals that make up the sustainable development goals (17 SDGs) contextualized to the reality of the archipelago.
“The SDGs and the goals and priorities of each government project have been identified directly and indirectly, as well as the budget allocation associated with each one,” said Padrón.
He also said that “this is allowing the different management units of the Government to know where they are within sustainable development in the Canary Islands.”
Specifically, it is a first “essential” point to continue advancing in the Government’s action plan, whose next challenge is to have the Canary Islands 2030 Agenda at the center of its actions.
“It should not be something that is added to tweak the projects,” said the director general, but the Canarian Agenda for Sustainable Development has to serve “to plan them from the beginning with a purpose, this is the next step.”
With 70 people in the room and some 300 following the day live via the internet, the forum was inaugurated by the Deputy Minister of the Presidency, Antonio Olivera, who stressed that this “is not the Agenda of the Government of the Canary Islands, but the Agenda of the whole of the Canarian society”.
Olivera defended the need for a collective effort, by everyone, to develop it.
“The responsibility of the Government is important,” he said, “but it cannot be the only one for an agenda of this magnitude”, in which appointments like the one on Monday serve and help share ideas and find common lines to move forward for the path of integral sustainability in the islands.
Organized by the Directorate General for Research, with the support of the Plan B Group consultancy, the conferences seek to consolidate themselves as a platform for debate so that Canarian society learns about and participates in the actions that are being carried out to have more sustainable islands, apart from to inform about the sustainability goals in the coming years.
The essential objective is to debate and analyze the milestones reached in the implementation of the Canary Islands Agenda 2030, of the sustainable development objectives already located, one year after the approval in Jameos del Agua of the strategic framework of the Canary Islands Agenda 2030.
CONTENTS PLACED ON THE TABLE AT THE CONFERENCES
Within the framework of this first anniversary, the conference ‘I Sustainable Canary Islands Meeting. Advances of the Canary Islands Agenda 2030’ delve into the actions deployed so far and the priorities and goals of this ambitious initiative, always from the participation of all the agents involved.
The program included this Monday 21 presentations on the 2030 Canary Islands Agenda as an opportunity, on the multi-stakeholder platform, the role of town halls in promoting the SDGs, the progress of the administrations in localizing the Agenda, as well as sustainability and culture, universities and other academic levels. The sessions of this first day closed with a debate on the Agenda and what it represents as an opportunity for the public administrations of the Canary Islands.
On Tuesday the offer is enriched with presentations on the SDGs and their link to companies and the world of work, the contribution of the social economy to the 2030 Agenda, cooperatives and Third Sector entities, as well as an exhibition on SMEs and the corporate social responsibility in this framework.
The sessions will conclude with a panel discussion on this corporate responsibility and multi-stakeholder alliances.
