SDGs September

Reaching Local Government’s Voice for SDGs

Localise SDGs Team organised local training for East Java, in conjunction with UCLG ASPAC Congress.

THE significant roles of local governments in achieving SDGs are undeniable as they are the frontliners in providing public services. Therefore through the Localise SDGs program, UCLG ASPAC focuses on strengthening the roles of Local Governments and their associations for SDGs implementation at local level. To reach wider audiences, on 12-15 September 2018, the 7th UCLG ASPAC Congress in Surabaya brought SDGs theme in several sessions, included were training sessions and networking events.

As part of the UCLG ASPAC Congress Team, the Localise SDGs team organised local training for East Java. This is the first of training series that will be conducted in 16 provincial cities and participated by approximately 50 city and district representatives throughout East Java. The participants of the training were enthusiastic in sharing their challenges and needs on SDGs implementation at local level. There are challenges faced in implementing SDGs. Among many are alignment process between SDGs targets and local programmes, development of local action plan on SDGs, and finalisation of environmental strategic assessment for local development planning. On local action plan, city and district governments in East Java Province have to consider the development challenges and potential partners to get involved in future SDGs activities. They also mentioned the

importance of circular letter endorsed by the East Java Provincial Government to strengthen local implementation of SDGs. The need for knowledge exchange and coordination were also underlined among the participants, hence this is why the local SDGs training is very important in facilitating these needs.

After training for East Java, Localise SDGs team will conduct local trainings in Bandung (West Java) and Ambon (Maluku). The training in Bandung will focus on the importance of local development plan for SDGs, while training in Ambon will emphasise on the importance of multistakeholder partnerships for SDGs. In the latter training, Mayor of Ambon will join and share his experience in developing partnership with the Government of Nederlands in the health sector.

At the 7th UCLG ASPAC Congress, the Agenda 2030 of SDGs and LOCALISE SDGs were also featured in five different sessions: Training Event (1) How Do I Implement SDGs in My City; Network Event (2) The Benefits of Functional Assigments for Implementing Agenda 2030 in a Multilevel-Governance System and 3) Promoting Human Rights Cities in Achieveing SDGs’ Targets and Plenary Session (4) Leveraging for Innovation Sustainability and 5) Multistakeholder Partnerships for Sustainable Local Development).

How Do I Implement the SDGs in My City – Training Event The Training Event on “How Do I Implement the SDGs in My City” was held on the first day of Congress (12 September 2018) in Dyandra Convention Center, organised

by Cities Development Intiatives for Asia (CDIA), UNESCAP, and UCLG Learning.

The training was intended at raising awareness towards the cities and local governments on the importance of implementing 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the challenges, opportunities and examples of concrete entry points for action. The session featured short input presentation; interactive, practiceoriented exercises, day-to-day work relevance, and peer-learning and exchange.

The training session utilised visual media (SDGs Wheel and Power Point Presentation) and invited participants to discover their strength and weak points of development in their respective cities as well as the interlinkages of SDGs targets.

Innovation, good governance, friendly cities and city environment were reflected as strongest points for participants from Kerala (India), Jakarta (Indonesia), Kediri (Indonesia) and Sambas (Indonesia). Affordable housing, water management system and sanitation were among the weak points mentioned by the participants.

Moreover, the training also made use of group work to find the challenges and opportunities. Discontinued capacity building process was one of the challenges

mentioned by a group discussion while the opportunity was raising awareness on various capacity building programs. Other group mentioned the challenge was lack of data infrastructure, while the opportunity was the linkages between local and national government authorities. Other challenge included different political focus, and one of the opportunities was periodical reporting so that related stakeholders could follow the progress of the program. It was also quoted that insufficient budget planning was one of the challenges, while the opportunity was alternative funding scheme, such as bonds and Private-Public Partnership.

The Benefits of Functional Assigments for Implementing Agenda 2030 in a Multilevel-Governance System – Network Event The Network Event was held on 13 September 2018. During the session, it was pointed out that SDGs implementation at local level need to consider the functional alignment of national and local governments. Functional assignments can be defined both as a process (of identifying, negotiating, and assigning responsibilities between levels of government) or the existing state of affairs of such a distribution of functions within the state. In a glimpse, subnational governments are significantly responsible for many of the SDGs policies such as health, education, water and infrastructure development, yet the responsibility of these functions in each country are not clear cut as it seemed majority of the central governments around the world are still lacking in devoluting their responsibilities to sub-national governments. However, the reality of the decentralisation process in each country is that it should do a mapping of each functional assignment for each SDGs. In the case of Mongolia whereby the functional assignment process is still underway, the government is trying to identify the problem of ‘who does what’ to ease implementation and monitoring process. The next process will be focusing on functional assignments with fiscal arrangement to match the load of local government with its budget.

Promoting Human Rights Cities in Achieving SDGs’ Target – Network Event The Network Event was held on 14 September 2018 at Crowne Hotel in Surabaya.

This event highlighted the roles of local governments in line with SDGs 16 compliance, particularly with rights-based approach. This event is held together with Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Lund University Sweden (RWI) and Indonesian Association of Municipalities (APEKSI). The event discussed practices and experiences of "human rights cities" from international and local perspectives. The presenters were representatives from RWI and local governments of Gwangju, Palu,

Bandung, Wonosobo, and Bojonegoro. A member from the Indonesian national parliament gave an overview on the Indonesian governance system. Human rights cities concept is an adaptation of rights-based approach that has been advocated by UCLG CISDP (UCLG Committee on Social Inclusion, Participatory Democracy, and Human Rights). The discussion pinpointed the strategic roles of UCLG ASPAC in advocating the concept of human rights for local government, and that human rights encompass not only political and security, but also economy and social aspects of development, including SDGs fulfillments.

Leveraging for Innovation Sustainability – Plenary Session During Plenary Session on “Leveraging for Innovation Sustainability,” three speakers namely Mr. Slamet Soedarsono, Deputy Ministry of Bappenas for Politic, Law, Defence and Security, Republic of Indonesia; Mr. Yanuar Nugroho, Deputy Chief of Staff, Executive Office of the President, and Mr. Dave Cull, Mayor of Dunedin City Council shared their views on SDGs and LOCALISE SDGs. Mr. Slamet Soedarsono stated that since SDGs is an ambitious agenda, it needs new approach that includes all related stakeholders, both government and non-government actors. The multistakeholder partnership concept was launched to respond to this need and in cooperation with LOCALISE SDGs Program of UCLG ASPAC-APEKSI, it will be attempted in some of the program’s target areas. Meanwhile, Mr. Yanuar Nugroho explained three points related to SDGs: the government still needs the collaboration from other stakeholders, multidisciplinary actions are required to make policies, and also the important of data for better policy making. The Mayor of Dunedin City, Dave Cull, shared the needs of his city to develop framework that is in line with the SDGs strategy. In Dunedin City, focus will be on clean energy. The development plan itself included the community on the process.

Multistakeholder Partnership for Sustainable Local Development – Plenary Session The Plenary Session discussed platform towards effective partnership between public-private and civil society partnerships in Asia-Pacific and to discuss how cities and local governments can take full benefits from the multi-stakeholders partnership to achieve sustainable development. The Multistakeholder Partnership is not always about money, but also sharing expertises from various stakeholders. An example, besides local wisdom, the local group could also be part of a multi-stakeholder partnership since they also have better understanding with local dynamics.

Partnership is not simple as it involves risk taking, innovation making, willingness to change, adopting and learning from that process, building trust and providing space to the partners so that they could contribute to the partnership are very important for Multi Stakeholder Partnership, as well as good governance. ***