Ghana reports on progress in implementing the HLPF's 2019 Sustainable Development Goals

The HLPF is part of the monitoring and revision
Agenda 2030, and provides a platform to examine the
progress in the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the
learning and building partnerships to accelerate the implementation of the
The SDGs.

A statement issued by the National
Development Planning Commission (NDPC)
and copy to the Ghana News Agency, said the HLPF on Sustainable Development
started on Tuesday 9 July at the UN headquarters in New York under the theme
"Give more power to people and ensure inclusion and equality" and ends on
Friday, July 19th.

He stated that the 2019 HLPF, meeting more than
2000 participants from governments, companies, universities, civil society
youth organizations and United Nations agencies.

Professor George Gyan-Baffour, the Minister
Planning Officer and Member of Parliament for Wenchi, presenting the Revision Report
on behalf of the Government revealed that Ghana had made progress in many areas
The Sustainable Development Goals added that "overall, poverty had decreased slightly from 24.2 percent
pe 4 cent in 2013 to 23.4% in 2017.

He said, GDP growth remains robust,
accelerating to 8.1% in 2017, making Ghana the second fastest country
growth of the economy in Africa that year.

He said that the main macroeconomic indicators,
including the budget deficit, inflation and interest rates have tended to fall,
adding that the trade balance recorded surpluses in 2017 and 2018, which led to a
improvement of the balance of payments position.

Acting on the social sector, he said
that access to education, especially in high school, had
generally improved.

This, he attributed to the introduction of
The government's flagship free initiative for high school, which resulted in
out of 271,000 other students enrolled in SHS for 2017/18 and 2018/19
academic years.

He stated that the gender parity had been reached at
the basic level.

According to the Minister, the proportion of
the population with access to electricity has also improved from 70.6%
in 2013 to 81.1% in 2017.

On the environment, there had been marginal
increased forest cover. Ghana started the implementation of the forest
2017-2040 Planting Strategy to Protect Forest Cover
to achieve a sustainable supply of planted forest goods and services.

The minister in his presentation emphasized
several important lessons from the implementation of the SDGs in Ghana.

These included the importance of developing
strategic partnerships with key stakeholders; establish strong links between
government, research institutes, universities, private sector and others
actors in research and innovation; strengthen the capacity of
subnational structures for the effective implementation of the SDGs; mobilize
sufficient national resources to maintain and expand existing interventions;
strengthening the capacity to generate and use administrative data for
follow-up of the results.

Touch a part of the implementation
Teacher. Gyan-Baffour said, sustained funding is essential for the
achievement of the SDGs.

He said improving national resources
mobilizing and mobilizing available resources from the private sector
necessary to accelerate the implementation of priority interventions.

Address the data challenges badociated with
the implementation of the 2030 Agenda, said the Minister, the government was
implement a data roadmap with three priority areas for action – data filling
gaps, the encouraging data use a strengthening of the data ecosystem.

The statement says the beauty of the
The Ghana situation report presentation in Ghana was that the government was doing it jointly with the
CSO platform on the SDGs, illustrating the partnership agreement to the world
that exists between the two.

He said in the spirit of "do not let anyone
behind ", the presentation of the CSOs was made by Mr. Alexandra Bankole Williams, a
visually impaired who was guided from the lectern to his seat by the
Minister.

The statement said that the platform of civil society organizations was
recognizing the government's opportunity to work together on the SDGs
implemented and indicated their willingness to work with the government to
improve awareness of the SDGs.

Mr. Williams said: "The awareness of citizens about
sustainable development goals was crucial, as many of them can only be achieved
Changing behaviour. "

The representative of the CSO platform also
called on the government to help strengthen the capacity of CSOs in the field of
efficient data collection, as they also produce
additional data to track progress.

Other ministers of state who participated in
The 2019 HLPF was composed of Dr. Matthew Opoku-Prempeh, Minister of Education; Mr. Ignatius
Baffour-Awuah, Minister of Employment and Labor Relations; Mrs. Patricia
Appiagyei; Deputy Minister of the Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation;
Ms. Abena Osei Asare, Deputy Minister of Finance and Ms. Barbara Ayisi
Asher, Deputy Minister of Public Works and Housing.

GNA