NEW YORK, July 17 (Xinhua) -- The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) should be implemented at a faster rate to meet the agenda by 2030, the latest annual United Nations SDGs Report said on Monday.
"Implementation has begun, but the clock is ticking," said UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres while launching the report here, adding that the report shows "the rate of progress in many areas is far slower than needed to meet the targets by 2030."
Adopted by 193 UN member states in September 2015 at the expiration of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), the SDGs, including 17 goals, aim to eliminate poverty, tackle climate change and ensure prosperity for all by 2030.
The UN report was launched on the opening day of the ministerial meeting at the High Level Political Forum (HLPF) held at the UN headquarters, on the progress of the SDGs.
According to the report, despite past progress, acceleration is needed in ending poverty, reducing maternal mortality and children mortality, and expanding access to clean fuels and technologies for cooking.
Statistics show that an alarmingly high number of children under age 5 are still affected by malnutrition. An estimated 155 million children under five were of low height of their age in 2016.
The progress achieved is unevenly shared. Women, youth and the rural population are more likely to share less benefits.
"Empowering vulnerable groups is critical to ending poverty and promoting prosperity for everyone, everywhere," said Wu Hongbo, undersecretary-general for Economic and Social Affairs.
In looking to the future, the UN secretary-general urged stakeholders to anticipate "problems of tomorrow", warning that some jobs might disappear due to robotization and other forms of automation, which will cause dramatic impact to labor markets.
"We need to be able to work together -- countries, international organizations -- not to be reacting, but to be foreseeing what is coming and investing in education, in training, in new skills, in the adaptations of the labor markets to be able to cope with the challenges of the future," said Guterres.
The funding problem was also brought up at Monday's meetings. The United Nations should ensure the leverage of resources, and help countries to access global market and attract private investment.
