Iran SDG Plan Under Final Review

A deputy foreign minister said Iran's national plan to help achieve the provisions of the Sustainable Development Goals is undergoing a final review by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

The United Nation's 193 member-states unanimously agreed in August last year on a new Sustainable Development Agenda with 17 goals, including the elimination of extreme poverty and hunger, to be reached by 2030.

Under the agreement, they are all committed to mobilizing domestic resources to help attain the goals.

"The five-year plan was drawn up through intense negotiations between a number of Iranian organizations and UN agencies in the past few months," said Abbas Araqchi, deputy foreign minister for legal and international affairs.

"It has been endorsed by UNDP and UNICEF in New York and is now under the examination of the FAO office," he said in an address to a ceremony to commemorate the 71st anniversary of the United Nations, IRNA reported.

SDGs are a successor to the eight Millennium Development Goals, which were approved by heads of state in 2000, and ended in December 2015.

The new goals cover a wide range of political and socioeconomic issues, including poverty, hunger, gender equality, industrialization, sustainable development, full employment, human rights, quality education, climate change and sustainable energy for all.

Araqchi also called on the world body to assume a more active role in efforts to effectively address regional conflicts. "The United Nations has a heavy responsibility to help end this disaster [the Syria war] but it has failed so far to provide a proper response due to its political structure," he said.