18 July 2019
Knowledge Partners for Sustainable Development: IFLA Joins SDG 17 Event at United Nations
The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals place a strong emphasis on partnerships, within and across countries. These, the UN argues, are essential for spreading ideas, reducing inequalities within and across countries and improving the effectiveness of development policies.
Libraries are well suited to participate in and support these partnerships, as was made clear in an event held at the UN Library on 16 July during the High Level Political Forum 2019, Partnering for development - From global to local: the role of knowledge and libraries.
Partnering for development - From global to local: the role of knowledge and libraries
Global Information Partnerships
The entire 2030 Agenda, as agreed in 2015, is based on a growing understanding that the challenges the world faces are interlinked. Success in one area – such as education – tends to have positive impacts on another, while a failure to act – for example on climate change – puts everything else at risk.
This growing understanding is based on information, and the work of researchers and other experts around the world.
Glòria Pérez-Salmerón, IFLA President
Citing all of the examples of positive contributions she had seen during her presidency, she underlined: ‘Libraries are already doing so much. But there are so many more lives we can improve, so much innovation to support, so much understanding to create. Work with us to make this a reality!'
Shantanu Mukherjee, Chief of Service, Sustainable Development, UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs
Thanos Giannakopoulos, Chief, UN Dag Hammarskjöld Library
From the Global to the Local
IFLA Secretary General Gerald Leitner opened the second part of the session, highlighting the specific role of libraries as partners for development.
Gerald Leitner, IFLA Secretary General
As he underlined, 'Information is key for delivering the SDGs, and libraries provide the infrastructure to make it happen. This is our invitation: work with libraries, from the local to the global levels, to build partnerships for success'.
Zoubeida Bouallagui, Head of Unit for Technical Monitoring and Dissemination, Public Reading Directorate of the Ministry of Culture, Tunisia
She set out efforts both to build awareness of the SDGs, and to take practical steps, for example through developing coding skills, or enabling women in rural areas to sell their handicrafts online.
Going Forwards
With a strong understanding among participants of the potential of information to drive development, and the potential of libraries to form the basis of partnerships, the main question was what we can do next.
In response, and in closing, IFLA Secretary General Leitner echoed his call on everyone involved in the SDGs to reach out to libraries, and see how we can worth together to go further.
See a photo album with highlights of the event in our Flickr channel.