'Collaboration a must for SDGs implementation' -The Asian Age
Former Governor of Bangladesh Bank Prof Dr Atiur Rahman has remarked that there is a need for wide ranging collaboration between state and non-state actors for planned implementation of the SDGs. They must be entrepreneurial and bold in this complementary journey.
Technology alone is not enough even in this digital environment. Human factors are equally important. He made these remarks while addressing the closing ceremony of "First International Symposium on Achieving Agenda 2030 of Sustainable Development" on Saturday as the chief guest at the BPATC, Savar.
Chaired by Rector Dr Aslam Alam, Prof Rahman handed over the crests and certificates to the participants. Fifteen foreign participants from both South Asian and South East Asian countries in addition to many Bangladeshis participated in this international symposium.
Both public officials and researchers from home and abroad joined this concluding session. The symposium focused on SDGs Implementation mechanisms, challenges faced, capacity building needs and desired training curriculum for developing critical competence of civil servants of the participating countries.
Dr Chae Gun Chung, Head of UN Project Office on governance of UNDESA participated as a resource person. Atiur Rahman welcomed the foreign participants to BPATC and provided an overview of how Bangladesh made a spectacular journey of inclusive development from ashes to prosperity.
He said that government alone could not have made it without the contribution of the non-state actors. The positive policy environment has, of course, been created by the government for such a complementary role of other actors. However, the challenges of change management still remain and the significance of integration and navigation between the actors demand development of capacity building of the public servants.
And there is a significant scope of learning from neighboring countries for which such a symposium deserves to be supported by both governments and UN Agencies. Dr Rahman reminded the participants that a digital culture which empowers people and attracts better talents was already on and it was up to the leadership involved in improving public services to take it forward for achieving transformational goals.
He suggested that this leadership must look outside and link itself to the global changes, prize delegation of decision -making, encourage boldness, appreciate more actions and reward collaboration between different actors. He asked the civil servants to look at the society as the mirror and must ask themselves if they like what they see in that mirror. The digital technology has, of course, been providing a sharper interaction with the people at large.
This change in mindset will help them create more space for their own capacity development and as well as provide scope for other actors to join hands for implementing SDGs. This journey of SDGs implementation can't be a hundred meter sprint but a long haul of caravan where multiple actors will have to move with hands in hands of each other.
Bangladesh has already shown the way of how to do this with its spectacular success in inclusive development through joint actions and the whole world can learn from these rewarding experiences of ours, concluded Dr Rahman.