Post-2015 'outcome document' to set global goals — Piebalgs

There’s growing momentum for world leaders gathered in New York to sign an “outcome document” on Wednesday that is seen as an important milestone toward setting a post-2015 global development framework.

The outcome document is expected to examine progress toward achieving the Millennium Development Goals and suggest a process for arriving at a followup set of goals that — unlike the MDGs — is meant to be global.

The document, which is currently being negotiated on the fringes of the 68th session of the United Nations General Assembly, won’t suggest specific goals, targets or metrics, according to European Commissioner for Development Andris Piebalgs. That will be the focus of negotiations next year, he told Devex on Monday.

In that sense, it is different from a draft post-2015 framework suggested in May by a high-level panel appointed by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. That framework did suggest a set of goals and metrics, although they were called merely “illustrative” — a decision made by panelists to avoid a negotiation stalemate.

Negotiators won’t have that luxury in the coming years, as the deadline for achieving the MDGs draws closer and disagreements on climate change, human rights and other issues come to the fore.

Post-2015 discussions

The MDGs — and post-2015 agenda — were the focus of a series of events on Monday in New York, including a high-level meeting on disabilities and development and a ministerial breakfast hosted by the governments of South Sudan, East Timor and Denmark in conjunction with the g7+, a voluntary association of countries transitioning from conflict and the International Dialogue on Peacebuilding and Statebuilding.

The breakfast included an update on the post-MDG development agenda by Amina Mohammed, Ban’s special advisor on post-2015 development, as well as remarks by the chair of the g7+, East Timorese finance minister Emilia Pires and the co-chair of the International Dialogue, Danish international development secretary Christian Friis Bach.

Monday’s meetings highlighted the importance of peace and security for international development and the need to come up with a set of measurable goals that also address employment gaps and human rights, said Piebalgs.

The EU, he added, will continue to push for inclusive growth.

“There are marginalized groups that live in extreme poverty,” he told Devex. “My task is mostly to look that extreme poverty is not forgotten because the numbers are small, because it still is a very serious issue and as long as societies don’t address people in extreme poverty, they’re not sustainable societies.”

U.N. leaders want to ratify a post-2015 global development agenda at the General Assembly in two years.

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