The United Nations and its state members have long been coming together to create plans for a better future. Since Agenda 21 in 1992, these plans have adapted to meet the ongoing changes to our world. Likewise, in 2015, building off the Millennium Development Goals (which had striven to reduce extreme poverty by 2015), the United Nations states adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. This action plan for people, planet, prosperity, peace, and partnership, placed 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)—and within that, 169 actionable targets—at its core. These SDGs are described as an urgent call for action by all countries in a global partnership to implement strategies that improve health and education, spur economic growth, and tackle climate change in addition to ocean and forest preservation.
As a member of the UN, Canada has been making some effort to contribute to the completion of global targets. This includes establishing a Federal Sustainable Development Strategy, sharing its Voluntary National Review at the UN Summit in 2018, and outlining domestic indicators for target completion. Many of our partners have also begun to adopt the SDG framework of goals and targets.
But where does Tides Canada fit into all of this? Why the SDGs?
Our vision says it all. Tides Canada is dedicated to a healthy environment, social equity, and economic prosperity for all Canadians, which strongly aligns with the global goals of the UN and its members. Additionally, each of our shared platform projects touch on one or more of the 17 SDGs, including Climate Action, Life Below Water, Sustainable Cities and Communities, and Reduced Inequalities. Tides Canada applies the SDGs to our work in solidarity with a global movement that shares our goal of eliminating major social, environmental, and human rights issues, as well as evaluate our impact using transparent, globally shared language.
Visit our Shared Platform and Grants pages to discover the breadth of issues we support and their relevance to the achievement of the UN’s SDGs and global targets.
