Tag: business

SDGs

Ever heard of SDG washing? The urgency of SDG Due Diligence

By Roel Nieuwenkamp, Chair of the OECD Working Party on Responsible Business Conduct

September 25, 2017 marks World SDG Action Day.

SDG-dayA couple of months ago during the OECD’s Global Forum on Responsible Business Conduct,1 I heard a new term: SDG washing. After green washing and blue washing – using a UN logo to signpost sustainability without doing much – the term SDG washing points to businesses that use the Sustainable Development Goals to market their positive contribution to some SDGs while ignoring their negative impact on others. For example, a car company may market their electric cars as saving the climate (SDG 13↑). Yet, the cobalt in their batteries may be mined by five-year old kids in Congo (SDG 8 ↓).

It is clear that the world will never reach the SDGs without businesses. While businesses can make positive contributions, such as creating jobs, finding innovative solutions for climate challenges or contributing to human capital development, they can also cause or contribute to negative impacts, such as exploiting labour in supply chains, damaging the environment or engaging in corrupt practices. Businesses should pay due attention to ensure that they avoid undermining the SDGs by causing or contributing to negative impacts. Continue reading “Ever heard of SDG washing? The urgency of SDG Due Diligence”

Development Matters3 Comments
Africa, Building resilience, Policy

Implementing industrialisation strategies in Africa

By Dirk Willem te Velde, Director of Supporting Economic Transformation Programme and Head of International Economic Development Group, ODI

Explore this topic further with the upcoming launch of the
2017 African Economic Outlook: Entrepreneurship and Industrialisation in Africa.
Stay tuned for details

Industrialisation-Africa

A cursory look at national and pan-Africa policy statements suggests that many African countries have a strong desire to industrialise. They have a point: manufacturing creates jobs, diffuses technology and makes the economy more resilient. Unfortunately, much analysis points to a reduction recently in the share of manufacturing as a percent of GDP on the continent, although significant progress is being made in selected countries. Real manufacturing value added has grown around 7% annually or more over 2005-2015 in Tanzania, Rwanda or Ethiopia. And few realise that real manufacturing production and exports of manufacturing doubled in sub-Saharan Africa in the decade to 2015.1

Continue reading “Implementing industrialisation strategies in Africa”

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Africa, Gender, Women and Girls

Little changes for women entrepreneurs in Africa unless mindsets and policies change

By Mike Herrington, Executive Director, GEM Global

Explore this topic further with the upcoming launch of the
2017 African Economic Outlook: Entrepreneurship and Industrialisation in Africa.
Stay tuned for details.

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Women selling eggs in Kigali, Rwanda

In the last decade, most countries in Africa underwent radical transformation, increased their GDP per capita and moved towards globalisation. Just look at Botswana where GDP per capita increased from USD 7 136 in 2013 to USD 7 505 in 2014, or Cameroon that saw an increase from USD 1 271 to USD 1 405, or Nigeria that experienced a jump from USD 1 692 to USD 3298 during the same period.1 

 However, to move closer to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030, the continent needs to change the mindset of people and pursue policies to boost the development of small, medium and micro-sized enterprises (SMMEs) to help reduce poverty and unemployment, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa.
Continue reading “Little changes for women entrepreneurs in Africa unless mindsets and policies change”

Development Matters
Policy

Increasing impact through partnerships

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By Francesco Starace, Chief Executive Officer and General Manager of ENEL SpA

Learn more about this timely topic at the upcoming
Global Forum on Development on 5 April 2017
Register today to attend

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A view from the community of Ollagüe

Planet Earth is changing, evolving, with such speed and disruption that humans have been forced to question many of the things that used to be taken for granted. This is due in great part to the digitalisation of a world that is ever more interconnected, and therefore increasingly complex.

Whilst this complexity and change might bring about some discomfort initially, it is important not to fight it. It is inevitable, and it must happen. It is much better that humankind embraces it. Doing so means being willing to open up to new ideas, to the potential of new technology, and to listen to what people want and need.
Continue reading “Increasing impact through partnerships”

Development Matters
Africa, Asia, Food security, SDGs

Tackling crop losses at the root means sharing knowledge

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By Dr Ulrich Kuhlmann, Executive Director Global Operations, CABI

Learn more about this timely topic at the upcoming
Global Forum on Development on 5 April 2017
Register today to attend

ACABIll farmers are affected by pests and diseases attacking their crops, but smallholder farmers and their dependents in low- and middle-income countries are disproportionately affected. To put it in perspective, there are about 500 million smallholder farmers worldwide who feed about 70% of the world’s population. When you cultivate less than a hectare (2.5 acres) of land and rely on your crops for both sustenance and income, fighting pests can become a battle for life and death. International trade and climate change are exacerbating the problem by altering and accelerating the spread of crop pests.

Occasionally, when a particularly destructive pest surfaces, it can make headline news. Last year it was reported that the tomato leaf miner moth (tuta absoluta) was wreaking havoc across Africa, causing USD 5 million of damage in Nigeria alone and driving up the price of tomatoes, a food staple. Earlier this year, the fall armyworm made the news for devastating maize crops from Ghana to South Africa. But for smallholder farmers the battle against pests is a daily struggle, not an intermittent occurrence.

Continue reading “Tackling crop losses at the root means sharing knowledge”

Lia Beyeler
Gender, Women and Girls, SDGs

How we all benefit when women have access to finance

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By Mary Ellen Iskenderian, President and CEO, Women’s World Banking

Learn more about this timely topic at the upcoming
Global Forum on Development on 5 April 2017.
Register today to attend!

shutterstock_453468400The International Finance Corporation estimates that approximately 65% of women-led small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in developing economies are either unserved or underserved financially 1. For a women entrepreneur, this means the odds are already stacked against the growth potential of her business. Giving women access to credit and other financial tools will not only help those businesses, it will also help us achieve critical Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

This gap in access to capital for women-led SMEs exists despite significant contributions by these businesses to gross domestic product and employment. Women-owned businesses account for approximately 40% of the world’s 340 million informal micro, small and medium enterprises and one-third of the 40 million formal SMEs 2. A projected 112 million female business owners also employ at least one other person in their business 3.

Continue reading “How we all benefit when women have access to finance”

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Africa, Development finance

The Global Goals’ Business Opportunity in Africa

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By Lord Mark Malloch-Brown, Chair, Business & Sustainable Development Commission, former UNDP Administrator and Ex-UN Deputy Secretary-General, and UK Minister of State for Africa, Asia and the United Nations

Learn more about this timely topic at the upcoming
Global Forum on Development on 5 April 2017.
Register today to attend!

Lord-Mark-Malloch-BrownA critical transition from a heavy reliance on international public development finance to locally generated private sector solutions to development problems is underway. Earlier this year, the Business & Sustainable Development Commission launched its flagship report, Better Business, Better World, which makes the case for why the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) offer the private sector a growth strategy that opens new market value and helps solve significant social and environmental challenges at the same time. The Commission shows how sustainable business models could unlock economic opportunities across 60 “hot spots” worth up to USD 12 trillion and increase employment by up to 380 million jobs by 2030. In Africa alone, sustainable business models could open up an economic prize of at least USD 1.1 trillion and create over 85 million new jobs by 2030.
Continue reading “The Global Goals’ Business Opportunity in Africa”

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