Sustainable development in the 21st century
take a second
imagine a world where every single child
has access to free
high quality education a world
where every family has the ability to
provide clean drinking water for their
kids
a world where your gender race religious
beliefs
or anything else does not burden your
chances to reaching your dreams
a world where not a single soul is
living under the poverty line
it sounds like a perfect world however i
truly believe that even though it might
be difficult
it’s definitely not impossible on
september of 2015
the united nations 193 world leaders
agreed to pass resolution 701
which included a set of 17 goals under
the title of the sustainable
development goals to be achieved by
it was a process that drew the
conclusion three years of fairly robust
community consultation program
which saw over 8 million people frame
out and discuss the issues that mattered
most
in their communities and on the planet
they ended up with 17 goals but they
came up with 300 issues in that
community consultation program
and so tucked within each one of these
goals is a fair amount of thought
and a fair amount of consultation which
really is meant to represent a studied
guess
at the issues that matter the most in
our world today
and if they were to be achieved then the
world would become a much better place
with no one left behind
the sustainable development goals to put
it simply are
go our set of goals which are a set of
17 goals
which main aim is to make the world a
better place
and once they are achieved then the
world will become a much better place
with nobody left behind at all
as of today 200 million kids are not
attending school
one billion people live on less than two
dollars a day
42 mega rich people own as much money as
a collective than the entire bottom half
of humanity
and not a single country is on track to
reaching the goals
which they have all agreed to with 2020
just recently marking
the beginning of the final decade to
achieve sustainable development goals
the world now more than ever is in need
of all hands on deck
my name is and how i chose to affect
change is by speaking up by being the
first
and by being a domino for a line of
dominoes to fall
it takes one domino to fall first
leaving the others choiceless to do the
same
and we’re hoping that the next person
that sees this is inspired to be a
domino
being a domino for me started a few
years back when i was sick
and tired of sitting on the sidelines
waiting for someone else to make the
first move
as if my life and my future wasn’t
affected every minute
and day that went by without any sight
of change
so i decided to target my impact towards
people i knew best
and weirdly enough the people i had the
most trust in at the time
the youth throughout my journey i served
as secretary general of the middle
school model united nations program in
qatar
where with the main aim being to embed
the sustainable development goals into
the minds of middle schoolers
from around the world i was president of
the general assembly in time in
singapore
secretary general of taiman qatar some
of the world’s largest model u.n
conferences
which some of the world’s most largest
um conferences which aimed
to make this world a better place
however i couldn’t stop there
on august of 2015 i had the privilege to
be chosen as one of the panelists
speakers for the united nations
youth summit which took place in the un
headquarters in new york city
on the topic of merging sustainable
development goals
to model um programs all over the world
and let me tell you
the power of the youth was present in
that room
despite being among some of the world’s
most powerful and influential figures
the power of the youth was present and
at that moment i truly knew
that the transformative power of the
youth
is unstoppable on
later that year i had the privilege to
join the qatari youth delegation
which as you guys can see from the photo
is composed out of three fourths
bold strong empowered qatari female
leaders
to washington dc to take part in the
united nations youth assembly
where we met sat down and discussed with
other youth leaders
on topics that could help make us the
pave way to success for the
sustainable development goals
the sustainable development goals back
in 2001 the united nations introduced
another set of goals
known as the millennium development
goals where the main aim being to have
the proportion of people living under
the poverty line
the baseline was taken from 1990 where
36
of the world’s population lived under
the poverty line
to 18 by 2015. so the question is
did we reach our target well no
matter of fact we exceeded it with 12
percent of the world’s population
under the poverty line by 2015 and only
8.6 out of 2019.
however that’s still not good enough and
the world still has plenty of problems
but the point is to say that the
pessimists of the world
that believe that we cannot reach the
sustainable development goals and make
the world a better place
and especially not within the next nine
years are actually not 100 wrong
if we remain business as usual then we
will not be able to reach sustainable
development goals on time
and that’s why i reach out to you future
doctors
ceos politicians authors
scientists to put it simply the youth or
as they like to call us
generation z researchers have been
looking at the data to see where the
change might come from
and the change calls upon gen zeus we
are currently the largest generation
making up approximately 2 billion of the
world’s population
we are the most connected and we see
science as a solution
gen zirs do not believe in fake leaders
as we saw on the rise of the arab spring
in yemen egypt libya and sudan who were
all
regimes against fake leaders started
single-handedly by this generation
they don’t believe in fake news they
don’t believe in fake solutions
and they are definitely not afraid to
challenge science
is about facts so to run the facts
sdg4 quality education aims to provide
inclusive and quality education for all
promote lifelong learning and teach
basic literacy and social skills
however if we were to achieve this then
171 million people
could be lifted out of poverty if all
mothers
were able to have high quality access to
secondary education
12 million children could be saved from
hunger
and if everyone has secondary education
then
quality of life could be left could be
lifted for both men
and women equally
sustainable development growth cannot
occur without education as only one year
of high quality education
can lead to a 10 increase in wage
earnings
knowledge to grow and build upon our
economies and
increase the reduction of inequalities
so by achieving sdg4 quality education
alone
we would already be taking massive
strides towards achieving sdg 1 no
poverty
sdg2 zero hunger sdg
5 gender equality sdg 6 clean water and
sanitation
sdg 8 decent work and economic growth
sdg 9 industry innovation and
infrastructure
and sdg 10 reduce inequalities
jen’s ears have a lot of vitality they
have more trust in the un than they do
in their own governments
they are more willing to take action
join campaigns volunteer
donate or simply post something on their
instagram story
if we are able to connect with the
passions of people
connecting with their lifestyles with
their hearts with all adversity
and if we reunite for the sustainable
development goals
mixed with the passion and knowledge
that we already have the action
potential of generation z
can turn into a weapon of mass creation
it’s time we take actions in our own
hands and demand a seat on the
decision-making table
don’t get me wrong i’m not asking at the
minute you leave this room today
you change the world but instead i’m
asking you to take a look at yourself
and make a change identify what you’ve
been doing right
and what you can be doing more to play
your part in reaching sustainable
development goals
find out the goals that reach and
identify to you the most
joint initiatives start campaigns or
simply
educate yourself and the people around
you on the issues that matter to you
take one more second and think about how
you can become the change you wish to
see in this world
think about how you can impact change
turning from the people closest to you
think about how you can become
a domino thank you