Latest information on the HLPF, July 2017

Lotta Tahtinen, DESA/DSD, briefed members of the NGO Major Group on the preparations for the High-level Political Forum (HLPF), to be held from 10-19 July. It will include a 5-day Expert-level segment, followed by 3-day Ministerial meeting. The theme will be Eradicating poverty and promoting prosperity in a changing world, and the following sustainable development goals will be examined in depth: SDG 1, SDG 2, SDG 3, SDG 5, SDG 9, SDG 14 and SDG 17 (which is considered each year).

Forty Member States will also do voluntary national reviews (VNRs) on the  implementation of 2030 agenda. In addition to the countries listed previously on this website (See: Two more countries will present their national voluntary reviews at 2017 HLPF)  the following countries will also be reporting: Afghanistan; Bangladesh; Belize; Botswana; Brazil; El Salvador; India; Indonesia; Nepal; and Zimbabwe. (The full list of countries including the links for specific country information is included at the end of this posting)

The Session will be held under the guidance of the ECOSOC President, Ambassador Shave of Zimbabwe. He is currently considering how to accommodate such a large number of voluntary countries witin the 3-day ministerial segment. The programme for the HLPF will be released in the Spring and it is expected that the 5-day expert level segment will focus more on the SDGs.

Volunteering countries have begun to come together to discuss some common issues, including what presentations should be like. They are expected to be meeting again in the coming months.

The main documentation before the HLPF will be the 40 VNRs and the SDG progress report, prepared by the Statistics Division. (The first was done 2016 in July 2016.) There will not be a Sustainable Development report.

The Major Groups and other Stakeholders (MGoS) will again prepae thematic position papers with an invitation being sent in early 2017 to submit sectoral thematic position papers relating to theme of HLPF. DESA/DSD hopes that the NGO Major Group would collaborate in this. The deadline will be end of April. There will be possibilities for applications for side events later in the Spring. Should an organization or Group know that it plans to organize a side event, it shold begin now to consider with which Member States it wishes to partner.

The Coordinating mechanism plans to organize a meeting sometime towards the end of January, although no date yet been set and a call is also tentatively planned with President of ECOSOC in late January or February.

Afghanistan; Argentina; Bangladesh; Belarus; Belgium; Belize; Botswana; Brazil; Chile; Costa Rica; Cyprus; Czech Republic; Denmark; El Salvador; Ethiopia; Guatemala; Honduras; India; Indonesia; Iran (Islamic Republic of); Italy; Japan; Jordan; Kenya; Luxembourg; Malaysia; Maldives; Monaco; Nepal; Netherlands; Panama; Peru; Portugal; Qatar; Slovenia; Sweden; Thailand; Togo; Uruguay; and Zimbabwe.