Celebrating International Development Week: Go for the Goals
This week marks Canada’s annual celebration of International Development Week (IDW). It is a week to reflect on and celebrate the contributions of Canadians working in partnership globally to improve the wellbeing of all. The theme of IDW 2022 is “Go for the goals”. It is a call for all Canadians to support the pursuit and achievement of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDGs are made up of 17 goals meant to mobilize the global community to achieve a better and more sustainable world by 2030.
Bhutan has made some notable strides in the pursuit of the SDGs. As of 2021, it had made almost 70% progress in achieving the SDGs, up from 58% in 2000. Specifically, Bhutan was already on track in 2021 to successfully achieve 3 of the 17 goals and is moderately improving in 9 others. Drilling down more deeply illustrates some of Bhutan’s key successes. Extreme poverty was reduced from 17.6% in 2003 to just 1.4% in 2017. Bhutan is also expected to graduate from being a Least Developed Country by 2023. Further, Bhutan is one of the only carbon negative countries in the world with a landmass that is over 70% forested.
Significant challenges still remain. Bhutan’s successful actions on achieving two of the SDGs are stagnating or decreasing. Moreover, the covid-19 pandemic will continue to provide obstacles to the successful pursuit of the SDGs in the future. Now is therefore not the time for complacency. The Bhutan Canada Foundation continues a long Canadian tradition of working with Bhutanese partners to improve wellbeing in the country. While we have faced challenges during the pandemic, we continue to collaborate with our Bhutanese partners to strengthen the education sector as it moves to a post-pandemic model of education delivery and content. We also continue to support the Bhutanese in renewing and strengthening cultural heritage through the revitalization of the Trans Bhutan Trail. While the current pandemic context can be exhausting, International Development Week provides a great opportunity to take the time to reflect on the resilience of our global partnerships, celebrate our achievements in pursuit of the SDGs, and redouble our efforts to achieve them moving forward.
For more information on IDW 2022, please visit the Global Affairs Canada website here. And don’t forget to check out and tweet #IDW2022.
