The United Nations (UN) Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres appointed 17 global figures which includes China’s Alibaba chief Jack Ma and Indian actress Dia Mirza as the new Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) advocates. Jack Ma, the founder and Executive Chairman of Chinese MNC Alibaba Group has been an SDG Advocate since 2016.
About the New SDG Advocates of UN
- Who are they? New class of SDG, Advocates are globally influential public figures who are committed to inspiring greater ambition, raising awareness, and pushing for faster action on SDGs.
- Function: The new SDG advocates are tasked to work together so as to drive action, build ambition, solidify global political will, and leverage and build bridges between their audiences to drive progress on achieving ambitious SDGs.
- Representation: These New Advocates which includes representatives from academia,
- Business, sport, entertainment, governments, and activist organizations around the world shows the universal character of SDGs.
- SDG Advocates will utilize their unique platforms and leadership skills to inspire and mobilize global community in order to build momentum for transformative, inclusive development by 2030.
About Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
- The SDGs were born at United Nations (UN) Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro in 2012.
- The SDGs replaced Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) which were active from 2000-2015.
- They are also known as ‘Global Goals’ and were adopted by world leaders on September 25, 2015. The adoption year 2015 coincides with other historic agreement like ‘COP21 Paris Climate Conference’ and ‘Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction’, signed in Japan in March 2015,
- It is a set of 17 Universal Goals, that seeks to meet urgent environmental, political and economic challenges facing our world. For ex- Poverty, Hunger, Education, Climate Change, Peace etc.
NOTE: The 38 year old Dia Mirza, is an actor, film producer and United Nation Environment Program (UNEP) Goodwill Ambassador for India.
