Nagaland: Building young leaders in localising SDGs

Our Correspondent
Kohima | June 28

A two-day Young Leaders Training on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) on the theme ‘Role of Young Leaders in Localising Sustainable Development Goals in Nagaland’ commenced today at Capital Convention Centre, Kohima.

Altogether 95 young leaders have been identified from all the districts of Nagaland to advocate the SDGs and the Nagaland SDG Vision 2030 agenda.

Addressing the inaugural function, Dr Kekhrielhoulie Yhome, Advisor School Education & SCERT Nagaland complimented the young leaders joining the platform of SDGs. 

“You must be responsible. You are the right stakeholders for the change in our state,” he said. Maintaining that there are a lot of global challenges, he stressed on the need to apply local ideas to deal with local issues. “We need to bring workable ideas to address local problems and issues,” he said.

Universal call to action 
R Ramakrishnan, Principal Secretary (Planning) & Development Commissioner, Nagaland said that the United Nations member states adopted the SDG in 2015 as a universal call to action. The SDGs consist of 17 ambitious global goals and 169 associated targets that serve as a blueprint for a better and more sustainable future.

He said Nagaland has also formulated and launched a ‘Nagaland SDG Vision 2030: Leaving No One Behind’ in August 2021. “It is a strategic development roadmap to work coherently towards a holistic pathway for the inclusive development of Nagaland,” he said. This was a document that was conceived in consultation with all the Departments. It provides the proposed sector-wise strategies to achieve the SDG targets.

“We are also encouraging the departments to sincerely implement various ongoing development programmes and schemes which are closely aligned to SDGs and bottlenecks in implementation of these schemes are flagged at the highest level for remedial actions,” he said.

He informed that the State Government “is committed to promoting inclusive, peaceful and sustainable development for a prosperous and sustainable tomorrow-Development for all and leave no one behind.”

He was optimistic that this training will be fruitful and there will be an improved understanding of the SDGs from Nagaland’s perspective, and ensure we leave no one behind. “I also hope that this training will foster innovative thinking among the young leaders to come up with suggestions on better implementation of SDGs,” he added.
 
‘We need fresh energy and thinking’
Nayantara Sasikumar, OSD (Planning) & SDG State Nodal Officer, SDG Coordination Centre, Government of Nagaland said that Nagaland has been actively working towards achieving the SDGs through its SDG Coordination Centre, Department of Planning & Transformation (DP&T).

To accelerate the implementation of SDGs, the State has established a dedicated centre- SDG Coordination Centre (SDGCC) under the DP&T in October 2019 with technical support from United Nations Development Programme, she said.

The centre is established with a mandate to act as a centre for SDG knowledge dissemination, monitoring, policy strengthening, and as an accelerator of SDG implementation across the state. Since then, the state has been actively pursuing and has taken various initiatives for the implementation, streamlining, and strengthening of the SDGs.

“The SDGCC has been working closely with all the implementing line departments, district administration and communities within the state focusing on capacity building and aligning the SDGs to the priorities of the State,” she said.

The State also recently had a collaboration with the AIC Selco Foundation to identify rural local innovators from Nagaland who have the potential to scale up their innovative ideas and transform them into successful business opportunities, she informed.

“We are happy to have played a role in bringing together the diverse stakeholders in the sphere of innovation and entrepreneurship in Nagaland for this initiative. Nagaland is a state that has won international accolades for its communitisation and rich social capital. The community conservation efforts for protecting and preserving natural resources have also gained much traction,” Sasikumar said.

“But amidst a rapidly globalizing world, emerging technologies and deteriorating natural resources there is a need to reinvent our thinking on sustainable development and inculcate sustainable consciousness at all levels of society,” she added. We need fresh energy and thinking for this in sync with the modern times and this is where you young leaders can contribute to the SDG agenda, she asserted.

Stating that SDGCC is always open for idea for technical assistance with SDG implementation in Nagaland, she requested the concerned individuals to share their ideas and concern through sdgnagaland@gmail.com or reach out to SDGCC Nagaland handles on social media platforms.
 
‘Call for collaborative efforts’
Limabenla Jamir, Development Consultant, Coordinator Asia & Africa Expert Working Groups, Inclusive Governance and Local Public Sector Alliance said the training aims to augment the process gaps of contextualizing and localizing SDGs.

To achieve sustainability in Nagaland, ensuring economic growth, development, creating decent jobs for young people, preserving the rich biodiversity and ensuring social protection like education, health and financial security requires collaborative efforts of local government, international agencies, civil society, non-profit organization and young minds, she said.

The event organisers have brought together exceptional leaders, changemakers and industry experts and they will be interacting with the participants through technical sessions, documentary, panel discussion and networking, she stated.

Biraj Patnaik, Executive Director, National Foundation for India (NFI) through video message, said NFI considers it as a privilege to have young leaders from all 16 districts of Nagaland and to train them in SDGs. Imsutoshi from NFI delivered the closing remarks.

Earlier, shot clips on how to meet the Sustainable Development Goals Together|SDG Moment|United Nations and Nagaland SDG Vision 2030 was screened.

This two-day in-house training, organised by NFI, SDG Coordination Centre of DP&T, Nagaland, and co-funded by European Union, will continue till June 28.