For Benin, making progress on the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) has meant finding new ways to finance development.
The West African country has increased domestic revenue by 0.5 per cent of GDP each year for the past decade, issued Africa’s first SDG bond in 2021 and used the resulting funding to expand access to education and drinking water, Aristide Medenou, Benin’s minister of economic cooperation, said on Friday.
Access to drinking water there has increased from 40 per cent to 80 per cent in the past five years, Mr. Medenou said, while a new industrial zone launched in 2021 has created 25,000 jobs.
“If a country is not able to increase the domestic revenue, the country cannot go forward in implementing the SDGs,” Mr. Medenou said at the UN’s annual SDG Moment event ahead of the General Assembly’s High-Level Week in New York.
Even as the world remains far from achieving the SDGs, Mr. Medenou said Benin offers a concrete example of governments translating commitments into beneficial policies.
by UN News – Less than 4 years from development goals deadline, progress shows what’s possible
