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  2. Blog on SDG16

Blog on SDG16

Are some countries “rich enough” that they purchase for the lowest price?

Sustainable public procurement (SPP) provides Governments with the opportunity to move beyond procuring only from suppliers that deliver the least expensive products, to prioritizing procurement from suppliers that respect human rights and the environment. Since public procurement, on average, represents 13 to 20 per cent of gross domestic product, SPP has the potential to provide a major boost to sustainable development and could be seen by many countries as a strategic priority. However, to… Read More

Links between SDGs 2 and 3: Perspectives of Eatology

A key feature of the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is the multi-layering of links among the Goals. While this may add to complexities in implementation, it also gives rise to potential synergies and integration and to positive spillover impacts among the Goals. In this blog, I would like to share my thoughts on two SDGs – SDG2 on ending hunger, achieving food security and improved nutrition and promoting sustainable… Read More
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Higher Education and the Really Big Challenges

Our humanity and our planet exist in a time of great challenges. Billions of our fellow human beings still live in great poverty - and are thus denied a decent life. The inequalities in living conditions, wealth and power are enormous. Oppression of women, corruption and lack of democracy remain major challenges. Global health risks, increasingly frequent and intense natural disasters, violent extremism, terrorism and the associated humanitarian crises and forced displacements of people do… Read More

Digital Government Initiatives in response to the COVID-19 Pandemic must be inclusive

In a year where people worldwide have had to engage in social distancing, mask wearing and a range of unique behaviors to stop the transmission of the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), it is easy to think that we are more divided than ever – physically and socially. But on the ground, we often see a different picture - there is real cooperation.  Across the world we witness people help each other – including among frontline public servants, such as our healthcare workers, teachers, sanitation… Read More

Let’s Wake the Giant Now!

It is the final decade to implement 2030 #SustainableDevelopment Goals (#SDGs). Most governments are failing their commitment towards promoting #Sustainable #PublicProcurement: an immense opportunity loss for leveraging the purchasing power of the public sector towards SDG agenda. We have long thought that #sustainable #public #procurement (#SPP) can be truly “fit for purpose”. The question remains largely unanswered. Were we optimistic to think that "we can wake the trillion-dollar giant?" As… Read More

Public participation in external oversight: Demystifying false dilemmas

Citizen participation in external oversight has gained renewed salience in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. The resort to extraordinary powers and financial resources to face the health crisis and its economic impact highlights the importance of accountability and transparency to strengthen trust in public institutions.   The international seminar “Citizen Participation and External Auditing” (in Spanish) addressed two important issues for Supreme Audit Institutions (SAIs), namely  the… Read More

Ten Key Elements for Accelerating Digital Transformation for Sustainable and Resilient Recovery…

1 The blog is adapted from an opening address delivered at the webinar Capacity Development Webinar on “Accelerating Digital Transformation for Sustainable and Resilient Recovery from COVID-19 The year 2020 witnessed unprecedented challenges amidst the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. With social distancing and quarantine measures underway to contain the virus, digital solutions - by leveraging ICTs and digital government, particularly AI, big data analytics, and robotics - have become… Read More

Taking an evidence-based approach to governance policy in the face of COVID-19

Achieving the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development while addressing the enormous challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic requires identifying, implementing, and scaling the most effective social policies and programs. Too often, however, this key principle—effectiveness—can get lost amid other considerations. Determining which social policies and programs are truly effective, and parsing out approaches that do not work, requires rigorous, policy-oriented research. Focusing on research… Read More

The Predictable Piece in a Crisis

For most of this year, the coronavirus outbreak has continued to upend the world we live in. It has shaken our foundations to the core, displayed the fragility of the modern world, and put countries and citizens to the test. What started out as an invisible enemy, 5 million times smaller than a human, has torn away our reality and forced us to accept a new unpredictable normal. From Serbia, we watched carefully as the virus moved across continents and as leaders around the world struggled to… Read More

Public procurement as the source of resources to cope with future socio-economic crisis

Most experts are predicting that COVID-19 pandemic will not only cause hundreds of thousands of deaths, but also lead to deep socio-economic crises, with declining economic performance and millions of people in new needs for help. The domestic mobilisation of resources seems to be the most effective tool to cope with decreased revenues and increased expenditure needs in the coming period. According to unofficial estimates, in less developed countries better functioning of the national public… Read More

5 YEARS OF PUBLIC SERVICE RESEARCH: WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED?

The Bureaucracy Lab, part of the World Bank, has been researching public and civil services across the globe, for the past five years. We use micro-data on the characteristics of public officials and their organizations to inform and improve the public sector. Too often, we think, reforms and changes are not based on hard data. We seek to change that, by using rigorous survey data, micro-data (at the individual level), and field experiments (RCTs). Here are some of the things we have asked… Read More

Covid-19 budgeting for SDGs note Postscript

The Budgeting for SDGs Note was written, when we could not know how extraordinary important, probably more than ever, both the achievement of SDGs and the budgeting for this achievement would soon become. For the governments, the pandemics suddenly means decreased budget revenues and increased budget expenditures. For the citizens, it might mean life or death, i.e. drastic changes in access to health, jobs, education, welfare, security and numerous other public services.  Governments are… Read More