How tackling climate change will help achieve the Sustainable Development Goals

15:00-16:30 UK time (GMT+1) Register for the event here.

This year, governments will agree post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and a new global climate agreement. Together, these could set the course for environmental stability and human wellbeing to 2030 and beyond. These agreements together offer a once-in-a generation opportunity to end extreme poverty and set the world on a pathway toward a zero net carbon and climate-resilient society.

The world’s governments can choose how ambitious they want the SDGs to be in setting goals and targets for climate-resilient, low-carbon development, when these are agreed in New York in September. The stronger the SDGs are in tackling climate change, the more likely it is that a robust climate change deal will follow in December in Paris, France.

The level of ambition  embraced by the new climate agreement will have a significant impact on the world’s ability to achieve the post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals. A high ambition agreement that provides a clear policy framework for action on climate change, incentivises international cooperation, and mobilises additional resources for mitigation and adaptation activities is essential to give us the best chance of achieving the SDGs by 2030.

If the global climate agreement is weak on climate mitigation, adaptation and financing, then we will lose our ability to achieve the SDGs, particularly on poverty and energy.

In this public event hosted by CDKN, economists from Metroeconomica and HR Wallingford will launch the results of their new, leading-edge research on the relationship between global climate change policy and human development. They and panel discussants will explore through the case studies of Uganda, Pakistan, and the Caribbean nations of Jamaica and Dominica, how climate change policies and human wellbeing are inextricably linked.

Chair: Sam Bickersteth

• Speakers: Anil Markandya, Metroeconomica
• Ilmi Granoff, ODI
• Dr Ulric Trotz, Caribbean Community Centre for Climate Change
• Government of Uganda representative (tbc)
• UK Department for International Development representative (tbc)