In the fourth year into their implementation, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that aim at reducing developmental disparities in different parts of the world continue to be a cause for concern, with many international bodies urging for faster and effective action. There have been calls for better communication between research institutes and policy makers, increased responsibility by the private sector and more active participation from civil society to successfully implement the 2030 Agenda in developing countries such as India [1].
Source: www.un.org
While the core responsibility of meeting the development goals lies with national governments working with support (financial and building capacities) of international agencies, there is no doubt that increased engagement from industry leaders and civil society can make a huge difference. There are several reasons why NGOs as a part of the civil society can play an important role in influencing SDG outcomes. They provide, amongst others:
The scope to influence sustainability at the regional, national or international level lies in the shared agenda of all the stakeholders concerned, regardless of the point of entry or scale of operations [
The Watershed Organisation Trust (WOTR) has been evolving a knowledge-informed, multidisciplinary and participatory approach to sustainability and resilience building over the past decade. This approach had its roots in the inclusive and community-led watershed development strategies adopted by WOTR during the 1990s and early 2000s that resulted in significant policy influence to national watershed development guidelines and the programmes initiated by key agencies like NABARD and Ministry of Rural Development in India [
These interventions in watershed development also influenced other developmental outcomes in places where they were implemented such as improvement in agricultural outputs, elevation in status of women, better health outcomes and sustainable economic development through community participation in villages.
In the recently published 2017-18 annual report, we are happy to note that our works directly contribute to nine of the 17 SDG goals (UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development) and are aligned with other key international conventions—Land Degradation Neutrality, the Paris Agreement on Climate Change and the Sendai Framework on Disaster Risk Reduction [
Fig 1: Inter-linkages between WOTR’s thematic areas of work and the SDGs they relate to
WOTR recognises that all the above international frameworks are intrinsically linked and that action in one area benefits the other. Linking them to SDG targets can greatly help in developing an integrated approach to achieve the ‘future we want’ and ‘leave no one behind’ that national development priorities, as well as international frameworks, emphasise.
The maze of 17 SDGs, 169 targets and 232 indicators can be intimidating, especially to smaller organisations with a limited capacity to dedicate resources for this type of reporting. And this was without a doubt what made us at WOTR also hesitant to embark on this effort.
What we realised, however, was that taking a holistic approach to development and working on inter-and multi-disciplinary approaches, is something that is part of WOTR’s DNA (for example of multi-disciplinary and inclusive ways used by WOTR, see 1) WOTR’s Wasundhara Approach [
These principles towards poverty alleviation in semi-arid parts of India has led WOTR to develop expertise across a wide range of activities that impact all five capitals critical for sustainable development–natural, physical, financial, human and social [
Fig 2: The 5-capital framework used by WOTR towards achieving adaptive sustainable development viii
Taking a multi-disciplinary approach is not necessarily built into many of the individual projects that NGOs might be involved in. The challenges that the NGOs can then face are finding out ways of measuring the impacts that the projects have had on other indicators of development beyond those defined in the projects. WOTR’s attempt to map all thematic areas of work against relevant SDGs in its 2017-18 Annual Report [
WOTR is today amongst a small, select group of large national/international NGOs that have publicly mapped its actions against SDG outcomes. WOTR would like to take this structure of reporting, aligned with the SDGs, a step forward in the coming year and quantitatively measure its work against the relevant SDG targets and indicators. Such an integrated approach would enable WOTR to continue impacting both sustainable development as well as building resilience to climate change at scale by creating synergies with related national and international policy frameworks.
We believe that such efforts will help integrate impacts of various non-state actors to India’s SDG targets–corporates, NGOs, research institutes and other stakeholders (for example of WOTR’s efforts in multi-institutional collaboration, see the article on Integrated Agro-meteorological Services) [
Regardless of the point of entry or scale of operations, efforts of all stakeholders concerned are, without doubt, essential for our sustainable future.
Fig 3: Mapping of WOTR’s thematic areas with SDGs
A copy of WOTR's Annual Report 2017-18 can be accessed at this link
Arjuna Srinidhi, is a Senior Researcher, WOTR Centre for Resilience Studies (W-CReS)
Marcella D’Souza is the Director, WOTR Centre for Resilience Studies (W-CReS)
Crispino Lobo is the Co-founder and Managing Trustee, Watershed Organisation Trust (WOTR)