Canada has just under a decade to achieve the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), one of the boldest development plans in human history. How does the federal government plan to do it? 

Stay tuned. 

Canada’s recently-released 2030 Agenda National Strategy offers a broad sketch of how to bring together civil society, regional and Indigenous partners, and the private sector to implement all 17 goals. While the federal government points to its past policies, like its use of feminist principles in foreign policy, as proof that it is already making progress, a plan for implementing the SDGs themselves has yet to be released. But civil society organizations are already working toward the SDGs. 

Achieving the SDGs were a tall order before the COVID-19 pandemic began. Now, with no conceivable end in sight, the virus is hampering progress on every single SDG in Canada. The pandemic is widening health inequities in Canada’s Black and racialized communities, worsening economic prosperity, and triggering the worst job market for women and girls since the 1980s. 

Amid these unprecedented times, the federal government is still offering millions of dollars in grants to governments, social impact organizations, and businesses to promote the SDGs. It (along with Canadian civil society organizations) see the accomplishment of the SDGs as a means to not only recover from the pandemic, but improve Canadian society. 

What are the Sustainable Development Goals?

From the signing of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in September 2015, the SDGs were intended as an ambitious set of development goals meant to succeed the previous Millenium Development Goals. “The seventeen Sustainable Development Goals are our shared vision of humanity and a social contract between the world’s leaders and the people,” said then-UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in a statement. “They are a to-do list for people and planet, and a blueprint for success.” 

The 17 goals include the elimination of global poverty, action on climate change, economic growth, gender equality, improved education, peace, and a spirit of partnership among UN member-states to realize the SDGs. Within these 17 goals are 169 different targets and 231 unique indicators used by each country to measure its progress. Government policy at regional or national levels is expected to be the main driver of progress on the SDGs, but the UN also acknowledges the role other organizations within its 193 member-states can play. “Everyone has a stake and everyone has a contribution to make,” the UN’s statement says. “Reviews of progress will need to be undertaken regularly in each country, involving civil society, business and representatives of various interest groups.” 

This is where Canada’s 2030 Agenda National Strategy, launched in mid-February, comes into play. Over the course of its research, federal officials found that all of Canada’s levels of government, Indigenous communities, and every part of civil society has a role to play in achieving the SDGs both within the nation’s borders and abroad. The agenda specifically points out the work Canadian civil society is already putting in. “People who are active in Canadian civil society are working hard at home and abroad to realize the SDGs,” the agenda says. “They can benefit from access to more data, knowledge, networks and expertise to engage their communities more and make an even greater impact.” 

The national strategy also includes five key objectives for the Federal Implementation Plan, a breakdown of how exactly Canada plans to accomplish the SDGs: fostering leadership among every level of government, raising awareness of the SDGs, ensuring the SDG plan is transparent, reconciling with Indigenous peoples, and encouraging private investment into SDG-related projects. 

Through the 2020-2021 Sustainable Development Goals Funding Program, the federal government has promised $11.3 million in funding to 32 organizations, including not-for-profit organizations, the private sector, Indigenous communities, and provincial and territorial governments. These include the K’ahsho Got’ine Self-Government Negotiations, Food Secure Canada, Concordia University, the Centre for Equality Rights in Accommodation in Ontario, Shorefast, Future Earth and the Apathy is Boring Project. 

Teaching the next generation

Some civil society organizations are already well-suited to teaching Canadians about the SDGs. The United Nations Association in Canada, a non-profit separate from the UN that educates Canadians about its work abroad, currently has three concurrent programs focusing on the SDGs alone. Sarah Kambites, the UNAC’s acting president, says one of them is getting high school and university students to teach their communities about the SDGs — whichever one is most relevant to them. 

Whenever possible, UNAC adapts its mission to the curriculum of whoever they’re working with. The UNAC does classroom talks, but Kambites says they ask teachers if they can make youth more active participants: “Connect us to your students so they become the ambassadors.” 

All eight of Canada’s councils for international cooperation, regional alliances of local non-profits focused on humanitarian and international development work, work on achieving the SDGs. Jennifer Sloot, executive director of the Atlantic Council for International Cooperation (ACIC), says her organization differs from the others in their focus on teaching Indigenous youth about the goals. 

Around a decade ago — well before the SDGs were drafted — the ACIC noticed most of the youth they worked with were middle class white kids. “We wanted to make sure that our programs were accessible to others as well,” Sloot says. For thousands of years, many Indigenous cultures across Canada have practiced the values of sustainability and equality seen in the SDGs. Bringing Indigenous peoples into Canada’s SDG process is one of the federal government’s major goals, partly because of this deep commitment. 

Introducing kids to the SDGs isn’t just a way to teach them about sustainability or equal rights in Canadian communities, or an introduction to the role of the UN. For some children, learning about the SDGs may even be the first step towards a future career. After all, Sloot says:“They’re the ones that will be creating policies eventually.”

Taking care of business

For-profit businesses can also play a role in accomplishing the SDGs, especially those that prioritize community health and well-being alongside — rather than above — profit. Cooperatives are a very small portion of Canada’s overall business environment, but Peter Cameron, co-op development manager of the Ontario Co-operative Association, believes they punch well above their weight on fulfilling the SDGs. He says the principles of democracy, cooperation, and concern for community are very familiar to co-ops across Canada. “It’s in our DNA,” Cameron says. “If you take a particular SDG, I can give you a co-op that is working in that area.” 

Take The Co-operators. They’re a multibillion dollar insurance company, but Cameron says they also use some of their profits to support mental health programs. In 2019, they also offered $600,000 in funding for Partners for Action, a collaboration at the University of Waterloo’s Faculty of Environment to improve flood risk resilience. This work relates to at least three SDGs — SDG 11 (sustainable cities and communities), SDG 13 (climate action), and SDG 15 (life on land). 

A 2019 report by United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres also looks favourably on co-ops as a way to promote the SDGs. “Across the world, cooperatives promote sustainable development in all three of its dimensions — social, economic and environmental,” it reads. Co-ops are seen as particularly well-suited to providing healthcare and access to credit, two key attributes of the SDGs. According to the International Co-operative Alliance, co-op health care is available to around 100 million households worldwide.

The corporate world is also increasingly getting involved in SDG-related work, although it isn’t clear how willing they are to pursue the SDGs to their fullest extent. Six major Canadian companies, including Loblaw and Telus, began integrating SDG approaches to some of their business operations in the mid-2010s. They aren’t alone. According to the Harvard Business Review, a CEO commission chaired by former Unilever CEO Paul Polman concluded the SDGs could offer a $12 trillion business opportunity. That said, the Review found, after a review of 100 global companies and interviews with executives, that the SDGs simply replaced the work already done by the corporate social responsibility teams of these companies. “We found very few companies doing anything new or different to advance the goals,” the report said.

Some social impact organizations can go a step further by training workers, especially young graduates, to seek jobs in SDG-heavy sectors. One of UNAC’s programs called the Canada Green Corps pairs young workers with six-month-long internships. The business employing these interns pays half of their salary while the UNAC pays the other half. “This is an opportunity, but in the process of them gaining an understanding, the employer learns more about the Sustainable Development Goals,” Kambites says.  

Bringing everyone together

Hanging in the offices of the Alberta Council for Global Cooperation (ACGC) is a very unusual casino wheel. Instead of roulette numbers, it lists all 17 SDGs. Leah Ettarh, the ACGC’s executive director, says council staff use it to help youth think about the ways in which all 17 international goals can have immediate impacts on their lives — and how different issues can be top of mind for different communities. “Sometimes poverty is at the top. Sometimes we’re talking about climate change,” Ettarh says. “But we recognize that we’re in a wheel. We’re all in it together.” 

On top of public education, the ACGC tries to bring together civil society organizations for what Ettarh calls “critical discussions” about the SDGs. Not all of the goals are necessarily in harmony. Take SDG 9 — industry, innovation and infrastructure. Accomplishing it could mean increased automation and the elimination of  well-paying jobs, as is currently happening in Alberta’s oil industry. What does this mean for progress on SDG 8 — decent work and economic growth? “We try to help people drive those discussions,” Ettarh says. 

One of those discussions was the 2017 Together Symposium in Calgary, the first national SDG conference in Canada. Around 250 people attended, including representatives from the YMCA and international aid organizations, but also private companies like TC Energy, the pipeline company. “It brought together players who had never been in the same spaces before,” Ettarh says. The next year, organizers held Together in Edmonton. Since then, the event has grown too large for ACGC to handle, Ettarh says. Currently, the SDSN Network, and Universite Laval run the symposium. (The Waterloo Global Science Initiative was also involved before its closure in 2020). 

Alliance 2030 is also trying to connect Canadians to governments, businesses, and social impact organizations committed to the SDGs. Formed out of Alliance 150, a previous network working on youth engagement, environmentalism, and reconciliation, Alliance 2030 is building a database of SDG-related social good work from coast-to-coast-to-coast. On their website, Alliance 2030 says no one organization is spearheading SDG development in Canada — and working alone might preclude important opportunities. “By serving as a convener and facilitator, our mission is to strengthen that work through the creation of physical and digital spaces for the public sector, the private sector, and civil society to align on their efforts,” it reads. 

Ettarh says there are several ways that Canadian civil society organizations can help implement the SDGs, but believes the process of including all perspectives is something civil society organizations are well-practiced at. “When you’re talking about inclusive spaces, including voices, leaving no one behind — these fundamental principles have been part of civil society for a long time,” she says. “In so many ways, civil society is cutting-edge on this conversation.” 

Everything is interconnected

When Kambites is explaining the SDGs, the concept of connectivity is one of the more challenging ideas to unpack. Why should a farmer appreciate the importance of international development? The answer is simple: all of the SDGs are tied together tightly. Ending hunger (SDG 2) also means providing economic opportunity (SDG 8), reducing the effects of climate change (SDG 11), and ending poverty altogether (SDG 1). The SDGs are not divisible. 

But therein lies the challenge for UNAC and other organizations trying to persuade partners in the public, private, and civil society sectors to get on board. Arguably, the most important contribution a civil society organization can make is in teaching others about the importance of the SDGs in the first place. “Finding the points of entry to each partner’s directives and mandate is so, so important,” Kambites explains. “Otherwise, you are wasting their time.” 

But even if every civil society organization, business, and regional government in Canada jumped on board, the question of accountability remains. How does an organization that agrees to implement the SDGs ensure it actually follows through on its promise? What techniques does it use to keep track of its progress? Future of Good will explore those questions in the second part of this Special Report. 

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