During the Global Festival of Action for Sustainable Development in Bonn, 21st – 23rd March 2018, more than 1,500 SDG stakeholders shared their enthusiasm, activities and plans for implementing the Agenda 2030.

Together with 5 European partner organisations , we hosted a workshop titled “From policy to practice: Framing communication of the Sustainable Development Goals in the European Union” and introduced the successful campaign #notwastingourfuture.

WECF Youth

In the #notwastingourfuture campaign, 17 young people from 10 countries documented their weekly garbage and produced a film which was presented at the 6th Ministerial Conference on Environment and Health 2017 in Ostrava. Many of the youth had never done advocacy work before, so using communication and side events as a tool for advocacy was a first-hand experience for them, which also led to a successful Tweetathon as well as a position paper.

The campaign was the start of our Youth group. This group not only gave the project recognition but also shaped awareness of young people involved, their families and friends. The WECF Youth Group continues to work on the SDG 12 ‘Sustainable Consumption and production’ as well as other SDG goals.

Succesful tools and strategies

The workshop session focused on further means, strategies and tools for successfully communicating the SDGs at local, national and international levels. Among other things, emphasis was put on the necessity of SDG mapping; concrete actions and instructions; open communication and participatory mechanisms to include multiple stakeholders in decision-making processes; the appointment of SDG ambassadors; as well as lobbying, which must be carried out ahead of upcoming elections to challenge decision-makers on the SDGs. The session successfully encouraged new ideas and networks for spreading the word on the SDGs and achieve sustainable development for all in the future.

 

   

This workshop has been made possible thanks to financial contribution from the European Commission for the ‘Make Europe Sustainable for All’ project.