Bridging Science, Policy, and Practice to Address the Triple Planetary Crisis: Strengthening Synergies for the SDGs and a Sustainable Post-2030 Future (HLPF 2026 Side Event)

Okay, thank you, everybody, for your attendance today.
I'm delighted to invite you to our side event entitled Bridging Science Policy and Practice to Adré the Triple planetary Crisis, strengthening synergies for the SDGs, and sustainable post 2030 future.
My name is Eric Zussman and I am a research Director at the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies and this side event is kindly led by the government of Japan, along with co organizers, including the Republic of Panama, the United Nations Development and Economic and Social Affairs.
United Nations Environment Program, the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia Pacific, Agent Development Bank, and then IS my home Institute.
We have an ambitious schedule today that will go from approximately 115 to 230 and the overarching goal and objective of today's event is to talk about practical solutions that can leverage synergies so that we're addressing the triple planetary crisis of climate change, biodiversity, and pollution.
And as we move forward, we're going to have a series of opening remarks followed by two pillars.
One, some framing presentations, another one, a multi stakeholder dialogue, and then we have a few scheduled questions slash interventions at the end.
I do apologize that because of the tightness of the schedule, it might be difficult to accommodate interventions elsewhere, but we hope to have a lively dialogue and discussion among the different participants.
So without further ado, I'd like to now move into the high level opening remarks, and I would like to kindly call upon State Minister of Environment, Japan, Kyoto Tsuji to begin the first set of high level opening remarks, and State Minister Suji, you have approximately three to 4 minutes.
Thank you, Sir.
Good afternoon, everyone.
I'm Keita Tui.
I'm State Ministry of Environment in Japan, and thank you very much for joining the event.
And I'm pleasantly surprised that we have a full house.
And first, I'd like to express my sincere appreciation to the co organizers, Republic of Panama, Usa, SCAP, UNIP, ADB, and ISIS a lot of acronyms for their dedicated efforts in making this event possible.
Um, as it was mentioned, the triple planetary crisis of climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution, together with various environmental, social and economic challenges are becoming increasingly severe and making achievement of the SDG is unfortunately more difficult.
Addressing these challenges requires synergistic approaches that maximize co benefits and minimize trade offs.
Japan has consistently advocated the promotion of synergies.
At the United Nations Environment Assembly last December, Japan, together with the Republic of Panama, proposed and successfully advanced the adoption of a resolution on promoting synergies.
To translate the concept of synergies into concrete action on the ground, it's essential to have approaches tailored to the natural and social conditions of each region.
It's also critical to share practical experience and learn from one another in order to scale up and mainstream synergistic approaches.
For this reason, Japan in collaboration with partners, including SCAP, ADP, Unit PRP, and AGS launched the Asia Pacific Synergies report last month.
The report brings together more than 140 case studies and analysis from across the Asia Pacific region, and we hope it'll serve as a practical guide for policymakers and practitioners, including in national and local governments as well as in the private sector.
Furthermore, at the nth session of the SCAP Committee on Environment and Development, and development held earlier this month, a regional action program was adopted which clearly sets out the promotion of synergies through strengthened regional cooperation.
We believe these outcomes provide important guidance for the Asia Pacific region in taking concrete actions for synergies, including sharing knowledge, strengthening capacities for policy development and implementation and promoting the sharing of data.
And today's event brings together a wide range of stakeholders engaged in science, policymaking, and business.
Through dialogue among these stakeholders, participants will exchange views on how to implement synergies effectively and address pressing challenges.
I really do hope these discussions will help accelerate actions toward achieving the SDGs and also provide valuable insights for future discussions on the post 2030 agenda.
In closing, I wish you all a productive and fruitful discussion.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Okay.
Thank you so much, State Minister Suji, for these very encouraging remarks and for also flagging some of the progress that we've had along the way, especially with UNA resolutions and the recent meeting in Bangkok.
I would like to now turn the podium over to our Executive Director of SCAP, doctor Armida Asa Balna.
Armed An over to you.
Thank you very much, Eric.
Excellency, State Minister, Mr.
Sugi Kioo.
Also, excellency, distinguished participant, colleagues and friends.
It is indeed my pleasure to join all of you for this very important discussion on strengthening synergies to address the triple planetary crisis and excellent progress towards the SDGs.
I would like also to echo our appreciation and gratitude to the co organizer of this event, the government of Panama, UNSa, UNP, ADP, as well as IGS.
Again, we're very much aware that with less than five years remaining to achieve the 2030 agenda, progress across the SDG remains uneven and even in some goals, indicators, even back sliding and backtracking and of these goals that are of concern is related to climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution.
As well as deepen inequalities, and all these have placed increasing pressure on economies, ecosystems, and communities.
So therefore, the synergies initiative hopefully provides the direction solutions to solve these interconnected challenges by intentionally aligning policies, institution finance data, partnership across climate action, biodiversity conservation, pollution reduction, and sustainable development, countries can maximize co benefits while minimizing the trade offs.
I just would like to retreat again because we were hosts of these two very important events recently around three weeks ago in which, again, back to back, these two events were held back to back.
Earlier, the first one is the seventh Global Conference on strengthening synergies between the Paris Agreement and 2030 agenda.
For sustainable development in which we were one of the organizer, main organizers were DSA and UN Triple C.
This was, I think initially synergy initiative, which was launched back then in 2019, if I'm not mistaken.
So at this conference, we launched the synergy report for Asia Pacific.
Again, as mentioned before, it was a joint product SCAP UNEP ADP as well as IGS as the Secretariat with the kind support from the government of Japan.
Again, to reiterate, this is not a mere or simply an article report, but we hope that the report can help in a more practical way, policymakers as well as practitioners translate evidence into action because the report was also the report came with many, many case studies around 140 case studies from across the region.
And the second event, which was SCAP event, actually, which was the committee on environment development immediately after that synergy global event.
And every four years, we convene this at the minister level.
So this year we convened at the minister level, member state adopted endorsed a very, very important minister declaration on environment development and also specifically uh, focus on the regional program of action on advancing synergies for sustainable development in our region 2026 to 2030.
Yeah.
So again, you can see the alignment with the global initiative, the UNA resolution earlier already alluded.
Then the regional resolution or political minister declaration with also the concrete regional program of action.
Yeah.
And not to mention The case study.
This is now a matter of implementation, State Minister, matter of implementation.
Therefore, we need for all of us to work together to really make this happen.
Thank you very much.
Okay.
Thank you so much, Executive Secretary Armeda and thank you also for highlighting the Regional Action Program as a way to try to take some of the concepts from this report and make them actionable on the ground.
Now, I would like to turn the microphone over to executive or excuse me, Deputy Executive Director of UNEP, Elizabeth Mara Mia, and UNEP was also one of the partners in this synergies report, over to you.
Thank you very much.
Good afternoon to you all.
Let me begin by thanking through you, the government of Japan, through the Ministry of Environment for its leadership and state support in addressing triple planetary crisis while working towards achievements of the sustainable development goals.
But of course, I also need to congratulate our partners, ESCAP, Asian Development Bank, the Institute of a Global Environmental Studies in Japan, on the successful launch of the Asia Pacific synergies report.
This is a clear transformation, demonstration of the power of strong partnership.
The timing could not be more important.
We cannot tackle climate change, biodiversity, and pollution through fragmented silos approach, just as the UN Environment Assembly Resolution seven stroke five emphasized synergies and cooperation are key to implementing multilateral environmental agreements.
For UNEP, this is a strategic priority.
We are working with countries and partners to strengthen policy coherence, share good practices, and build capacity, including supporting more coordinated implementation of environmental treaties.
Our objective is simple to achieve greater impact by connecting efforts that too often have been pursued separately.
The Asia Pacific Synergies Report is an excellent example of how global commitments can be translated into practical actions at regional level.
While Asia and Pacific have achieved this remarkable development gain, the region remains still off track to achieve SDGs and is also experiencing growing impacts of climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution.
The report clearly demonstrate that stronger alignments across policies, institutions, finance, data, and partnerships can deliver multiple benefits for people, for nature, and for sustainable development.
I equally welcome the recently adopted regional Program of action for advancing synergies for sustainable development in Asia and Pacific.
This action plan provides an important platform to translate the report's recommendations into coordinated action and to strengthen cooperation across the region.
The experience emerging from Asia Pacific offers valuable lessons that can inform and inspire similar efforts in other regions.
I hope today's discussion this afternoon will help us to move from evidence to action, from strengthening the links between science, policy and practice and be able to build the partnerships needed to address the triple planetary crisis while at the same time advancing the sustainable development goals and shaping a more sustainable 20, 30, and beyond future.
Thank you.
Thank you so much, Deputy Executive Director Moma for sharing these very insightful points with us and also for highlighting some of the collaboration that went on in synergies with some of the UNA resolutions.
I think that's also a nice segue to our next speaker.
And so now I'd like to yield the podium to Vice Minister of Environment from Panama, Oscar Valerino Vice Minister of the Floriaur.
Excellencies, distinguished panelists, colleagues.
It's an honor for Panama to co organize this side event alongside with the government of Japan.
Thank you for your leadership.
Unsa, UNP, Unscap, the Asian Development Bank, and the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies.
As we discuss the triple planetary crisis, climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution, I would like to highlight the importance of partnership.
Panama greatly value its collaboration with Japan at the UNA seven in Nairobi.
Our countries co sponsored the resolution on promoting synergies among multilateral environmental agreements at the national level, recognizing the need for more integrated implementation, simpler reporting, and a stronger participation of indigenous people, women, junk, and other key stakeholders.
At home, Panama have translated this vision into action through the Panama Nature Pledge, which brings together biodiversity, climate, and land restoration commitments into a single national framework to 2035.
By aligning priorities and indicators, we are replacing fragmented approaches with the integrated implementation.
We are also threncening long term conservation through our project finance for permanence and ensuring sustainable facing for our nation's system of marine, terrestrial, protected areas, and watersheds.
In addition, Panama continues to promote universal Declaration of the Rights of nature, recognizing that climate, biodiversity, and pollution cannot be addressed separately because nature function as one interconnected system.
We welcome the Asia Pacific Synergy Report.
Also, Panama belongs to another region that challenge or identify similar fragmentation, science policy gaps, and need for effectiveness financing are shared by many countries, including those in Latin America and the Caribbean.
Panama remains committed to working with all of you to strengthen the connection between science policy and practice because only through the integrated of actions and a strong partnership, we can accelerate the progress throughout sustainable development goals and beyond 2030.
Thank you very much.
Okay.
Thank you so much, Vice Minister Valarino, for highlighting some of the concrete actions that Panama is taking to implement synergies and also for pointing us in the direction of understanding how this report might possibly work in other regions as well.
Um, what I'd like to do now is move to the second segment of our side event today.
And this segment is officially pillar one.
It's Science and Evidence and Policy milestones, and it'll include both a framing presentation by myself as well as my colleague from the Asian Development Bank, Yoko Watanabe.
She is the Director of the Division on Sustainable Development and climate change and environment.
So let me put the projector on And G.
Hold on for a second.
There we go.
And I do apologize that the intention here was not to I Yeah.
Sine too much of a light on colleagues in the back there.
Thank you so much for providing us with a little bit of space.
We've heard a lot already about this Asia Pacific synergies report.
My intention is to give a brief framing presentation on some of the key messages and a little bit of the content, and then I'll turn it over to Yoko to talk a little bit more about how the ADB is working on some of these synergy and synergistic solutions.
Now, the starting point for the report is nicely summarized by this graph right here, and underlines the point that if we currently move along the current trajectory, our achievement on the sustainable development goals will take us an additional 32 years.
So if we want to close this gap between where we are right now and where we want to actually be by 2030, we need to accelerate progress on the SDGs.
And the report highlights the importance of synergies as a way to help expedite and strengthen the implementation of the SDGs.
It also underlines the point that there's been a growing amount of research and publications that point to the importance of synergies.
This is a graph that demonstrates the number of peer reviewed journal articles on synergies over the past ten years or so, and this is specifically focusing on climate and SDG synergies.
You can obviously see that there's been significant growth in this literature At the same time, if you read all of these articles, two things will happen.
You'll probably be quite blurry in the eyes a little bit.
But beyond that, there's also going to be a lot of emphasis on modeling of the potential for synergies as opposed to highlighting concrete cases that demonstrate how to achieve synergies.
And so as is also mentioned by some of the previous speakers, one of the unique features of this report is there's a 147 case studies that are drawn from across the Asia Pacific region, representing 29 different countries and about 90% of the Asia Pacific population.
Um, these case studies are actually included all of them are included in a supplementary compendium that you can download online.
And also, if you're interested in contributing case studies in the future, please do come talk to us.
But as you can see right here, one of the case studies is from a small city in Aomori Prefecture in Japan called Hachiohe and it's focused on the agrvoltaics or what we sometimes call solar sharing.
The case studies give us, um, some practical insights on how you would actually implement synergies on the ground and help to bridge some of the science policy society interface that is also featured here in our discussion today.
Another thing that the report does that some quite useful from my perspective, is it highlights four different key entry points for working on synergies.
These are health centered climate actions.
These are thematic entry points.
He centered climate actions, noting that health is a driver for climate ambition, and when it's paired with climate change, the two of them are mutually reinforcing.
A second entry point, thematic focus is nature positive nexus or nature positive solutions, and we'll hear more about that in just a bit.
A third entry point is the circular economy and also trying to take a more systemic approach to pollution control at its source.
And then a fourth key entry point which bridges or comes the middle of the report is on cities and cities as urban delivery platforms.
Now, the report, in addition to highlighting these different entry points, also makes the claim and demonstrates quite convincingly that you can't do anything by just focusing on the solutions themselves unless you have enablers or means of implementation.
There's also chapters on finance, data and tools, governance with a strong focus on inter ministerial coordination, and while there's not a separate chapter running throughout the report, there's a strong emphasis on regional cooperation and how regional platforms can help enable synergies.
The last point that I'll mention is the pairing of these means of implementation enablers with these key entry points is really where we see the opportunities for accelerating progress on the SDGs, not only up to 2030, but also potentially paving a way forward beyond 2030 up to perhaps 2050.
Now, in terms of some of the key chapters in the report, I've already highlighted some of the entry points.
For instance, there's a chapter on circular economy, and in each of the chapters you hear or you can see, different approaches to synergies.
For instance, in the circular economy chapter, we have a circular economy approach to synergies that focuses on agri food or housing in the built environment or mobility.
Energy, and then innovation.
Each of these different approaches once again gives us some insight on how you would pair and work across different SDGs from that entry points perspective.
Another interesting part of the report, as I mentioned previously, is some of these case studies.
And while we have 147 case studies in total, the report features and gives a deeper dive into 36 different case studies.
This is from Chapter five on cities.
For instance, you can read into a case study on a synergistic approach to dealing with urban air pollution, health, and climate change in Jakarta, or you can learn a little bit more about how to bridge the digital divide in Sri Lankan cities.
And so these case studies, once again, help give life and animate some of the discussion of how to make synergies operational.
Then another unique feature of the report, and this is highlighted in the case of the governance chapter, is giving us a sense of how to scale up synergies.
And so in the case of governance, when we talk about scaling synergies, there's a strong emphasis on moving from what we call tactical or more project based type of cooperation that's a little bit more experimental, a little bit more outside the box to gradually institutionalizing governance arrangements so that you have institutional incentives for different agencies and different stakeholders to cooperate with each other.
We call that more transformative governance.
This idea of scaling up is also something that's prominently featured throughout the report.
Now, the report concludes with the last chapter where we talk about six strategic directions on how do we move forward with synergies.
I'll briefly touch upon these before once again turning the podium over to colleagues from ADB.
Those six strategic directions are first and foremost, making synergies a key organizing principle for different policy making processes and different plans ranging from national development strategies to pollution control and urban policy, really making sure that synergies is at the core of what we do when we plan.
Two, empowering cities and sub national governments, once again, to really serve as delivery platforms and to demonstrate how to implement synergistic approaches.
I think we'll touch upon more of this when we have our panel discussion a little bit later.
Three, promoting cross sectoral investment by aligning finance with multi benefit outcomes.
There's a whole chapter on finance and how we can take different financial mechanisms and make them supportive of synergies and also how financial mechanisms themselves can be influenced by projects like JCM projects that demonstrate clearly how you can do synergies.
Four, transforming data and tools so that they can make synergies an actionable resource for routine decision making.
We talk a lot about using different types of models, but not necessarily new models, but adapting some of the types of models that we have already.
Once again, to make sure that synergies are visible and part of our core organizing principle for decision making processes.
Five, institutionalizing whole of government and whole society approaches, and this gets back to the governance chapter I talked about previously.
S, and last but not least, leveraging regional cooperation to synthesize evidence, harmonize approaches, promote learning, and once again, using regional platforms to scale up synergies across diverse contexts.
As you can see right here, which we passed out on this postcard, if you're interested in downloading the report, you can scan right here and it'll take you over to the URL as well as the compendium of case studies.
Now I'd like to turn the virtual platform or actually the physical platform over to my colleague Yota Watanabe to talk a little bit about the Asian Development Bank's actions and activities on synergies.
Great.
Thank you very much, Eric, and excellencies and colleagues and all friends and colleagues.
Good afternoon.
I'm Yoko Waatuabe.
I'm the Director of Nature and Environment at Asian Development Bank.
As Eric highlighted, the Asia Pacific Synergy Report is a joint product that the ADB and SCAP and UNEet work together with the support of Japan Ministry of Environment and IGES.
I had a pleasure of being in Bangkok to launch this together in SCAP with this conference, and that was a really momentous moment that the synergy approach come together and the regional countries commit on its implementation.
So it is the first regional synthesis, as Eric mentioned, and it's how countries in Asia and Pacific are turning synergy from an idea or a theory to practice and really drawing this case studies.
ADB has really had a pleasure of sharing some of our concrete examples from our own projects and also bring the finance and investment lens to this whole discussion.
Please have a next slide.
And through this synergies, actually, we get to deliver real projects and real capital and not through just policy and models.
And the timing really matters for implementation, and I think this is the time to really take action and move forward with its implementation.
So my presentation today is really focused on the implementation of the synergy approaches in Asia Pacific and highlighting one key projects that we have been working with the support from the Japan, Carbon market mechanism, and also with how we're scaling those with a financing platform called Nature Solutions Finance Hub.
I also want to inform that ADB has been taking already an action to really have a more synergistic approach.
Also, this is not just by Asian Development Bank, but currently, I chair the MDBs, a multilateral development Bank's nature group.
The nature heads come together to really advance on the nature topic, but the synergistic approach between climate, land, nature, and pollutions are core to our initiative and we are scaling our investment in capital in that regard.
Next slide, please.
So I guess after Eric's presentation, I really don't need to inform again why integrated and synergistic approach is so important in addressing triple planetary crisis, but I really understand that our fragmented and siloed approach in the past, in addressing the Paris Agreement, Commit Montreal Global biodiversity Framework, and other pollutions related commitments were and we're really having some bottleneck and also in terms of efficiency and effectiveness as well.
We're really being taking a more coordinated and integrated approach at Asian Development Bank as well.
So we have an environmental action plan which was approved in 2024, and this actually have a three pillar, which is really, correlated to the triple planetary crisis.
We have a biodiversity pillar, pollution pillar, focusing on air quality, and then on the climate side on the nature based solution.
But these are not isolated three initiative, but all come together while mainstreaming these elements into our investment project, but also another key approach is to have a dedicated, also more focused approach towards synergistic approach to triple planetary crisis and have a dedicated portfolio more towards addressing these initiative.
Next slide, please.
So one of the key project that I saw I will highlight as an example is in the Maldives, where electricity generation relies heavily on imported diesel, and ADB supported the project in transforming power system across 160 islands through solar diesel hybrid solutions, including energy management system, storage, and upgraded grids.
And the project reduces reliance on inefficient diesel generation, lowering electricity costs, and easing government subsidy pressures and cutting emissions.
And one of the city au actually with that have used 1.6 megawatt of solar PV was installed and supported by the Japan Fund for joint credit mechanism, which is supported by the Ministry of Environment of Japan and implemented by Asian Development Bank.
And this really supported the battery storage and energy management system and really reduced significant amount of CO two emission and have contributed to a significant amount of air quality improvement.
So what I wanted to highlight here was this project generated not only climate benefit, but also on other environment and social and economic co benefits together.
So the diesel use of power generation fell by 28%, and air quality improved and lower the respiratory health risk within the islands, and 28,000 people have benefited from the clean air.
So these are not just the theory, but through investment, we were able to really have a synergy derivery and one investment turning into three concrete benefits.
Next slide, please.
Now finally, I wanted to also highlight that we're not taking these action one by one project by project, but we really need to take a programmatic and scaled approach towards it.
That is why ADB has established the nature Solutions finance up and this hub is actually originating a more scalable investment on nature and addressing other a triple planetary crisis issues like climate and also health and also pollution matters altogether.
We have an ambitious 5 billion target to bring in both sovereign non sovereign resources together and scale these initiatives within Asia and Pacific, and we already have about a $1 billion pipeline of projects to be investing on using blended finance and other solutions, coupling with policy and regulatory barriers and also dedicated de risking mechanism to crowd in the private capital.
So these are sort of ways that we are trying to scale our investment, not by project by project, but have a more programmatic approach.
So as a conclusion of my presentation, I wanted to note that conventional fragmented and siloed responses are for the past, and this is really a moment that we really move forward with a more integrated approaches.
And I hope the Maldives example and our Nature Solutions finance example to scale these initiative have enlightened you with a concrete example and through the Asia Pacific Synergy report that we all together launched, we are turning these experiences into really practical solutions.
I think what we want to do is really when we design for synergy, we get more for every dollars and every decision.
So we really look forward to working with all of you.
And also, this is a year that the biodiversity, the climate, and the land cops are all in Asia region and ADB stands ready to work with partners to further the synergy approaches together with you.
So thank you very much again.
Thank you so much, Yoko, for giving us a really clear illustration of how we actually fund projects and fund projects at scale so that we can demonstrate how synergies can work, moving all the way from the JF JCM to some of the good work that's being done on nature based solutions, nature positive solutions.
I think this is a really nice transition and segue over to the second pillar of our, um, side event today.
That second pillar is going to be multi stakeholder dialogue that's focusing on accelerating SDGs implementation through synergies.
As implied by the notion of multi stakeholder, we're delighted to have with us representatives from not only government, but also from youth and from city platforms, as well as the business sector.
Um, and just for both our panelists and those in the room, the way that this will work is I will raise a question for different colleagues.
They'll have approximately three or 4 minutes to respond to that question, and then we'll work our way across the room.
We're a little bit short on time, so once again, I do appreciate the fact that we're not going to be able to take interventions from outside.
Having said that now, I'd like to begin the multi stakeholder dialogue with coming back to the State Minister of Environment, Suji, from Japan.
My question to you, State Minister is focusing a lot really on some of the ways Japan has worked on synergies.
We've heard and we've learned that Japan has been promoting this concept.
I'm wondering if you could give us some concrete examples of synergy related initiatives being implemented in Japan.
How does this work? Okay, here we go.
Thank you.
That's an excellent question.
And already we've heard about how to not just promote but put these in action.
And in addressing complex and interrelated environmental challenges, we believe that the key lies in effectively implementing synergies on the ground.
I don't know if this metaphor is appropriate, but killing a few birds with 1 stone.
And Look, I I'd like to introduce here.
One example of Japan's effort in Asia.
We have this joint crediting mechanism, JCM, which promotes greenhouse gas emission reduction through international cooperation, and projects are implemented not only to support decarbonization in partner countries, but also in a manner that contributes to sustainable development by addressing other environmental and social challenges such as waste management, control and job creation.
For example, a JCM project in Vietnam introduced a waste to energy facility utilizing technology developed by a Japanese company.
This technology enables the treatment of waste while suppressing methane emissions and simultaneously generating electricity to power the facility operations and surplus electricity is sold to the power grid.
In other words, this project provides an excellent example of a synergistic approach that addresses waste management challenges while also reducing greenhouse gas emissions and generating income and employment opportunities.
So by advancing such initiatives in accordance with local and regional characteristics, we hope to promote synergies and accelerate achievement of the SDGs at the local level.
And in this regard, we believe it's highly valuable to learn from each other's good practices, including through the Asia Pacific Synergy Reth that was just presented right now.
Thank you.
Okay.
Thanks so much for this really illustrative example of how you do synergies, for instance, in the Vietnam context and also demonstrating how it can be done at the local level by recognizing all of these different benefits.
I think that's also a nice segue over to our next panelist.
Our next panelist is doctor Bernardia Irawati Chanuy and doctor Bernardia is the head of the I UCLGASPAC and I'm going now to acronyms as opposed to full names.
Anyway, she's going to talk a little bit about the importance of empowering cities and sub national governments to serve as delivery platforms for synergistic solutions.
We want to learn a little bit, Bernardia from you, about how do you actually not only empower cities to do this, but how do you empower them to scale synergistic solutions up.
Thank you very much, Excellency.
Dear speakers and everyone, very good afternoon, Con Chiwa and just introduce myself once again, Bernardia.
It is very simple.
Secretary-General United Cities and local governments, Asia Pacific, this abbreviation of UCLG aspect is very long.
We are based at the City Hall of Jakarta.
First of all, thank you also for including us as one of the co authors of this report because we wrote a very important aspect, which is about cities.
Cities occupy only 3% of land, but consume more than 80% of energy and also waste maybe around more than 60% as well.
So that's why we are very happy that the city is being used as one of the important components on this.
It's very clear that Asia Pacific Synergy report sends a clear message here.
Number one is that achieving the SDGs and reporting or responding to triple percent crisis require integrated approach, so we cannot do a business as usual anymore, so that we need to bridge climate action by diversity conservation and pollution reduction, public health and sustainable development.
The second clear message is that the report also demonstrate that effective local actions and solutions already exist with more than 140 case studies.
Now important is how we can upscale it.
And cities and local governments, we cannot do and translate this vision into action we thought could enabling environments.
So this is why we also release enabling environment assessment and how local governments can perform well by looking at several aspects, financing, data, and other things.
But let me give you three points how we can scale up and demonstrate.
The first one, I think is important to enhance the capacity of development on the integrated urban planning because a lot of local governments and cities do not have climate actions in the ground.
I think this is important.
How can we address the limited technical capacities and to prepare these integrated climate and resilient plans? We actually supported climate action plans in several cities in Asia and Pacific.
Combining greenhouse gas inventory, climate trees, and vulnerable assessments.
Importantly, those climate actions also had been integrated in the local planning actions.
If you don't integrate then it will be separate actions.
Second, strengthen the regional law exchange through program idea development.
Actually, when this synergy report was released, we immediately introduce these triple planetary classes to all the mayors that join Asia Pacific Mayor Academy.
B Armida maybe you recall, we have Asia Pacific Academy that set up by SCAP and UN Habitat and USPAC together with other partners also including IGS.
So we have to come up with solution that already been tested under similar governance, financial, and socioeconomic conditions.
We have done this through peer learning, through coaching, especially related to financing as well because cities, they don't have investment plans.
They are not used to come up with investment plans.
This is why it's important to have some peer learning and also how to develop those investment plans and change into bankable programs.
We need to have good coaching, mentoring, city planning, communities of practice, technical advisory services, and to make digital learning platform as well.
The third one, this is the last one, We have to leverage the politic commitments into regional commitment or regional platform because we have already enough commitment, but what we need is more implementation.
We need to move from increased awareness raising gap for triple phonetic crisis and synergies and we have to have a development of different sectoral approach.
We cannot do as business as usual anymore.
What support do we need? I think there's a question you give us to succeed.
Cities need more than funding.
We don't need more than funding.
We need enabling ecosystem that supports cities.
That means predictable finance, that means sustained capacity buildings, stronger multi level governance, institutional regional peer learning platforms, and access to data and technical expertise.
If we can have one data from the whole countries, that would be excellent.
But again, this is not easy to do, but Empowering local governments require five interconnected elements.
C mandate.
We need a clear mandate.
We need to have adequate financing and strong institution capacity buildings, reliable data, and meaningful voice decision making processes.
I end this by thank you once again for the attention.
Thanks so much, Bernardia for highlighting the importance of enabling environments and for also being a change agent when it comes to equipping mayors with the knowledge of how to construct those enabling environments for synergies.
The free plug here is if you're interested more in enabling environments, you can also go to the UCLG APAC website, and they have some very interesting materials on enabling environments.
Now I'd like to also bring in the private sectors perspective on this.
I'd like to ask a question to our colleague, Scott Olenik from counterforce labor.
And, Scott, so my question for you is, we know businesses they can play a critical role and as you were using some terminology, moving the needle on the SDGs.
But at the same time, there can also be some trade offs that come out from trying to pursue synergies.
So we want to understand from a business perspective, how can companies minimize these trade offs while creating strong synergies for people, the environment, and the economy.
Over to you, Scott.
Thank you, everyone for having me today.
Appreciate it.
All my colleagues here.
Thank you, Minister.
There is a trade off with companies.
You're always making a trade off in this world no matter what.
I think when you think about it, you start with the C Suite.
Any C Suite in any big company, they have to drive a mission, they have to drive values.
I'll start with the mission of our company, and I'll relay that to everything else.
The mission of our company is to create a positive human impact in the world.
We hear a lot of E and G in the room today.
We're right in the middle with the S.
When I'm talking to C Suites, when I'm talking to executives, we're talking about the social aspects of these businesses, and there is a compromise there.
So when I look at this, and I've sent across the board from just about every Fortune 500 CEO.
It's a challenge to us because they always when we find forced labor, we find slave labor.
What's the first thing they do? They want to shut down the company.
We can't do that.
The average working age in certain countries is 13-years-old.
If you don't have a job by then, you potentially are sold into slavery or you're trafficked.
What is the compromise? We have to come up with a compromise.
On our end, we'll figure out a solution with the company for the broader scale of these large organizations.
What's the solution? Sometimes it's co locating a farm, sometimes it's setting up a school for after hours.
So it's bringing in an NGO at the end of the day to further help these communities out.
But you need to understand it.
In the private sector, a lot of times with what we deal in, they want to turn a blind eye to it.
It's a very big challenge.
If they don't see it, they don't know about it, they don't have to action it.
Bringing what I do to light is a very large challenge and to drive synergies in what I do to the executives, I have to make it relatable.
And I hate to use this, but I have children and a lot of people in this room have children.
Leave the world a better place for your kids than you came into it is my driving principle.
If I can relate to their children, I can relate to the broader audience and everybody has kids in those boardrooms.
And when you do that, you can drive synergies for them to move in the right direction.
You have to find something relatable with the audience you're dealing with to really turn the screws into and to make a good decision.
That's what I do.
Thanks so much, Scott, for highlighting the importance of trying to make some of these arguments most relatable and also making human connections there.
I think this is really important point.
And I think it also brings us to another very useful perspective on how do we make synergies actionable? I'd like to hear a little bit from the youth perspective on this.
And so we have a representative from the Children and Youth major Group to UNEP, and this is doctor Fria Iskandar Um, who's going to talk to us a little bit about how we can better involve young people in creating synergies that both improve planetary health and human well being.
Over to you.
Thank you so much, Ed.
Eing speakers, guests, colleagues.
Good morning, good afternoon.
My name is Vita I'm Indonesian, Imberma Bernadia.
I'm currently pursuing a master's degree in public health and environmental health sciences at Rutgers University and serving as the environmental health focal point for children and youth up Uni.
As a scar and now aspired to be a researcher, I truly understand how this is really important for us to work in COMD, especially for now, to make our advocacy based on the evidence based data.
So I want to depart this answer from the current resolution that has been adopted last year in the UN seven, resolution seven slash six, enhancing meaningful participation of young people in the environmental process and educations.
So I think that's our big milestone that we are glad to share here because we've been working really hard to have this resolution finally passed and then supported by the member states.
And now we as the form formal engagement for young people within the UNP, we have this more mandate to facilitate young people to engage within this space.
SCYMG itself, within these past two years, we have emerged supporting the establishment of three networks.
The first one, the Ocean Science and Government Youth Network.
Second one recently launched youth plastic Action Network, and then the last one is Young Science Policy Network or YSPN.
We realized that this is really important for us to also support the science policy interface and then help facilitate young people who are having this interest, especially in the YSP and the Young science policy network.
I think the minister mentioned how it's fragmented, how young people participation, young scientists also fragmented.
And then here we're trying to build synergy between young people who are having background in the diverse um, diverse knowledge and then diverse experience.
Within our YSPN we have three course issues that we want to work on more.
The first one under climate action, second is nature biodiversity, land, and ecosystem, and then the last one quite happening is chemical waste and poltions.
So through this platform, we're trying to build these, collaborations between the young people to engage in the various multilateral environmental agreements, science policy interfaces so we can provide better advocacy avenues for young people, not only on the advocacy section, but also in the research section.
I think that's how we are trying to express our engagement and our spirit to engage with this decision making process and then research process.
While also it's really important to us to be able to get these recognitions, the support to sit at the same table with the equal voices, and then also considering our expertise to also as equal as the other expertise for this human and then planetary health.
I think that's all my answers, sorry.
Thank you, Eric.
Hey, thank you so much, Vitrea for also reminding us that some of the other UNA resolutions focused on youth empowerment and also for highlighting.
I think one of the key points of synergies that we sometimes miss when we talk about multiple environmental benefits is that these interactions are also critical between different people.
So when you bring together different youth, you can also deliver a stronger case for collective action and help solve some of these environmental issues.
Really important perspective there, and I think that also loops us back around to a little bit more about how governments and also international processes can play a role in promoting synergies.
I'd like to basically conclude the multi stakeholder dialogue with a question to the deputy foreign minister from Armenia.
This is Robert Abu Sgmanan.
Deputy Foreign Minister, looking ahead to the CBD Cop 17 that's going to be hosted in Armenia and beyond, how can international processes help strengthen synergies across climate, biodiversity, pollution control, and sustainable development more generally? Thank you very much, Excellencies, distinguished colleagues.
Ladies and gentlemen, first of all, I would like to express my appreciation to co organizers for convening this important discussion for the opportunity to participate and share some thoughts as incoming presidency of the CBD Cop 17.
As presidency of Cp 17, we are committed to advancing practical, inclusive, and action oriented cooperation across the real conventions.
I see that there is a consensus in this room that climate change biodiversity laws and pollution are interconnected challenges that cannot be addressed in isolation.
And fragmented approaches that do not take into account cross cutting issues cannot yield effective results.
During these two years when Armenia was elected as incoming president of Cop 17, on some instances we have faced very worrisome phenomenon and decisions adopted during one cop can contradict or even worse, can affect the decisions adopted during the other cops.
And I believe we should work together to join up our efforts in order to address this issue.
In this regard, I believe the joint statement on synergies co signed by current and incoming presidencies of conventions last year during COP 13, Bm demonstrated growing political momentum for synergies and cooperation on the implementation.
The CBD Cop 17 can build on this political momentum and reinforce the support of the international community for synergies.
Actually, on the other hand, I also believe that the triple planetary crisis cannot be addressed by governments alone.
And here for effective implementation, we need the whole of government and whole of society approach, bringing together governments, indigenous peoples and local communities, civil society, youth, academia, philanthropy, private sector, et cetera.
So the synergies are best implemented at the national level through the integrated planning and coordinated implementation and Arma's own experience that demonstrate this.
We have aligned our updated NBSAp with our NDC helping strengthen institutional coordination, reduce the duplication, and focus national efforts on implementation.
When it comes actually to CP 17, as you may know, as a central element of the CP 17 process, the global review of the collective progress and implementation of the GIMGBF will serve as a key mechanism for assessing collective progress towards the goals and targets of the framework, identifying the gaps and informing the next steps of implementation, it presents a landmark opportunity to strengthen the science policy interface by drawing on scientific assessment together with national experience and traditional knowledge.
Looking ahead, countries should enhance coherence among national planning, monitoring, and review mechanisms, ensuring that these processes reinforce one another.
As incoming presidency of CBD Cop 17, we stand ready to work with all the parties and stakeholders to strengthen synergy across sectors in support of sustainable future.
Using this opportunity, I would like to invite all of you to make part of the Cp 17 Yerevan in October this year.
Thank you very much.
Okay.
Thank you very much, Deputy Foreign Minister, for also reminding us that there has been some recent discussions on trying to use synergies to strengthen coordination across these different agreements and also highlighting some of the good work that Armenia is doing, for instance, by integrating NDCs and NBSAPs and also for inviting us to come and experience what I think will be momentous progress at the CBD cop in Armenia coming up.
So now what I'd like to do is, um, Just to frame how we've moved things along, we've heard a little bit about the importance of synergies from many different perspectives, whether it be focusing on the ground, focusing on local governments and cities and using different platforms for scaling up synergies.
We've heard a little bit about how to make synergies relatable, especially from a business perspective and bringing in some of the human dimension as well.
And recognize the importance of youth and young people as ways to bridge the science policy practice interface, and also to bring together different young people to motivate collective action on synergies.
Last but not least, we've also heard a little bit about the importance, once again, of these international processes and how synergies can be mainstreamed in international processes, and hopefully that also can drive the scaling of synergies.
What I'd like to do now is, Turn us over to a brid of interventions from the floor.
As I mentioned at the very beginning, we've identified a few colleagues prior to the event that are going to provide some comments and interventions based upon what we've already heard.
First, I'd like to come over and I'm going to head over to this side of the table right now.
I'd like to ask I a colleague from the United Arab Emirates.
This is miss Hanan Ali, the Managing Director for Federal Competitiveness and Statistics Center.
She's also the chair of the UAE National Committee on SDGs.
I'd like her to reflect a little bit upon what she's heard today and raise some points that are salient from her perspective.
Thank you.
Thank you, Chair, Excellencies, distinguished criques.
It's very inspiring and enlightening to hear the different dialogues and I am sure dialogues like this would help us get closer to impact and that's the most important thing.
As we enter the final year of 2030 agenda, one lesson has become increasingly clear.
The challenge before us, climate change, water scarcity, food security, biodiversity loss, and energy transition do not exist in isolation.
It requires an integrated approach, the policies designed to address them and science are critical for bridging these gaps.
This is one of the key reflections of the UAE's third voluntary National Review.
Our experience has shown that sustainable development accelerators, when science accelerates when science helps governments understand the connection between challenges and designed integrated solutions.
One example is our approach to water resilience.
Through the UAE's Water Security Strategy 2036, we are bringing together engineering, environmental science, clean energy, and infrastructure planning to reduce water demand, expand water reuse, and transition towards lower carbon desalination.
Therefore, when policy framework is advancing SDGs six, seven, 11, and 13 simultaneously.
Science is also transforming how we govern.
Across the UAE, digital platforms, geospatial technologies, and artificial intelligence are strengthening the link between evidence and decision making, enabling the government to move from periodic reporting towards more continuous adaptive policy making.
Finally, I should note that success of building these connections has been underpinned by partnerships, partnerships that brings together the relevant actors from across the sectors.
As our third luntary National Review demonstrates, the future of sustainable development will depend not only on stronger science or stronger policies, but stronger connections between them.
Thank you, Chair.
Okay.
Thank you so much, miss Lee, for highlighting the role of science based decision making, especially when it comes to sustainable water management and the multiple benefits or synergies that can come from that type of approach and also making this point about connecting or making connections between different goals.
This is a really salient point, especially in the water space.
Now I'd like to hear a little bit of perspective from a colleague from the Canadian UN Youth Delegate program.
This is N Ip.
N like to hear some of your reflections.
Thank you, Eric, and thank you to the co conveners for organizing this really important event.
Excellencies, distinguished delegates and dear colleagues, I have the privilege of speaking on behalf of the UN youth Delegate Planetary Health Coalition.
As a Canadian UN youth delegate working alongside counterparts from six continents, we examined the triple planetary crisis through a planetary health lens, building on health as a driver of ambition mentioned earlier by Eric.
Our message was consistent across regions.
Climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution are undoubtedly interconnected crises driving wildfires in Canada, food insecurity in South Africa, threats to water security due to glacial retreat in Peru, and ecosystem degradation that undermines both human and planetary well being.
Delegates also emphasized the importance of indigenous leadership, ecological stewardship, and sustainable food systems.
We also identified a persistent gap between evidence and action as others have outlined today.
Our dialogue revealed that this policy action gap drives climate anxiety in young people.
To help close this gap, one of the ways we can work together is on youth citizen science and recognizing it as a valuable source of evidence.
Across regions, we found that youth are already monitoring biodiversity, documenting pollution, tracking wildfire impacts, and recording environmental change within their communities.
These efforts can complement traditional scientific data and meaningfully integrate youth perspectives into policy processes, which can in turn strengthen the science policy practice interface and ensure that responses to the triple planetary crisis are grounded in both evidence and lived experience.
Thank you.
Thanks so much for highlighting this action gap, Nathaniel and underlining the point that youth can be critical to help demonstrate how you deliver action on the ground.
I happen to have a 10-year-old daughter in Japan and living in Japan, it's really amazing to me is how well students are aware of the SDGs and how they try to practice them in their everyday life.
I think this is something that you're also pointing to.
Thanks very much for bringing this out.
Then I think I'd like to now turn the conversation over to our colleagues from Oxford University or University of Oxford and the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Index Initiative.
This is Sabina Al Kira, and I think they will reflect a little bit on some of the work that they're doing to try to bring some of the environmental and human development issues together.
Sabina, over to you.
Thank you so much, Excellencies, distinguished guests, friends.
Thank you for having me.
I commend the authors of the report on looking at the synergies between the triple planetary crises.
The word synergy to me brings the mind bowling.
And bowling, you want to have one ball, but you want to drop three pins or ten pins, get a strike and the synergistic approaches are so valuable, cost saving and visible.
I'd like to add one more not crisis, but one more consideration, which is poverty, which is what we work on multidimensional poverty.
We look at the different deprivations that strike the same person and household at the same time.
And the definitions of poverty differ.
Armenia has an official NPI, so does Panama, so do 56 countries.
I'll give an example, one example from the global multidimensional poverty index we do with UNDP.
It covers 6.3 billion people in the developing world.
1.1 billion are multidimensionally poor, experiencing deprivations across undernutrition, out of school children, water, sanitation, electricity, assets, and housing.
Of those 1.1 billion poor people, 887 experienced at least one climate hazard in their subnational region the same time they were poor, extreme heat, air pollution, flood or drought, 887 million, so that's 80% of all poor people.
Among those people, their poverty was higher if they experienced more at the same time.
651 had two climate situations at the same time they were poor, 309 experienced three climate hazards at the same time.
And so I think bringing into focus these impoverished communities, you see another resource.
You see people who can host ecotourism, people who can build flood resistant housing, people who can think about the ways of cleansing the environment.
So I think that trying to some of the 147 case studies did this, but bringing them in as collaborators, bringing the, the impoverished youth in as innovators, is another way to broaden and ground this and also to integrate it with another area of work that's trying to be synergistic in a different way.
Thank you.
So much, Sabina, for reminding us about this strong connection between some of these planetary crises and then also the poverty crisis.
I think more so than ever, we need to recognize that these things are inseparable.
The economics and the environment are absolutely inseparable and also for reminding us the importance of the meaningful participation of different stakeholders that typically might not have so much power.
My colleague Mickey Fukuda, who's been working with us on arranging some of this is very much a strong advocate of meaningful participation.
I think bringing some of those ideas to the fore is really important way to think about how we can activate and motivate action on synergies.
So, colleagues, we have a few minutes left here, and now I'd like to actually have this event closed off by one of the key people who has helped raise the profile of synergies on the global level and by one of the key people that's been behind the global initiative on climate and SDG synergies.
So for our closing remarks, I'd like to turn the microphone over to Bare Sari, and she is the Senior Sustainable Energy and climate advisor at UN Desa.
So Barez nice to see you again and closing remarks over to you.
Thank you so much, Eric.
Let me start by thanking the Ministry of Environment of Japan for convening us and bringing us here together, as well as the organizers for this event, UNEP, ADB, and of course, IGS.
I also want to share that we were honored to collaborate with all of you at the seventh Global Conference on climate and Institut synergies, which actually took place just before the AtopF.
We gathered in SCAPs beautiful headquarters at the end of June and we were able to discuss this topic in detail.
I wanted to and focus my intervention here on four key messages that came out of the conference.
The first one is that we have reached a point in time where the interconnected between the world's most critical challenges, whether it's climate change or addressing pollution or biodiversity or income inequality or poverty reduction is no longer a debate.
It is now wildly recognized that the only way to address today's most critical challenges is to move away from siloed approaches to integrated solutions and synergistic action.
Now, you have all participated in the HLPF.
You know the state of the world.
Last week, the global Sustainable Development Report was launched and let me highlight some of the statistics.
Of the 139 SDG targets with trends data, just over a third, 36% are on track or moving moderately.
Nearly half of them, 49% of accessible SCG targets are moving too slowly, and 15% have slipped beyond the 2015 baseline.
One in ten people still lives in extreme poverty.
Food security affecting 2.3 billion people remains well above 2015 limits.
This is briefly a regression on that in particular.
On climate, of course, many of you are familiar with the statistics.
Global temperatures reached 1.43 degrees Celsius above pre industrial levels in 2025 and greenhouse gas emissions have hit records high.
Meanwhile, the official development assistance fell by a record 23% in 2025, weakening the financial foundations the world's poorest countries depend on.
What does this tell you? We can no longer afford addressing each of these critical challenges in isolation from one another.
The only way to course correct is to look at it from the synergistic lens and integrated solutions.
Now, the second point, We have a an increasing body of evidence, data and examples from rational, regional and global actions.
We heard many of them here today.
The Regional Synergy Report is a perfect example of that.
140 countries around the world have shown how synergies can happen on the ground.
And we know if we move in synergy, then we will have more efficient, more effective, and more impactful results.
Now we have heard different analogies for that.
State minister mentioned 1 stone hitting, I would add harmful burns at the time.
Colleagues here from Aug mentioned one bowling ball hitting multiple pins.
That's the idea.
We do work more effectively to address multiple challenges simultaneously and more impact.
But we know the progress is not at the speed and the scale that is needed, and that brings me to the third point.
Despite our expanded understanding, despite the increasing body of knowledge and the evidence and the examples that we see from around the world, we continue to rely on fragmented systems fragmentation in policy, fragmentation in finance, fragmentation in data and monitoring systems, and even fragmentation in intergovernmental fora.
I can use an example from my own day to day work.
When we attend meetings during the HLPF in many cases, when I say When we talk about NDCs and NB SAPs, you would be surprised how many colleagues don't know what NB SAPs are.
Similarly, when we attend the cops and let's say university SPs, when we talk about the VNRs and how many people are familiar with the VNRs, not a lot of people raise their hands.
These intergovernmental fora and processes continue to work with communities that are very much focused on them in isolation from one another.
We need to change that and that takes all hands on deck.
Which brings me to the last point, and that is the critical importance of the next several years.
We are in 2026, less than four years to go to 2030.
Of course, these years will be important in terms of closing the acceleration gap for the SDGs and climate change and other issues, and this topic of synergies is going to play a key role.
However, we also know that discussions about what would be the future global agenda will kick off next year.
What we are talking about today is critical in laying the foundations for what is to come beyond 2030.
So in that regard, and our colleague Scott mentioned, we all have a role to play.
We all have children.
Let's do it for our children.
We all need to do what we can, whether it's within our institutions, whether it's governmental institutions or private sector or civil society or youth or the MDBs, we can all do more to get us to where we need to do it to.
Now, at TSA, of course, we remain fully committed to push this agenda forward in collaboration with the Ministry of Environment of Japan and IGS and UNP, and SCAP, of course, we will continue to convene global dialogues.
These are the annual synergy conferences.
Stay in tuned for the announcement of where the next one will be.
Will continue to deepen the evidence based on climate and SDG synergies.
In fact, at the conference in Bangkok, the Asia Pacific report gained so much traction that there was a recommendation to replicate the same report and case studies in other regions, Africa and elsewhere.
We hope to contribute to that as well.
Lastly, of course, we will continue to leverage intergovernmental processes, including the discussions that will kick off in the SDG summit in 2027 that will formally start the discussions for what is to come beyond 2030.
Thank you so much and back to you, Eric.
Okay.
Thank you so much, B.
I think this is a really good way to bring us to a close by highlighting not only the need for synergies to accelerate progress up to 2030, but for synergies to play a role beyond that and especially to do this for our children.
Thank you very much, colleagues.
We appreciate all your time, energy, and inputs, and we look forward to seeing you in the hallways and talk a little bit more about the issues covered here.
Thank you.
Bye bye.