National Consultation on Sustainable Development …niti.gov.in/writereaddata/files/NC_SDG1_Report_14032018.pdf5 NITI Aayog – National Consultation on Sustainable Development Goal

SDG 1 – End poverty in all its forms everywhere

National

Consultation

on Sustainable

Development

Goals (SDGs)

2 NITI Aayog – National Consultation on Sustainable Development Goal 1, 14 March 2018


Introduction

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as detailed in the UN resolution, ‘Transforming

our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development’ have emerged as the new

development goals for the whole humanity. The SDGs comprehensively cover social,

economic and environmental dimensions and build on the Millennium Development Goals

(MDGs), which spanned the earlier fifteen-year period from 2000 to 2015. Significantly, the

SDGs constitute a universal agreement to end poverty in all its forms and dimensions, including

extreme poverty. The SDG 1 enunciates this core agenda and specifically focus on completely

eliminating poverty in all its manifestations from everywhere.

The interconnected and integrated strategic perspective of the SDGs is reflected in the

complementarity and interlinkage of SDG 1 with several other SDGs: SDG 2 (Zero Hunger),

SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-being), SDG 4 (Quality Education), SDG 5 (Gender Equality),

SDG 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth), SDG 10 (Reduced Inequalities), etc. This

interconnectedness derives particular salience in the case of SDG 1 because of its centrality to

addressing the cross-sectoral and multi-dimensional impact of poverty.

National Consultation on SDG 1

As a part of its role of overseeing implementation of SDGs in the country, NITI Aayog has

been conducting a series of National Consultations on SDGs involving Central Ministries, State

Governments, experts, academia, CSOs, international organisations and other stakeholders.

The proposed National Consultation on the SDG 1 was organised by NITI Aayog in

collaboration with the Research and Information System for Developing Countries (RIS), New

Delhi and the United Nations in India on 14th March 2018 at the India Habitat Centre, New

Delhi.

Objectives of the Consultation

• Facilitate deliberation on key thematic areas and issues around ending poverty in the

Indian context;

• Generate clarity about various targets of SDG 1 and associated national indicators;

• Analyse critical gaps and important strategies to achieve the targets, and highlight best

practices from the States/UTs in those contexts; and

• Strengthen partnership among various stakeholders around anti-poverty interventions.

Sessions and Themes

The Consultation had four technical sessions covering key aspects of poverty and poverty

eradication as covered under SDG 1 and as relevant to the Indian context. The sessions were

as follows: 1) Analyzing Strategies for Poverty Eradication at National and State Levels, 2)

Enhancing Social Protection for All, 3) Creating Sustainable Livelihoods and Decent Jobs to

Overcome Poverty, 4) Building Resilience to Economic, Social and Environmental Shocks and

Impact of Climate Change.


Inaugural Session

Dr. Ashok Kumar Jain, Adviser, NITI Aayog initiated discussion for the day-long

Consultation and stressed upon the core of Agenda 2030 to end poverty with its inter-linkages

with other goals. He stressed on building resilience against disasters, and climate change to

achieve poverty alleviation and social protection for vulnerable people. He highlighted the

recent initiatives of NITI Aayog with Central Ministries including the Ministry of Statistics

and Programme Implementation (MoSPI) to take action for development of about 63 priority

indicators after discussing with 38 Central ministries for quick monitoring of progress on

SDGs. He shared the performance and achievement of the states like Assam, Haryana and

Himachal Pradesh which are doing well in adopting sustainability in the state agenda and 15

states that are focussing on monitoring framework.

Prof. Sachin Chaturvedi, Director General, RIS made the initial remarks that unless we

make adequate progress in Goals 8 and 9 which cover entrepreneurship, access to decent work

and significance of technology, we can’t achieve Goal 1. He highlighted the interdependence

and cross domain connects of the Goals and cited the significance of other Goals which impact

upon poverty. He stressed on Goals 10 and 12 which also impact poverty significantly and

mentioned major challenge for a growing economy which need to be addressed adequately. He

gave a glimpse of the IMF and World Bank mechanisms for alleviating poverty in the world,

particularly in Africa. He summarised the strategic changes led by PM that have fructified

major initiatives towards paving the way forward for reducing poverty. He also emphasised on

the current dispensation which encompasses three components macro economic stability,

political patronage to poverty alleviation programmes, and social sector reforms. He cited the

new approach that PM has adopted which is a change from entitlement to expansion of

entrepreneurship base. Schemes like MUDRA, Skill India, Ayushman Bharat bring the

aspiration of the Agenda 2030 and programmes like DISHA addresses localization of SDGs at

district level. He recommended narrowing down the number of the indicators; simultaneous

progress in all other Goals along with Goal 1 and to encourage states to explore options and

inter-balancing the goals for district level development.

Mr. Yuri Afanasiev, UN Resident Coordinator India focussed on the interconnectedness of

the SDGs as well as the multidimensional nature of poverty in India. He highlighted that while

India has made significant strides in halving poverty to 22% over the last 20 years, 500 million

people are still subject to multidimensional poverty. He emphasised that without a focus on

increasing incomes, other aspirations cannot be realized. He acknowledged that since there is

an overlap between income, health coverage, education and malnutrition, the inter-linkage

between these issues should be given importance. He underlined the importance of reducing

medical bills and costs for India’s young population, who will otherwise lag behind due to

compromised capabilities, detachment from the increasingly complex job market in India’s

emerging economy and would therefore be prone to poverty. Stating the example of insufficient

internet access and digitalization for e-governance, he stressed the importance of properly

dispensing essential services in order to enable capitalization of implemented programs in rural

areas. He also highlighted that the next 10-15 years will be critical as our understanding of

poverty changes. Lastly, he opined that while India’s poor population is concentrated in rural


areas, poverty may move into urban areas, and should therefore be examined now, accentuating

that understanding the challenges of tomorrow while dealing with the challenges of today is

the way to go ahead.

Dr Rajiv Kumar, Vice Chairman, NITI Aayog delivered the special address and emphasised

on taking away the poverty debate down to district headquarters, urban slums, rural centres and

below where poverty is concentrated in India. Quoting a study he stated that there are around

200 districts in India where the large number of social indicators are way below the national

standards. Therefore, NITI Aayog has adopted 115 aspirational districts programme with a

focus on implementation and delivery of services. He emphasised that we need to focus on the

instrumentalities for eradicating poverty instead of calorie-based definition of poverty. Such

new definition of poverty should come up which emphasises on multiple dimensions of poverty

like shelter, health, education and so on, and helps in raising the share of public services in the

consumption basket of the poor. He praised the new approach of delivering public services

which are more efficient, transparent and deliverable and cited the success of direct benefit

transfer through JAM trinity. He stressed the need to successfully implement Ayushman Bharat

which would act as a good tool to address poverty and improve primary and preventive

healthcare and further reduce out of pocket expenses. He suggested toexpand DBT programme

and work further on district development plans which can enable and empower districts and

optimise the resources available at districts.

Shri Narendra Singh Tomar Hon’ble Minister of Rural Development and Mines, in his

keynote address stressed upon the need for a crucial collaborative thought process in all

aspects for the achievement of poverty reduction. He commented that a number of efforts have

been taken in this direction but there are still challenges which need to be addressed. He

stressed on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s and NITI Aayog’s continuous efforts for

achievement of SDG 1, with a core focus on poor sections of society. He emphasised on the

importance of rural development programmes such as Sarva Siksha Abhiyan, Pradhan Mantri

Gram Sadak Yojana, Gram Awas Yojana, Mission Antyodaya of Gramin Vikas Mantralya and

also various other programmes. Referring to the establishment of District Mineral Foundations,

he stated that such initiatives should be undertaken that reduce environmental impacts of

mining. He also stressed on the 115 districts identified by NITI Aayog where gaps need to be

filled through interaction of national, state and district-level institutions.

Session 1 - Analysing strategies for poverty eradication at national and state levels

The session was chaired by Shri. S. Vijay Kumar, Distinguished Fellow, TERI, New Delhi.

He gave an overview of poverty alleviation strategies (i.e. direct and indirect approaches) and

highlighted overall aspects of existing rural employment programmes which have proved

successful in the last few decades. These comprise of the shift towards a demand-based

approach including self-targeting, improving natural base, building resilience and capacity for

planning and maintenance. He suggested that anti-poverty programmes should be inclusive

rather than exclusive and cited the success of self-targeting mechanism, and scope of

improvement in terms of restructuring Panchayati Raj planning, execution Monitoring and

management. He recommended indirect approaches over direct to reduce poverty. The former

enables systems and drivers in the general economy, provides a pro-poor bias which further


warrants upliftment of people out of poverty, while the latter affects only families and their

ecosystem directly. He suggested that education through SHGs, particularly for women, under

NRLM is a great example of sustainable poverty reduction and therefore be mainstreamed. He

recommended boosting rural infrastructure under PMGSY, while also deepening, broadening

and converging it with other programmes. He suggested contract farming, land leasing and

watershed programmes to increase farmers’ incomes and to improve natural resource base to

strengthen resilience. He also suggested that addressing regulatory and governance issues can

help the land market and the poor by Aadhaar seeding and block chain-based database for land

records. He summed up that integrating poverty reduction strategies with general economic

strategies is the way to go. He requested panellists to express their viewpoints.

Dr. Rajesh Tandon, President, Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA), New Delhi,

highlighted the case of BIMARU states as they still continue to account for 50% of India’s

poor population. He recommended increasing agricultural income, focussing on the growing

urbanization of youth, facilitating the role of small businesses in small towns, and enabling

localization of opportunities in terms of economy, assets and markets. He underlined the

importance of strengthening the Panchayati Raj system in reducing poverty in these states. He

recommended amelioration of state government services through nudging, incentivizing and

pushing reforms as well as improving governance to strengthen the state of the individual.

Shri Atul Tiwari, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Rural Development, presented an integrated

approach of Mission Antyodaya that has built social capital through SHGs and convergence of

central ministries and gram panchayats. He highlighted the shift towards evidence-based

interventions, as promulgated by the SECC. He recommended addressing vulnerability,

supporting and organizing of skilling of poor in terms of basic living as well as leveraging

modern technology in order to increase their capacity. He also suggested for creating assets to

increase agricultural productivity. Lastly, he mentioned issues of clarity in terms of definitions

and of coordination in reporting, to highlight substantive outputs.

Professor Rohini Somanathan, Delhi School of Economics, highlighting the history of

poverty in India, indicated that poverty is reduced not only through the policies formulated to

combat it, but also the environment in which the policies have been created, which demands

integration of policy and its environment in order to reduce poverty. She underlined the

importance of marketing linkages for SHGs to carry out income generating activities and that

the linkage of poverty to healthcare, education and the environment must be acknowledged.

She recommended addressing deficiencies in terms of quality of public services that are catered

to the poor, as well as filling gaps in the services provided in rural areas. Prof. Somanathan

advocated for better measurement of poverty by moving beyond the NSSO, suggesting that

worldwide experts should be consulted for extending poverty reduction strategy-making

beyond just governmental institutions.


Session 2 - Enhancing Social Protection for All

The session was chaired by Shri. Heeralal Samariya, Additional Secretary, Ministry of

Labour and Employment, Government of India, who welcomed his fellow panellists and

requested Prof. Amitabh Kundu, Distinguished Fellow, RIS, New Dehli, to open the panel.

Prof. Amitabh Kundu, Distinguished Fellow, RIS, New Dehli, opened the discussion with

a presentation emphasizing achievements in rates of poverty reduction, adding that attention

was called to the need for separate targets for urban and rural poverty reduction. He pointed

towards the need for achieving targets faster in rural areas as deprivation in rural areas is very

high, drawing attention to the fact that the poorer a region, the higher the gap between economic

poverty and multidimensional poverty is and offered examples of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. Prof

Kundu flagged the issue of poverty pockets, both geographical and social. He expressed the

need for access to health care for Scheduled Tribe, Scheduled Castes and minorities

Communities as these groups have lower access rates than the national average. He also

highlighted the higher dropout rates for these groups and suggested that attention should be

paid to ensure that youth from these groups, especially young women, attend school for as long

as possible.

Shri Shishir Sinha, Development Comissioner, Government of Bihar, spoke on

development progress in the state of Bihar, citing that last year’s growth rate was at 10.3

percent. He highlighted the need for inclusive growth where everything reaped should be

reaching the ultra-poor. To do this, he stated the need to sharpen the state’s service delivery

system. Shri Sinha spoke of the Saat Nischay Scheme Yojana or the 7 Resolves, a

multidimensional scheme concerning human development. The focus of the resolves are on

gender equality, human development indices in capacity building, aspirations for every

household to be provided with running water, paved roads and drainage systems. Swachh

Bharat Abhiyan is another focus with specific attention on reducing public defecation. Finally

equal access to electricity and more investment in higher education in Bihar cover the

intentions of the 7 resolves. Shri Sinha concluded with the thought that reduction in poverty

starts with the ultra-poor and the poverty reduction work should focus on them.

Chair, Additional Secretary Heeralal focused on the rights and needs of labourers in the

States of India. He highlighted 3 specific things that workers require for social protection: i.

Minimum wages ii. A Good work environment and iii. Social Security. Focusing on the formal

sector, he mentioned that the Ministry of Labour and Employment had taken up the process of

wage revision, in which semi-skilled workers would see a 42 percent increase in wages, raising

the minimum daily wage to Rs. 300. He mentioned recent success in maternity policy where

now mothers are entitled to 26 weeks of maternity leave. He also cited an amendment to the

child labour Act for preventing children under the age of 14 from working and also forbidding

children between the ages of 14 and 18 from working in hazardous processes or industries. In

his closing remarks he stressed the importance of finding effective ways to provide social

security to workers in the unorganized sector.


Ms. Mittal Shah, Coordinator, Social Security, Self Employed Women Association,

stressed that economic empowerment of women could not be achieved without social

protection. Ms. Shah called attention to the importance of the informal sector citing that it

makes up 50 percent of India’s GDP, 55 percent of national savings and 47 percent of all

exports. She pointed out as to how empowerment requires the common principle of starting

with small projects and building up and spoke of the work that SEWA was doing with informal

female workers. In the 1st stage of their projects they had provided women with financial

services, child care and health care. Following this, their projects focused on housing and basic

amenities and finally on pensions and insurance. She commended the 26-week maternity leave

in the organized sector but highlighted the fact that informal female workers need to be back

at work within a month of child birth. To aid these women, Ms Shah stressed the need for early

childhood care programmes. Concluding Ms Shah insisted that social protection should be

championed with a holistic, integrated and decentralized approach.

Mr. Markus Ruck, Senior Specialist on Security, Decent Work Team for South Asia, ILO,

highlighted that economic growth does not automatically reduce poverty. He added that even

social protection for all does not automatically reduce poverty. He stressed on the importance

of social protection in guarding against back-sliding into poverty and its crucial role in

inclusive growth. He highlighted the interconnectedness of the Sustainable Development

Goals, citing SDG5, 8 and 10 as crucial to inclusive poverty reduction.

Ms. Misaki Akasaka Ueda, Chief Social Policy, Monitoring and Evaluation, UNICEF

India, spoke on social protection in terms of children. She Misaki offered four crucial points:

how social protection and child rights intersect in the SDGs; how social protection provides a

roadmap to address poverty and child specific vulnerabilities; how we need to include

multidimensional aspects in our development programme; and how the principles of the SDGs

are based on survival development protection and define the accountability of the nation. In

that regard India has taken a number of steps to address poverty and progress the SDGs but it

needs to include multidimensional aspects. She stressed on the importance of protecting

children from malnutrition, child marriages, child labour and ensuring opportunities for

education. She highlighted that we need a more integrated look at the role of social protection

throughout a person’s life so we can identify gaps and assess inadequacies. Globally we have

strong evidence that social protection aids in increasing resilience, adapting productivity, and

building skills to break the intergenerational poverty cycle.

Session 3 - Creating Sustainable Livelihoods and decent jobs to overcome poverty

The session was chaired by Dr. P.K. Anand, Visiting Fellow, RIS, New Delhi. Emphasising

on the need for child development, he suggested that focussing on the first 1,000 days of a

child’s life is pivotal to prevent undernutrition. He cited an example of the issue of non-

availability of hot cooked meals to children in some anganwadis under the ICDS, and how this

problem can be overcome with the help of SHGs adding that it can also lead to generation of

jobs. He added on the need to ensure nutritious meals to public through community canteens

generating further jobs. He requested panellists to express their views.


Shri Atul Dulloo, Joint Secretary, NRLM, Government of India, highlighted that creating

institutions such as SHGs, village-level organizations and cluster-level federations to achieve

social mobilization of the poor, enabling financial inclusion in terms of demand and supply

side interventions, facilitating sustainable livelihoods through value-chain approaches and the

Start-up Village Entrepreneurship Programme in order to improve sustainable agriculture,

livestock and total factor productivity, social development through schemes such as access to

sanitation and nutrition services, as well as skill development through placement linked

programmes are the five pillars of the NRLM. He mentioned the success of NRLM households

in terms of increased savings, greater access to higher loans at lower interest rates, significant

increase in livelihood assets, a 22% hike in per capita income and greater number of enterprises

that indicate livelihood diversification. He also stated the examples of Bihar, Madhya Pradesh,

Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Orissa and Kerala for introducing various interventions to support

farmers and empower women.

Prof. H. S. Shylendra, Centre for Sustainable Livelihoods, IRMA presented the results of

an objective assessment of NRLM based on its design strategies and impacts. Focussing

exclusively on the interlinkage between Community Based Organisations (CBOs) and

livelihoods, he outlined the strategies undertaken by NRLM, such as placing emphasis on wage

and self-employment, implementing programs through CBOs in order to build capacities of

people and to enable mobilization of livelihoods and providing professional support to farmers.

He stressed on the 3-tier structure of the NRLM, where upstream and downstream flow of

resources across the tiers has proven beneficial. He emphasised that while NRLM is a saturated

and universal model as it covers socially, economically and geographically disadvantaged

households under the fold of community-based organizations, it still needs improvements. He

also underlined the limitations of NRLM, such as the need for role clarity for SHGs, movement

beyond microfinance as it tends to exclude poor households and improved capacity in terms of

governance and legal frameworks.

Shri Anil Meshram, Member-Secretary, State Planning Commission, Government of

Tamil Nadu shared his experience from Tamil Nadu in terms of the state’s specific schemes

for targeted groups, such as Vision Tamil Nadu 2023 and other programmes. He mentioned the

success of universal PDS, Micro Credit Support System, Tamil Nadu State Rural Livelihoods

Mission, State Balanced Growth Fund, Special Area Development Programme and Special

Programme for Tribals. He also stressed on the adoption of multipronged strategies, such as

distribution of government wastelands to landless poor agricultural families and improved

animal husbandry. He brought attention to the importance of MSMEs and tapping into the

service sector to generate employment and income for the poor.

Shri R. C. M. Reddy, MD & CEO, IL&FS Education and Technology Services Ltd.

emphasised on the need for bottom-up skill development as an essential tool for empowerment

and capacity building in rural as well as urban areas in order to reduce poverty. He suggested

that such strategies should be lifelong learning approaches instead of short-term booster

schemes. He recommended creation of highly local economic programmes instituted at school

level, focus on agricultural skills and farmer training as well as on non-farm livelihoods in rural

areas, development of entrepreneurial skills and public-private partnerships.


Shri Krishna Kumar, Visiting Fellow, RIS, highlighted that no comprehensive attention has

been given to the sustainability aspect of poverty and that so far most of the sectoral

programmes do not adequately address the issue of sustainability. He recommended

improvement in collection of data for SDG indicators, especially in order to measure the

interlinkage of poverty and sustainability. He advocated substantial consideration of

environmental conservation in policy prescriptions so as to protect poor segments of the

society.

Session 4 - Building resilience to economic, social and environmental shocks and impact

of climate change

The session was chaired by Dr. Sharmila Mary Joseph, Secretary, Planning and Economic

Affairs and Member-Secretary, State Planning Board, Government of Kerala, who

stressed on different kinds of shocks in the context of SDGs, such as economic shocks when

an income-earning member of the family dies due to illness, cancer, cardiovascular diseases,

etc., social shocks that can occur due to poor skill sets of the workforce, poor and/or low quality

of education and health epidemics, as well as environmental shocks that take place majorly due

to natural disasters, mishaps, calamities and degradation of the environment. She also

mentioned that shocks can be manmade, such as when houses are built on seashores,

anthropogenic, such as due to deforestation, soil erosion, and unscientific methods of farming

or they can be natural.

Dr. V. Thiruppugazh, Joint Secretary (Policy & Plan), National Disaster Management

Authority, Government of India, stressed on the largely manmade reasons behind climatic

disasters. He emphasized that shocks occur due to concentration of people and assets in one

place, which in turn increases exposure to vulnerable situations. He mentioned the concepts of

consequent and social vulnerability, as well as desired and acceptable risk. He highlighted that

more deaths occur due to risk ignorance as compared to natural disasters, in both rural and

urban areas as both areas are insensitive to risk. He recommended that in order to reduce

mortality, economic loss, missing persons and to build resilience, we must share best practices,

envision people as partners, adopt a proactive rather than a reactive approach and invest in not

only infrastructure but also people. Lastly, he emphasized that risk governance, in terms of

institutions, instruments, human resources and community capacity must be improved.

Shri Ray Kancharla, National Manager-Humanitarian Response & DRR, Save the

Children India, highlighted the importance of child-centred disaster risk reduction and climate

change. He stressed that different people are affected differently and that children should not

be perceived as passive recipients but as active torch-bearers of change. He emphasized that

children should be given space and modalities to contribute to DRR legislation, national

practice and educational curricula. He highlighted the need for age, gender and disability-

specific data at least at local levels. In order to protect development gains and to perceive them

as windows of opportunities, he recommended promotion and practice inclusive risk and

vulnerability informed planning, unifying poverty, reduction of inequalities and climate change

as well as adopting educational and comprehensive school safety mechanisms, such as in Tamil


Nadu, Odisha and Assam. Lastly, he highlighted the need to enable children and youth at all

levels, and to integrate child rights with poverty reduction and climate change mitigation.

Dr. James Matthew, Deputy Director General, Ministry of Statistics and Programme

Implementation, stated about the draft National Indicator Framework evolved by MoSPI in

consultation with stakeholders to measure India’s progress towards achieving the SDGs. He

highlighted the challenge of existing data sources in India and their administrative nature. He

emphasized on the need for disaggregated data to be collected at shorter intervals, as this will

help in ensuring that no one is left behind in the development process. He also underscored the

need for clarification on definitions of several SDG global indicators. Lastly, he recommended

strengthening the states’ statistical collection system as well as creating an evaluation

framework that would complement statistical data with qualitative data, which will allow

assessment of progress on targets as a whole.

Shri Abhay Kumar Singh, Senior Assistant Director, FICCI, highlighted the role of

industries and corporates in building disaster resilience with respect to economic, social and

environmental shocks faced by individuals and households. He highlighted that resilience

building must begin at a grassroots level in vulnerable as well as elite societies. He stated that

FICCI has moved towards studying how societies can be more proactive and responsive to

incidents of disasters. In doing so, he stated that FICCI has partnered with the United Nations

International Strategy for Disaster Risk Mitigation to form the Global United Fund, a platform

that brings together various stakeholders in order to create a resource pool for not only funds

but also expertise. He suggested that not only advocating for risk mitigation but also executing

certain programmes in partnership with like-minded people and organizations is essential.

Referring to the example of capturing excess run-off in monsoon season to facilitate the next

crop season, he stated that it is important for corporates to scout Indian innovations. He

emphasized that creating a platform where countries can collaborate to understand what is

needed according to different geographies can result in productive exchange of technology and

expertise. Lastly, he highlighted that corporates can contribute to developing an investment

matrix for disaster risk and mitigation in order to discern business opportunities in this area.

Way Forward

Shri B. N. Tiwari, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Statistics and Programme

Implementation (MoSPI) suggested that a critical role must be assigned to development of a

national indicator framework for measuring SDG targets. He highlighted that while preparation

of metadata and baseline data is underway, collecting data on around 300 indicators will be a

time-consuming task. He stated that non-availability of data is a major concern, especially for

Central ministries and Departments, which must strengthen their data collection system in order

to maximize information on the indicators. He suggested that some new approaches to data are

required, such as the need for generating disaggregated data. He highlighted that constraints of

time and cost will be important to NSSO in this case, especially since sample size will be

increased extensively to generate information at local and district levels. Lastly, he suggested

the creation of a dashboard, where concerned ministries can upload collected data directly as

and when it is acquired.


Dr. P. K. Anand, Visiting Fellow, RIS, stressed that sustainability must be a part of the

national fabric and it can be achieved with collective commitment and participation. Giving

the example of village level stakeholders, he suggested that development process must be

inclusive. He recommended to focus not only on entitlements but also on asset creation, so that

income generation takes place. He also suggested to look beyond food security and move

towards nutrition security, since the issue is not merely about calorific consumption. He

highlighted that under NFSA legislation, there should be better implementation of the provision

of procurement of coarse grains among foodgrains. He suggested that health concerns should

not be limited mechanically to only medical centric issues, but also on inherent human values

such as peace and trust. Speaking on SDG interlinkages, he emphasized on the connection

between Target 10.1 and Goal 1, where the need to look beyond the trickle-down effect should

necessitate at least conditional income conversions. Lastly, he suggested that discrimination

against farmers in terms of procurement mechanisms should be reduced, especially for

producers of coarse grains such as bajra.

Dr. Ashok Kumar Jain Adviser, NITI Aayog, summarized key points discussed throughout

the Consultation. He stressed on the interconnectedness of SDGs and their instrumentalities for

implementation. He emphasized on the need to undertake an integrated approach towards

pockets of poverty that exist in rural and urban areas with low HDI, especially for youth who

are now moving into urban and peri-urban areas. He highlighted the need for proper

infrastructure not only to increase incomes but also to tackle multidimensional poverty. He

referred to the success of SHGs in terms of credit mobilization, especially in the Southern states

of India. He also mentioned the need for social protection and a mechanism from entitlement

to entrepreneurship for India’s unorganized sector. Lastly, he called for a focus on sustainable

livelihoods, skill development in non-farm sectors, development of SDG indicators under

MoSPI, inclusion of corporates in the sustainability agenda as well as transparency in service

deliveries.

Vote of thanks was delivered by Ms. Sanyukta Samaddar, OSD, NITI Aayog to all the

participants. She also informed about the role of various stakeholders in progressing

achievements under SDGs.

Documents

National Consultation on Sustainable Development …niti.gov.in/writereaddata/files/NC_SDG1_Report_14032018.pdf5 NITI Aayog – National Consultation on Sustainable Development Goal