UWI professor chosen to co-chair UN committee

UWI St Augustine scientist Prof John Agard has been appointed to co-chair the UN’s 2023 Global Sustainable Development Report team. He is the only scientist from the Caribbean region on the team.

In a release, UWI St Augustine said Agard will join a diverse group of 15 independent scientists around the world, representing a wide range of disciplines, expertise and backgrounds, who will work as a team on preparing the report. He was appointed to help draft the report by UN Secretary-General António Guterres.

The UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs said the report "will provide guidance on the state of global sustainable development from a scientific perspective, address new and emerging issues and challenges, and offer recommendations for action by governments and other actors.”

This is the second such group and report mandated by UN member states. The first, titled The Future is Now: Science for Achieving Sustainable Development, was released in September 2019.

UWI said the emergence of the covid19 virus is threatening decades of development progress, and the next report, to be published in 2023, will be developed in that context.

The first group released its report, entitled The Future is Now: Science for Achieving Sustainable Development, in September 2019.

UWI said the covid19 pandemic is threatening decades of development progress. The next report will be developed in this context and will be published in 2023. It will then inform the high-level global review of the implementation of the 2030 agenda in September of that year.

The team will work from October 2020, co-ordinating inputs from existing networks, representing the UN, the private sector, civil society and academic groups.

Agard has served on a number of global working groups. He was a lead author of the UN Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change fourth and fifth assessments and a review editor on the sixth assessment report. He also served as the co-ordinating lead author on the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services.

Agard is an independent adviser on environment and sustainability policy to the board of the Inter-American Development Bank in Washington, DC. He has previously been a member of the Caricom Climate Change Task Force and the Caribbean Sea Commission formed by the Association of Caribbean States to advance the cause of integrated management of the Caribbean Sea.