The level of implementation of sustainable development goals in Namibia towards the 2030 sustainable development.

THE LEVEL OF IMPLEMENTATION OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS IN NAMIBIA TOWARDS THE 2030 SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AGENDA.

Keywords: Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Harambe prosperity plan (HPP), national development plan (NDP5), Gross Domestic Product (GDP)

Summary.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure that all people enjoy peace and prosperity. Namibia, like many regions, is working towards achieving these goals through various initiatives. Several countries have developed strategies and policies that align with the SDGs. These policies focus on improving the quality of education, reducing poverty, promoting economic growth, improving healthcare, and ensuring environmental sustainability. However, challenges such as political instability, inadequate funding, and weak institutions continue to hinder the implementation of the SDGs in Namibia. Despite these challenges, progress has been made in some areas. For example, Namibia has made significant strides in reducing poverty and improving access to education. In addition, the country has taken bold steps to address climate change, including the adoption of renewable energy sources.

1 INTRODUCTION

In the year 2016, many countries worldwide came together in Paris and adopted a common interest with a sole aim to transforming our world with an agenda for sustainable energy. The framework gave birth to 17 suitable development goals (SDG) which in parallel co-existed with their measurement proposed targets. In adjustment to the sustainable development goals (SDG) targets for 2030 Namibia has prioritized the implementation of policies into the national development plan to address the 17 different SDG has hinders the country’s economic growth. Namibia Is classified by the world bank as an upper middle-income country, which impacts the amount of aids and investment from non-profit origination like the UN and GIZ that are meant to tackle and help achieve SDG with an assumption that the country is selfdepended. This information could be misleading as the country still has relatively a huge First A. Author, Second B. Author and Third C. Author 2 percentage of the population living below the poverty line and the recent data by Gini coefficient indicate that about 60% of the country’s wealth is uneven distributed. As per commitment to achieving the 2030 agenda for sustainable energy, Namibia embarked on its first national volunteer review in 2018 to reflect on the progress made on attaining the SDG. Documenting the progress on the implementation of the SDG is significant and helps sail the country in the right direction. The progress report can be used as a benchmark to review how far the country has gone in implementing the SDG and facilitate other countries by using each other as reference to solve similar challenges faced in the process of implementing the SDG.

2. THE LEVEL OF IMPLEMENTATION OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS IN NAMIBIA TOWARDS THE 2030 SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AGENDA.

2.1 End poverty in all its forms everywhere Namibia continues to commit towards the eradicate poverty and all its forms. The country strives to increase the standard of living at least if not above $1.25 a day, which according to the 2023 SDG for poverty is the measure for poverty eradication. In 2021, the new government rolled out the Harambe prosperity plan (HPP) and the national development plan (NDP5) with a sole mandate to create job opportunities. Part of the mandate was also to empower the less privilege and poor ethnic groups. Overall, there has been a decline in the poverty level of the country due to the implementations of social and policies put in place to focus on poverty eradication. The ministry of poverty eradication played a major role in bring the poverty percentage down by giving incentives in form of grands and support to poor and severally poor people. The poverty ratio of Namibia is decreasing and hence there is so much background work that needs to be done to make sure we attain the sustainable goal by 2023.

2.2 End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture for Namibia is the second sustainable development goal target on the agenda. No hunger is top priority of the sustainable development goals that Namibia is fully committed to eradicate and this is quite evident in most of the publications made by the government. There is a national deployment of food banks across 6 regions to assist people affected by hunger. In addition, to the existing 6 food banks the government has added 3 more food banks to assist the needy. In conjunction to ending hunger in the country, in parallel Namibia has prioritized the importance of nutrition and sufficient food. Deployment of community health centers and access to public heath facilities has ultimately increased the number of children getting treatment for malnutrition. The government has collaborated with private sectors to empower and help children development. The government has implanted feeding programmed with schools across the country and continues to encourage agriculture, horticulture in terms of First A. Author, Second B. Author and Third C. Author 3 incentives to the community.

2.3 Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages Access to good and affordable health facilities for all citizens is a basic human right. Namibia is struggling with a certain diseases like malaria and HIV that have completely devasted the nation. The country keeps fighting by enrolling programs that provide free preventive measures and building new public facilities for the nation. New school of medicine build helps produce health professions like doctors, nurses, and other specialist to help cover and assist more people.

2.4 Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all At the front, Namibia recognizes the importance of quality education as the key enabler to spiral the country in the right path of attaining the sustainable development goals. The government of Namibia regards the basic education as a mandatory training and a bridge to higher education and job creation. The huge allocation of budget towards the ministry of education every financial year indicates how critical quality and accessible education is to attain the countries sustainable goals. There has been a positive trend and increase in the number of children enrolled for primary school. The government has provided support in terms of study loans (NSFAF) and has pledged the private sector to support students in providing bursaries and scholarships. Although there have been some challenges for instance the government targeted to construction of 255 new schools but only managed to build 89 schools due to financial challenges. The government has a plan in place to expand the number of VTC and TVET institutions across the country.

2.5 Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls The progress on gender equality and women empowerment in Namibia has been at the core of the governments implementation plan for achieving the sustainable development goals. Namibia has a few legal law acts that prohibit sexual discrimination against women and encourage women empowerment when it comes to leadership. The government implemented the gender policy in 2010 with a sole mandate to empower both females and males. The implementation of the gender-based violence (GBV) aims to prevent all sorts of GBV in all forms and make sure that the community is well educated and drive the awareness in the nation. There is still a significant amount of sexual harassment being recorded at a steady increment. By protesting and creating awareness in the nation the government pledges and encourages the youth to change their social and cultural norms that is seen to lead to sexual harassment and gender-based violence. First A. Author, Second B. Author and Third C. Author 4

2.6 Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all Namibia is a semi-desert country located in the Sub-Sahara region with very high extreme temperatures. This high living conditions causes high evaporation and make it very difficult to have surface water on land. Namibia has very dry season accompanied by low water fall and makes it very hard to provide clean and reliable sanitation to people. In rural areas Namibia aims to achieve 95% of its nation with access to clean water. The NDP5 aims to develop and build 12500 toilets for sanitation in rural settlement, due to challenge of politics and funds not even half of the amount was achieved. There is a huge drive from unions like GIZ to pay incentives and encourage people to build boreholes. In terms of moving forward, the government aims to promote investments from private sector and unions to assist in building clean water and sanitation to the nation of Namibia. 2.7 Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all Namibia is one of the best countries in the world located geographically to receive the best radiation from the sun. This placement puts the country in the best position to capitalize on solar technology to provide clean, suitable, reliable, modern, and affordable energy to its nation. Amongst these advantages the country till imports more than 60% of its electricity from neighboring countries. The percentage of households with access to electricity is reported to be 48% in 2020, which of this percentage about 72 % is in urban areas and significantly 21% is in rural areas. Most of the population to date still uses wood as a source of energy for lighting, cooking, and heating sadly these sources of energy are harmful and causes illness and death to most rural communities. One of the main challenges with providing clean energy is that most communities live in isolation and very far from the national grid making it very hard to provide them with power. Regardless, the government in conjunction with ministry of mines and energy has rolled out a programme for rural electrification in the past years which has indicated to be a success. Nonprofit organizations like GIZ also provide free clean energy to people by driving the programs for solar installation in the country. Going forward, Namibia encourages the development of independent power producers, and the government is part of the SAPP which includes other SADC countries to help mitigate and share power to achieve the sustainable development goals. 2.8 Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all First A. Author, Second B. Author and Third C. Author 5 Namibia’s economy is built around the sectors of mining, agriculture, and tourism. In 2020 mid covid, the country recorded the lowest drop in economic growth contraction of 8%. The country thereafter has been struggling to provide decent jobs and economic growth and has been listed as one of the countries with the highest unemployment rate of 34.3%. Financial institutions have come on board to try and provide incentives to SMEs in terms of loans. Small and Medium business employ the largest number of the nation and face huge challenges which one of them is lack of funds. The country has the highest population of young graduates that are unemployed and the leads to a high rate of poverty and crime rate in the country. Overall, the country has failed drastically when it come to creating jobs and boosting the economy, and it is no where near achieving the sustainable development goals 8. 2.9 Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation Namibia is one of the most politically stable countries in Africa, besides its challenges of lack of water, electricity, and lack of human skills. This makes Namibia very suitable for foreign investments and other private sector investments. The government introduced a parastatals body called the Namibia Industrial Development Agency (NIDA) in 2019 which is responsible to drive industrialization in the country to ensure the achievement of suitable development goal 9 is met effectively. Namibia mines and produces a lot of raw material which are exported to other countries and imported as finished products. Since less manufacturing happens in the country, this leads to less industrialization. When it comes to road infrastructure, the country has one of the best roads in Africa with a rating of 5.3 out of 7 in the category according to the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Report of 2019.In terms of innovation the government was able to build and set up rural development centers across all regions which are public research centers.

2.10 Reduce inequality within and among countries Sustainable development goal number 10 addresses inequality and Namibia seems to struggle reducing the inequality.in terms of harassment and discrimination the country is actually reporting less cases than it should. More people are being harassed and less likely reporting this matters. When it comes to the labor share in conjunction to remuneration, the employees receive a fair share of the GDP with an increase of 5% from 2015 to 2019. Namibia has recorded quite a significant number of increase in the refugee number in 2019, the amount is believed to be around 7500. The main struggle Namibia is facing is reducing the gap between the rich and the poor. The government strives to promote social, economic and political inclusion for all sex and age groups. The country continues to encourage its people to do voluntary work and support to eliminate inequality.

2.11 Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable First A. Author, Second B. Author and Third C. Author 6 The high rate of people moving to urban areas has spiked and thus the need to make the cities safe and sustainable. In Namibia most of the population resides in Windhoek and people flock from different towns to the capital city. The number of people keeps increasing hence we need to build resilient cities for our nation. Ensuring adequate and affordable housing through government entities like NHE has help drive sustainable energy development goal 11. Namibia has affordable transportation systems in place that is subsidized by the government. There is still more to be done when it comes to strengthening and protecting cultural and social natural heritage. In the attempt to provide sustainable cities to communities the government continues to remove shacks and provide low income house to the less fortunate. Municipalities’ are encourages to continue providing land in conjunction with National Housing Enterprise (NHE). Strengthen data collections in term of human settlement in urban arears and also try to diversify and encourage people to move out of congested cities.

2.12 Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns Our planet has so many more than enough resources to sustain our existence provided we need utilize them in a very sustainable manner. We need to implement measures in place to help manage the rate at which we utilize our resources. Namibia takes priority to ensure environmental management of resources is of top priority. In terms of conservation Namibia has rolled out several programs to assist with saving energy through utilities and other means of marketing. The countries go a step further, to make sure that all the fishing that happens in the waters is managed through licenses. Bush encroachment is managed via licensing and proper education to the nation. According to the Namibia Zero Hunger Strategic Review Report (2016/2017), it is estimated that about 24% of all food calories grown per year are lost or wasted along the food value chain of smallholder producers. The government entities like Agro-Marketing and the Trade Agency (AMTA) help to minimize food losses.

2.13 Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts Namibia is one of the countries that is prone to high climate changes and the impacts are already visible. Through diverse education and innovation, the challenges faced with climate changes can be mitigated. The country was affecting by drought in the year 2013, 2019 and 2020. Since the country has highlighted the threats from climates change, the government has gone a step further to implement measures in place to mitigate and react to natural disasters and hazards related to climate. Namibia has managed to integrate most of the measures into the policies and framework. creating awareness through education and national level is very critical to make sure people understand the impacts of climate change. Most companies have resorted to implement better framework that put in place climate consideration. The country is constantly developing and encourage farmers to use drought resistance seeds. Namibia is fully committed reducing green house gases.

2.14 Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development First A. Author, Second B. Author and Third C. Author 7 Life under water is very crucial to Namibia and globally to other countries as well. Fishing sector is the biggest contributor to the GDP of the country. Hence it is very essential we take care of life under water and make sure all the resources are utilized in a good sustainable manner. The laws are in place to help facilitate and reduce marine pollution. There is a lot of mining happening in the Namibian ocean and hence why it very important to make sure the life under water is protected.to protect the life under water, Namibia has implemented many measures to make sure that the coastal are protected by using regular patrols. Namibia is currently busy with deploying its Blue Economy Policy and the Marine Spatial Mapping Framework. The country continues to engage in the trans-boundary management of migratory shared resources.

2.15 Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss Protect, restore, and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss. Namibia is not excepted like other countries when it comes to protecting the land and its resources. The government has done sone activations in creating awareness to end deforestation in Namibia. The is a huge protest to protect habitant life on land and the other resources. The country continues to facilitate the formation of community conservancies to reduce pressure on biodiversity and to enable communities to appreciate game as a resource rather than a burden. The country is working with regional partners to enforce the protection of Red List species, especially those targeted by international wildlife crime syndicates like elephants and rhino. The country continues to work towards minimizing human-wildlife conflicts and compensating victims.

2.16 Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels Namibia is a very peaceful country and politically stable. This could be pinpointed to the years the country has had its independence in 1990 and has held free elections after that. The counties rule of law is highly implemented in the court of law. Due to the strong legal system in the country, there is not much violence and abuse leading to death. The traditional legal way is still in place to help Ombudsman and Village head leaders to implement the law of the court, with assistance from the government. Namibia has other independent government bodies such as ACC that also play a huge role when it comes law enforcement. Namibia aims to put in place measures to assist with cyber security threats that a very common elsewhere in the globe.

2.17 Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development First A. Author, Second B. Author and Third C. Author 8 Namibia is fully committed to partnering and working hand in hand with other countries to make sure they attain the sustainable development goals by 2030. There has been an improvement driven by the government to assist NamRa to collect domestic revenues. As a developing country Namibia has access to AfDB for funding to assist with the country’s development. Namibia has been working very closely with more developed countries like Germany for innovation and technology exchange. In return it is quite evident that the government is promoting sustainable technologies locally. Utilize bodies like the Namibia Investment Promotion Development Board (NIPDB)to drive investments into the countries and merge relationships between foreigners.

3 CONCLUSIONS

Overall, the implementation of the SDGs in Namibia requires a collective effort from governments, civil society, the private sector, and other stakeholders. It also requires increased funding, capacity building, and stronger institutions to ensure sustainable development across the continent. There are also many non-governmental organizations, civil society groups, and private sector actors that are working towards achieving the SDGs in Namibia. These organizations are implementing innovative projects and programs that target specific SDGs, such as clean water and sanitation, gender equality, and sustainable agriculture.?