The United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA), through its Division of Public Institutions and Digital Government has developed a Global Initiative for Schools of Public Administration also including civil service colleges and similar training institutions on the topic of Transformative Leadership and Transforming Public Servants’ Mindsets for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
We shared a survey with 23 national schools in the Asia-Pacific region this past April 2018 to develop a baseline and map where the region is on training public administration for the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Similar mappings and baseline research we also undertaken in Africa and Latin America as regional networks are developed for this new global initiative. Data was collected to compare good practices and lessons learned, while shaping greater knowledge exchange in the region and strengthening public administration institutions to achieve the SDGs.
The final report of the survey results for Asia-Pacific is now available.
The survey data shows clear patterns and recommendations for follow up, including the development of short curricula on training public service on the 2030 Agenda, requests for regional coordination that can ensure continued knowledge exchange of good practices between countries and more. Countries such as Singapore and Sri Lanka are also highlighted as they have developed new competency frameworks including core competencies that can enable SDG achievement across government, while other countries are highlighted as they have already developed multiple training programmes on the SDGs or key priority areas for SDG achievement in government, such as Bangladesh. We hope the report provides good examples of where national institutions are in training civil service for the SDGs.