Sustainable development goals and our fascination with mega-targets
A handful of dramatic targets — set and met — seems to have also emboldened the global community with a sense that “Yes, We Really Can”. These include, for example, the eradication of smallpox and hopefully the imminent eradication of polio and Guinea worm. Such successes are a remarkable tribute to cooperation and sustained commitment, and perhaps it is these indisputably admirable qualities that have led the international community to set an ever-increasing range of ambitious targets, including the Millennium Development Goals, Kyoto Protocol Emission Targets, the Aichi Biodiversity Targets, the Pearson Target, etc.
March 21, 2013