On May 29th, the APRC’s Salome Gelashvili spoke at the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development - Tbilisi Implementation Conference hosted by the Parliament of Georgia and held at the Radisson Blu Iveria Hotel from May 28th to 29th. She participated in a panel discussion on data for sustainable development.

During her speech, Salome discussed the role of academia in measuring Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), and emphasized the importance of tailoring SDGs to the countries’ local conditions, as well as selecting relevant indicators for tracking progress towards established targets. She also highlighted the need to collect data on a regular basis, improve coordination between various agencies involved in data collection processes, and fine-tune the national SDG matrix.

According to Salome, research communities can help governments and global leaders to make informed and evidence-based decisions through the following measures: contributing to the process of specifying country-relevant targets; studying country contexts in terms of different targets to offer country-specific solutions to problems; and helping to translate general scientific findings into policy implications. In other words, academia can play the role of a hub for aggregating, analyzing and sharing data with students and the general population to increase their awareness about sustainable development approaches.

Agenda 2030 with SDGs covering seventeen different areas is an ambitious project which requires collaboration between public, private and civil sector representatives to reach those goals and ensure the sustainable development of Georgia.