How we work

Members and their partners take many forms and seek to influence and support their governments to achieve the SDGs in diverse and innovative ways. Some exist within the framework of government while others are pressure groups and other types of organisations influencing policy and practice from outside.

Receptiveness by governments to the work of members vary and sharing examples of success and the learnings from failure enable peer progress amongst our membership.

Examples of approaches that have been trialled with positive outcomes include:

• Using digital tools to capture and disseminate data that show progress towards the SDGs involving members in Colombia, Kosovo, Philippines, and Tanzania
• Stakeholder mapping and the use of regional dialogues by members in Benin, Cameroun, Côte d'Ivoire, Senegal and Togo
• Introducing national dialogues, called Sustainable Forums and regional events for sharing best practice, experiences, and challenges related to the SDGs by members in Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Panama, and Mexico.

The Global Forum enables exchanges between members and strategic partners in a variety of ways:

• webinars and events that present cutting-edge knowledge and insight to a wider audience and showcase member’s work. 
• sharing insights and knowledge though commissioned reports and short practitioner-focused guides and ‘How to…’ notes, but also by contributing to research. Find all our publications here.
• regional exchange to enable learning in similar context situations on the African continent and in Latin America and the Caribbean

The GF also runs Communities of Practice (CoPs) on topics of interest to members, past CoPs have included:

1. Using Voluntary Local Reviews (VLRs) to drive localization of the SDGs and inform Voluntary National Reviews (VNRs)

Objective: to gather experience, develop and share best practice on various challenges surrounding VLRs and their links to VNRs, and produce outputs such as guidelines, summaries of best practice and ‘how to’ notes that provide practical insights on these issues

2. Leave No One Behind (with a focus on youth)

Objective: to focus on the inequalities faced by marginalised groups, such as youth, addressing the following challenge: ‘How can we as advisory bodies contribute to education and information sharing about the SDGs towards youth and other marginalised groups?’

3. Transformative action towards structural change to achieve the 2030

Objective: to foster learning and dialogue, and broker knowledge on the transformative actions toward structural change to achieve the 2030 Agenda, through assessing challenges and barriers that hinder transformation and acceleration; identifying and documenting relevant best practice and understanding the enabling environment for the transformative actions.

4. VNR 2024 webinar series

Objective: In 2024 we organised a series of monthly 1-hour webinars that delve deeper into specific topics of interest in support of VNRs. Topics included: engaging non-state stakeholders in VNRs, utilising and localisng GSDR report reccomednations, and collecting data for VNRs from a local level. 

Working groups with roadmaps of action were established in the first two years of the network and have implemented various sustainability activities at local and national level, including research, monitoring of indicators and data as well as production of knowledge and advocacy through stakeholder engagement.

The working groups and their current status are:

• Multistakeholder platform processes and regional cooperation for national SDG -delivery in sub-Saharan Africa (COMPLETE)
• SDG stakeholder mapping in Francophone West-Africa (ONGOING)
• Governance for successful SDG advisory bodies (COMPLETE)
• City movers towards VLRs-digital tracking -platforms for municipalities (COMPLETE)
• Advocacy for sustainable development in Latin America and the Carribean (ONGOING)