In 2015, the UN General Assembly approved the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which enshrined the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). 193 countries - both developed and developing - have committed themselves to achieving 17 goals to improve the well-being of people, the economy and the environment, according to 169 global targets.
The Sustainable Development Goals aimed to liquidation poverty, fight against inequality and injustice, protect the planet, ensure peace and prosperity for all people.
Kazakhstan started work on the implementation of the SDGs at the national level. The country has nationalized the global SDG indicators, and today the monitoring system includes 280 indicators - 205 global and 75 national.
In the global ranking of countries for achieving the sustainable development goals for 2021, Kazakhstan increases his position by 6 lines and took 59th place (65th a year earlier). Kazakhstan is ahead of such countries as, for example, Brazil, Malaysia, Turkey, Singapore and Uzbekistan.
The achievement of the SDGs realizing by the government, local executive bodies, and central state bodies.
At the same time, enterprises of the quasi-public sector have a significant impact on the achievement of the SDGs in the Republic of Kazakhstan. In general, the portfolio companies of the managing national holdings of the country - Samruk-Kazyna and Baiterek - actively participate in the implementation of measures to achieve the sustainable development goals, including the development of particular documents aimed at sustainable development.
For example, back in 2019, the Development Bank of Kazakhstan (DBK, a subsidiary of the Baiterek holding) approved the sustainable development polic As part of this policy, there developed a map of stakeholders that determines the list of stakeholders and the degree of their influence on the financial institution. In general, the mission of DBK is to promote the sustainable development of the national economy by investing in the non-primary sector.
As part of its activities, DBK seeks to take into account the principles of sustainable development. For example, in 2020, the bank introduced a development index as a tool for prioritizing potential investment projects and (or) export operations. The development index allows you to classify projects according to the level of socio-economic impact. The components of the development index are indicators such as an increase in project output, an increase in labor productivity, an increase in export earnings, an impact on the economy and sustainable development of the country and the region, and a positive environmental component of the project.
In general, the bank's activities directly or indirectly contribute to the achievement of at least 12 of the 17 SDGs - for example, SDG No. 9 (industrialization, innovation and infrastructure), SDG No. 12 (responsible consumption and production), SDG No. 10 (reducing inequality), etc. e. In particular, the bank finances ecological friendly production and resource-saving projects (SDGs 7 and 13). Including in the loan portfolio of DBK there are 6 projects on renewable energy and energy efficiency improvement, which contribute to the mitigation (mitigation of the consequences) of climate change. Now the bank's loan portfolio represented by projects in all areas of renewable energy: wind farms, small hydroelectric power plants, as well as projects in solar energ It should be noted that, according to data for 2020, about 17.5% of the total country volume of RES falls on projects financed by the Development Bank of Kazakhstan.
The Bank finances socially significant projects for national health system (SDG No. 3) and directly supported Almaty medical institutions during the pandemic by purchasing 2.8 thousand FFP2 protection class respirators as part of charit In addition, DBK promptly sent 70% of its own employees to a remote work schedule and retained full wages during the period of temporary disability for those affected by COVID-19. DBK also adheres to the work of SDG No. 5 regarding gender equality: the share of women among bank employees in 2020 was 52.8%, the share of women in leadership positions was 48.7%.
An action plan has been developed, which reflects clear-cut actions aimed at reducing CO2 emissions. We are talking about reducing energy consumption by replacing incandescent lamps with energy-saving ones, installing contactless water taps and waste sorting containers, as well as reducing paper consumption due to a complete transition to electronic document management, which made it possible to reduce paper use by almost half.
According to the Global Sustainable Development Report for 2021, there is a trend of improvement in achieving them for the three SDGs. Five SDGs show modest improvement and there is no decreasing trend any other indicators.
Achieving the SDGs requires coordinated efforts by government agencies and the quasi-public sector.
