Saudi Gazette report

NEW YORK — On the sidelines of the High-Level Political Forum for Sustainable Development (HLPF), the Quality of Life Program, which is one of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 programs, organized several events highlighting the Kingdom's contributions to achieving sustainable development goals.

The Forum is being held at the United Nations headquarters in New York City from July 8 to 18.

The first day’s session, which was titled “From Vision to Impact: Integrations to Achieve Sustainable Social and Environmental Change,” focused on enhancing awareness of Saudi Vision 2030 and the Quality of Life Program initiatives, and their role in achieving sustainable development goals.

The session reviewed the most important urban challenges and how to confront them using advanced data and practices, innovation, and the impact of cooperation, participation, and exchange of experiences on achieving local, regional, and international goals.

On the second day of the forum, the program held an event on “Quality of Life and its Link to Sustainable Development,” which included discussion sessions and interactive lectures, in which a group of experts and officials from within Saudi Arabia and around the world participated.

During the opening of the event, the CEO of the Quality of Life Program, Khaled Al-Bakr, gave a speech in which he emphasized the program’s role in achieving the goals of the Kingdom’s Vision 2030 and sustainable development, indicating that work is being done to improve the quality of life for all individuals in Saudi Arabia through a variety of initiatives that focus on areas such as arts and culture, sports, tourism, urban development, entertainment, hobbies, and security and safety.

He said: “We seek to find innovative solutions and create a knowledge system that redefines the concept of quality of life, and our cooperation with global partners such as the United Nations Human Settlements Program (UN-Habitat) enhances our efforts to achieve the goals of sustainable development.”

The events witnessed the participation of representatives of a number of government agencies, Ministry of Economy and Planning, Ministry of Energy, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Environment, Water and Agriculture, Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development, National Center for Oversight of Environmental Compliance, and the General Authority for Food Security, Royal Commission for Riyadh, Royal Commission for Al-Ula Governorate, Madinah Region Development Authority, Urban Observatory for the Qassim Region.

The program’s participation in this high-level forum organized by the United Nations comes within the goals of Vision 2030 to transform the Kingdom into a leading global model in various fields.