The MENA region continues to face a range of formidable and chronic developmental challenges, severely limiting its ability to implement the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
As the world navigates the “Decade of Action for the Sustainable Development Goals,” the Arab region has faced many recent setbacks, including the global pandemic, a series of economic shocks, large-scale natural disasters, major political conflicts, and wars devastating millions.
The aftershocks of these major crises continue to reverberate across the region, disrupting prior steps toward climate action and sustainable development efforts.
As the region hosts its second UNFCCC Conference of the Parties (COP) in the span of two years (first in Egypt, now in Dubai, United Arab Emirates), critical questions around the facilitation of a just transition linger, and along with it, the possibility of achieving the SDGs overall.
For example, the Arab SDG Index; a regional data-rich policy tool tracking the progress of each SDG and its targets for all Arab states, shows that despite poor regional results in achieving the SDGs overall, in some areas there are positive trends relating to clean energy and climate change mitigation.
In light of these mixed results, how can the region progress towards a just transition that ensures environmental sustainability, social inclusion, decent work, and poverty eradication, and which priority actions can policymakers in the region take?
What is Needed for a Just Transition
Put simply, a ‘just transition’ refers to the transition to a greener economy in an inclusive and fair way. The burning of fossil fuels is the largest contributor to climate change, leading to elevated global temperatures and adverse consequences on societies and ecosystems.
To avert a climate catastrophe, there has been a concerted global mobilization of efforts aimed at limiting global warming to 1.5°C, a goal of the Paris Agreement. Consequently, transitioning from fossil fuels to renewable green energies has emerged as a pivotal means of advancing the attainment of net-zero targets.
For fossil fuel-dependent economies, including oil and gas producers in the MENA region, such transitions pose a significant challenge intertwined with a myriad of social and economic risks.
Though challenging, policymakers may find the most success through data-driven approaches to policymaking that ensure energy transitions are based on the best science and data available.
Most countries in the MENA, a region where climate action has been handled haphazardly thus far, could benefit from such an approach.
A data-driven approach would not only ensure a more inclusive and just transition by showing progress pertinent to net-zero goals, but also simultaneously help identify social and economic challenges directly or indirectly impacted by such transitions.
The rich data of the Arab SDG Index and Dashboard offers a data-driven practical tool for governments, policymakers, and other stakeholders to measure progress on the SDGs and highlight implementation challenges and data gaps.
Environmental, Social, and Economic Benefits of a Just Transition
Energy transitions will inevitably render certain occupations, if not entire sectors, obsolete, but it will concurrently create new employment opportunities. The distribution of job generation and loss through green transitions often reflects deep geographical and socioeconomic disparities, necessitating policy intervention.
For example, to achieve any progress towards a just transition in the region, policymakers should primarily consider data insights from indicators under SDG 4 (Quality Education) and SDG 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth) to assess where each country stands in detail.
The success of a green transition hinges on equipping workers with the necessary education and skills tailored to emerging green opportunities, particularly those at risk of job displacement from the gradual phasing out of fossil fuel industries. Youth unemployment continues to pose a pervasive challenge in the Arab Region, despite the successes in economic diversification achieved by certain oil producing countries in reducing these rates.
Compounding this challenge, disparities in progress towards SDG 4 within Arab countries are concerning and may impede equitable transitions. Unequal educational attainment levels across the region could hinder the full realization of sustainable, green economy goals. A just transition emphasizes societal inclusivity, especially gender inclusivity. However, the Arab region also faces chronic challenges in achieving SDG 5 (Gender Equality); this poses a significant issue for the attainment of just transitions.
Despite these challenges, there is an opportunity, with the right policy interventions, to foster gender inclusivity in future green jobs. Ensuring an inclusive labor workforce for a green future requires granular data to show the status of women’s education and employment, particularly in STEM fields.
Besides education and capacity building, the realization of just transitions requires robust social protection measures and the preservation of labor rights. Within the Arab region, however, the labor landscape is characterized by a magnitude of challenges, which are compounded by limited data availability on social protection and labor rights, as the latest edition of the Arab SDGs Index finds.
High rates of informal employment in some Arab countries make it harder to determine the true cost of energy transitions and job displacement. Policymakers must address these concerns by assessing the region’s performance in SDG 8 and devising policies aimed at fortifying labor rights and promoting decent work opportunities. Such measures are essential to avert potential social and economic disruptions as energy transitions unfold.
The Importance of Regional Data
In-depth analysis of country-level datasets can inform local actions by business leaders and policymakers within each country. Moreover, by looking at the data through a regional lens, policymakers and international organizations can also serve regional collaborative efforts, an important element for achieving the SDGs.
While the Arab region is composed of 22 countries with vastly diverse economic tendencies, systems of governance, and developmental maturity levels, the countries of the region share important interlinkages and dependencies.
These dependencies can have a multiplier effect in terms of accelerating the achievement of the SDGs and facilitating just transitions for the region as a whole, if a collaborative approach is pursued. Conversely, they can lead to the creation of shared obstacles and systemic barriers for the many countries of the region if the developmental plans and actions of individual countries are not regionally coordinated.
Moving towards achieving the SDGs and putting together building blocks of a more just transition remains critical for the Arab Region. Data can empower all stakeholders to make informed decisions and hold governments accountable for progress.
With mounting pressure towards achieving the SDGs and fighting climate change, governments of the MENA region must commit to bridging the sustainable development and climate action agendas by systematically collecting, governing, and leveraging quality data to ensure that the region can overcome its developmental challenges and move towards building a just transition to a more sustainable future.
