Lagoa’s commitment to becoming a sustainable municipality has been named a top priority for 2020, the local council has announced.
Choosing an annual theme has become a tradition in Lagoa – last year it was ‘Inclusive City’.
This year, the focus will be on sustainability and on implementing measures that aim to accomplish the “17 Sustainable Development Goals” included in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by all United Nations Member States in 2015.
The agenda is described as a “shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and into the future”, while the goals are dubbed an “urgent call for action by all countries – developed and developing – in a global partnership.
“They recognise that ending poverty and other deprivations must go hand-in-hand with strategies that improve health and education, reduce inequality, and spur economic growth – all while tackling climate change and working to preserve our oceans and forests,” the UN says on its website.
Lagoa is taking these goals very seriously and will try to implement measures that lead to a “sustainable development that will meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to grow,” the local council says.
Its main goal is to “improve people’s living conditions by conserving their surrounding environment in the short, medium and long term”.
The council hopes that this way of thinking will lead to an “economically effective, socially equitable and ecologically sustainable development” which, to be achieved, will depend on adequate planning and recognising that “natural resources are finite”.
“Lagoa Council strives every day to make sure these goals are achieved, because sustainable development has to be seen as a human right, and we have the power: the power to create machines, to create happiness, to do more and even better,” says Lagoa Mayor Luís Encarnação.
He adds: “In the name of humanity, let’s all unite and fight for a better world, without leaving anyone behind.”
