The United Nations member states agreed Sunday to an agenda on sustainable development for the next 15 years.
The ambitious agenda, endorsed by 193 member states, features 17 new sustainable goals that aim to eradicate poverty in all forms, promote prosperity and people's well-being while protecting the environment by 2020, United Nations said in a statement.
The endorsed draft document - "Transforming our World: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development" - will be ratified next month in New York. The head of governments of the 193 member states will attend a Sustainable Development Summit at the U.N. from Sept. 25 to 27 to adopt new sustainable development agenda, according to AFP.
"We are resolved to free the human race from the tyranny of poverty and want and to heal and secure our planet. We are determined to take the bold and transformative steps which are urgently needed to shift the world onto a sustainable and resilient path. As we embark on this collective journey, we pledge that no one will be left behind," the preamble of the 29-page document said.
Kenya's U.N. Ambassador Macharia Kamau said implementing the goals will cost between $3.5 trillion and $5 trillion every year, according to Associated Press. Kenya and Ireland jointly chaired the negotiations.
U.N. General Secretary Ban Ki-moon welcomed the draft blueprint for sustainable development as an "agenda of the people, an action plan to end poverty."
"This is the People's Agenda, a plan of action for ending poverty in all its dimensions, irreversibly, everywhere, and leaving no one behind. It seeks to ensure peace and prosperity, and forge partnerships with people and planet at the core," Ki-moon said in a statement, according to U.N. News Centre.
"The integrated, interlinked and indivisible 17 Sustainable Development Goals are the people's goals and demonstrate the scale, universality and ambition of this new Agenda," he said.
