AFRICA AND THE SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS: A THEMATIC REVIEW OF CURRENT TRENDS

Abstract

Since 2015, Africa has scored lower on many indexes of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) than other regions of the world. The advent of the COVID-19 pandemic was sure to clog whatever wheel of progress Africa seemed to be riding. This paper thus reviewed various themes on Africa and its internalization and localization of the SDG. The relevance of the SDGs in Africa was highlighted as well as its symbiotic relationship with the AU’s 2063 agenda. Also, its progress in terms of her successes, failures, and struggles taking into account the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic was discussed. While being optimistic about Africa’s chances of achieving the SDGs by 2030, the author argued that policy reforms, political will, and huge capital investment is needed and urgently so, for any possibility of the reversal of the current trend to be actualized.