After carefully studying the challenges facing most developing countries that keep them out of track to achieve the SDGs by 2030, the LEEG-net team by using their innovation and foresight skills have developed Six Rights-based Recommendations to Accelerate Action on the SDGs. The main objective of this set of recommendations is to help accelerate the SDGs by leveraging the 2030 Agenda's grounding on human rights and commitment to ending poverty through the promotion of legal, economic and technological empowerment of people including the poor and marginalized groups.

Recommendation - 1: Develop a rights-based National Legal Roadmap (NLR) for each country to effectively leverage the human rights foundation of the 2030 Agenda towards accelerating the SDG implementation.
Suggestion: The Human Rights Guide to the Sustainable Development Goals developed by the Danish Institute for Human Rights that outlines an “SDGs - human rights” mapping can be used along with National Constitutions and related laws as the legal basis of an NLR. Take the Recommendation nos. 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 mentioned below into consideration when developing an NLR.

Recommendation – 2: Mainstream the promotion and protection of the following eightfold rights into national policies and action plans for implementing the SDGs: Gender Equality, Property Rights, Contract Rights, Business Rights, Labour Rights, Right to an Effective Remedy, Right to Information, and the Right to Development.

Recommendation - 3: Prioritize programs and processes that promote legal, economic and technological empowerment of people (including the poor and marginalized groups) in national action plans for implementing the SDGs.
Rationale for Recommendations 2 and 3: The pillars of the rights-based blueprint SDG Temple of Justice (https://www.leeg-net.org/sdg-temple-of-justice) developed by LEEG-net symbolize the eightfold rights referred to in Recommendation - 2, the promotion of which leads to legal empowerment of people including the poor and marginalized groups -- a sine qua non for realizing the Goals.

Recommendation - 4: Implement social protection floors for the extension of social security guided by the ILO’s Social Protection Floors Recommendation No.202 of 2012 that progressively ensures higher levels of social security to as many people as possible.

Recommendation - 5: Promote business rights (i.e. the rights of businesses) as a means of eradicating poverty.
Suggestions: Adopt business-friendly policy, legal and regulatory frameworks capable of promoting innovation, employment and inclusive growth. Develop national action plans to enhance efficiency of business regulations so as to reach and maintain higher scores (preferably over 80) of the Ease of Doing Business (EODB) index developed by Doing Business (World Bank).

Recommendation - 6: Prepare Voluntary National Reviews (VNRs) and other reports on SDG implementation in close coordination with existing national human rights reporting procedures.

-- Implementation: A detailed Memorandum on the Six Rights-based Recommendations (already drafted) will be submitted to national SDG implementing institutions of all developing countries, and a selected number of developed countries.
-- Follow-up will be by means of direct communications with the recipients of the above-mentioned Memorandum. Handled by the SDG Volunteer Support Team. Governance by LEEG-net.org

Please view the LEEG-net Memorandum on Six Rights-based Recommendations to Accelerate Action on the SDGs at https://7faa9407-9d3b-4c45-adbd-4d22cf0ea13f.filesusr.com/ugd/475a74_87846620c2b24eb5ac92b63d848c7fa1.pdf

Expected impact from the Six Rights-based Recommendations include:
- Developing a rights-based National Legal Roadmap (NLR) for each country: The proposed NLR for the SDGs would be a human rights guide and a resource of legal information that helps national policy makers and implementers remain on track to achieve the SDGs while complying with legal obligations at both national and international levels. It would help accelerate the SDG implementation, enhances legal certainty and the human rights standing of the country concerned.

- The rights-based blueprint SDG Temple of Justice developed by LEEG-net seeks to help advance the 2030 Agenda by leveraging the human rights foundation of the SDGs through legal, economic and technological empowerment of people including the poor and marginalized groups. In this context, the multidisciplinary role of empowerment impacts on the 2030 Agenda as a universal means of implementing the SDGs, especially Goals 4, 8, 10, 13, 16 and 17.

- Preparing reports on sustainable development, e.g. Voluntary National Reviews (VNRs), based on existing national human rights reporting procedures provides a constructive and resource-efficient advantage for States. A close coordination between these two report making procedures would help leverage the human rights foundation of the 2030 Agenda towards accelerating the SDG implementation. The existing national human rights reports include those submitted to the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) under the Human Rights Council; the Human Rights Committee; the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights; the Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women; the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities; and the International Labour Organization’s supervisory mechanisms on the application of International Labour Standards.

https://www.leeg-net.org/sdg-temple-of-justice