The 2015 high-level political forum on sustainable development, convened under the auspices of the Economic and Social Council, will be held from Friday, 26 June, to Wednesday, 8 July 2015. The three-day ministerial meeting of the forum will be held from Monday, 6 July, to Wednesday, 8 July 2015.

The theme of the forum for 2015 is “Strengthening integration, implementation and review – the high-level political forum on sustainable development after 2015”.

What are the expectations of the forum?

The forum is something completely new that ensures a place for sustainable development high in the attention of world leaders, and ultimately to stimulate timely and effective follow-up to the Rio+20 Conference. It also provides a new opportunity to ensure that all the dimensions of sustainable development—economic, social and environmental—are brought together in a coherent way.

This would be a completely new and different way of supporting the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) after they are adopted within the post-2015 development agenda. Unlike a treaty body (such as the UNFCCC, or the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change), negotiations within the forum would focus on specific policies and actions that the
world can take together. The forum would not endeavour to negotiate a new treaty on climate change, for example.

The terms “under the auspices of the General Assembly” and “under the auspices of ECOSOC” mean that the forum will have links to these two main UN organs while keeping a distinct identity from them.