In this newsletter by the Peacebuilding Support Office you can read a story of the join UN initiative on peacebuilding in Bougainville, Papua New Guinea supported by the Peacebuilding Fund.

The quest of the last 15 years to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) taught us that Global Goals can motivate and help sustain leaps in human progress. It also taught us that the specifics matter. In some places, the MDGs became a widely-recognized, consistent and important driver of local progress; in others, the role and impact of the MDGs was more ambiguous. A lot depended on way the MDGs were implemented: if local change agents made them meaningful locally; if local leaders drew on their legitimacy and visibility; if they were employed to solve real-life problems etc.

This UNDP-World Bank Report pulls together the main lessons learned from the MDG Reviews for the UN system and for its engagement at the country level, which took place at the UN System Chief Executives Board for Coordination (CEB). The Reviews, which brought together UN and World Bank Group staff, systematically identified the country situation, the bottlenecks to MDG attainment, and potential solutions to be implemented. Since many MDGs have been absorbed into the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), many of the observations and solutions provided could prove useful to the implementation of the SDGs.

The idea for this publication originally arose during talks with representatives of the world’s major religions. What do Buddhists say about global justice? What status does the preservation of creation have for Christians? What do Muslims understand by responsible business prac- tices?

This Report considers the first hand accounts of women who contested the 2012 election, a group of media representatives and a group of representatives of political parties. The impediments to the participation and representation of women in public decision making roles in PNG are found across all parts of life in PNG. The Report makes findings and recommendations based on the data collected at the Election Diagnostic Workshop and, using that evidence base, acknowledges the need for a multifaceted response to a complex problem with multiple causes and manifestations.