Namibia is falling behind on achieving the sixth Sustainable Development Goal, which aims to ensure access to safe water and sanitation for all by 2030.

With only four years to meet the target, National Planning Commission director general Kaire Mbuende says Namibia has achieved many of the Sustainable Development Goal (SDGs), but sanitation continues to lag behind.

"Our biggest challenge is more on the health side, in particular sanitation. That's one area where we are lagging behind, and we have committed ourselves to invest substantially in that area," Mbuende says.

According to the Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA) 2023 Population and Housing Census, about 40% of households in Namibia lack adequate sanitation.

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The situation is worse in marginalised communities, where the NSA reported last week that nearly seven out of every 10 households do not have a toilet.

The SDGs are a set of 17 global goals adopted by United Nations (UN) member states in 2015 with the aim of achieving them by 2030.

"In terms of education, access to health and all other indicators, we have done fairly well," Mbuende says.

Prime minister Elijah Ngurare last month declared sanitation a state of emergency.

World leaders and officials met in New York at the United Nations (UN) High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development to review progress towards the 2030 Agenda.

UN secretary general António Guterres at the event warned the world is running out of time to achieve the SDGs.

"We are now entering the toughest stretch of our journey," he said.

According to Guterres, only 36% of SDG targets are on track or making moderate progress, while 15% have moved backwards.

"Crisis by crisis, the SDGs are drifting further out of reach," he said.

He called on governments to invest more in education, healthcare, clean energy, social protection, gender equality and decent jobs.

During the forum, Namibia's permanent representative to the UN, ambassador Penda Naanda, said stronger international cooperation and political commitment are needed as the world approaches the 2030 deadline.

He said sustainable development in Namibia depends on building resilience, strengthening regional cooperation and creating an economy that benefits more people.

Naanda said Namibia's classification as an upper-middle-income country shows the limits of using income alone to measure development.

"Many middle-income countries continue to face persistent inequalities, unemployment, climate vulnerability and infrastructure financing gaps," he said.

Namibia last presented a review of its track on the SDGs in 2020.

"We are working on it and just want to update what has happened. We even have a better system now of monitoring what is happening on the ground," Mbuende says.

He says the government has introduced a national monitoring dashboard to track development projects and progress across the country.

The forum ended with countries adopting a ministerial declaration calling for faster action to achieve the SDGs by 2030.

The declaration calls on countries to strengthen cooperation and take practical steps to improve progress on the 17 SDGs.