Peru – Perú 2021

What is your country’s government doing with respect to the SDGs and how have they engaged business around this agenda?

The Government of Peru has aligned its General Government Policy (see p. 104-114) to the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs. CEPLAN, the specialized technical agency that acts as the governing, guiding and coordinating body of the National Strategic Planning System and the principal entity in Peru for the 2030 Agenda, annually publishes a National Report on the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

To monitor progress towards achieving the SDGs, the Instituto Nacional de Estadística e Informática (INEI), with the support of the UN in Peru, has developed an online platform to monitor and track the indicators based on statistical data obtained from household surveys and national censuses.

The Sustainable Development Report 2019, prepared by the Bertelsmann Stiftung and the Sustainable Development Solutions Network, shows that Peru’s performance is moderate, ranking 51 among 161 countries. While Peru scores 6.1% over the overall global average and is on track to achieve SDG 4 ‘Quality Education’ and SDG 7 ‘Affordable and Clean Energy’, the country faces significant challenges in reaching SDG 9 ‘Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure’, SDG 10 ‘Reduced Inequalities’, 16 ‘Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions’ and SDG 13 ‘Climate Action’.

Government driven business engagement around the 2030 Agenda has been very limited. Basic sustainability practices are being implemented such as the Superintendencia de Mercado de Valores that requests sustainability reports from all companies trading in Peruvian Stock Exchange as a first step towards more disclosure and transparency from businesses. A study published by Programa de Inversión Responsable (PIR) and Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú (PUCP) evaluates progress towards incorporating corporate sustainability criteria in the stock market during 2017/2018.

Moreover, the Competitive Business Program (2016-2020) – funded by the Swiss Confederation State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) and implemented in collaboration with the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) in Colombia, Ghana, Indonesia, Peru, South Africa and Vietnam – aims to promote sustainability reporting among SMEs in the program’s target countries, helping to improve SMEs’ competitiveness and to facilitate market access. This program has shown a growing number of engages businesses from 72 in 2017 to 324 in 2018. In 2020, the program will incorporate the SDG tracker allowing SMEs to report on the GRI indicators and SDGs in one document.

What are some of the key trends with regard to how business is engaging with the SDGs in your country?

In 2018, Perú 2021 conducted a survey of our members companies (70+ companies, 40+ entrepreneurs and 5+ academia) to find out how they are prioritizing the SDGs within their business.

As demonstrated in the graphic below, the results indicate that among the most prioritized Goals were SDG 4 ‘Quality Education’ (64%), SDG 8 ‘Good Jobs and Economic Growth’ (60%), SDG 17 ‘Partnerships for the Goals’ (52%) and SDG 5 ‘Gender Equality’ (50%). These were followed by SDG 9 ‘Innovation and Infrastructure’, SDG 12 ‘Responsible Consumption’, SDG 13 ‘Climate Action’, SDG 11 ‘Sustainable Cities and Communities’, SDG 2 ‘No Hunger’ and SDG 3 ‘Good Health’.

These results demonstrate that Peruvian businesses tend to place more weight on SDGs related to social impact over environmental priorities. In other words, companies recognize the importance of satisfying certain basic human needs for their employees and consumers, before having the ‘climate action dialogue’. Some companies, however, do recognize and engage with the SDGs as an integral system in which all aspects are connected: people, planet, prosperity, peace and partnerships.

While most of the companies in Peru are only beginning to link the SDGs to their business activities, there is a growing interest in the subject as demonstrated by the attendance of various business’ representatives at the recent Perú Sostenible event as well as the active participation and engagement of companies in our SDG Labs (see below).

What is your organization doing with respect to the SDGs?

In November 2018, we launched the program Per ú Sostenible which aims to engage, connect and activate businesses and citizens around the SDGs. In 2021, Peru will celebrate its bicentennial anniversary of independence which also represents our first deadline of defining guidelines for action. This program was developed following a partnership with UNDP and consists of four initiatives:

SDG Labs: Exchange space between the private and public sectors, academia and civil society to identify the barriers and propose actionable solutions to respond to the challenges of each SDG in Peru. SDG 17 ‘Partnerships for the Goals’ is the essence of this initiative, promoting multi-sector partnerships as the foundational pillar to move forward. Based on the request of our network members we are currently running the following labs:

SDG 2 ‘Zero Hunger’
SDG 4 ‘Quality Education’
SDG 5 ‘Gender Equity’
SDG 6 ‘Water & Sanitation’
SDG 11 ‘Sustainable Cities & Communities’
SDG 16 ‘Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions’

Peru for the SDGs Award: In alliance with UNDP, KPMG and El Comercio, this award aims to identify all the initiatives and projects from companies, entrepreneurs and NGOs that contribute to the SDGs nationwide. With this recognition we will consolidate the first directory of initiatives aligned with the SDGs in Peru. Participants submit their applications for the five categories that cluster the SDGs: People, Planet, Partnerships, Peace, and Prosperity. We piloted this in 2019 and awarded 7 winning initiatives from different sectors and categories.
Content Platform with El Comercio: Hundred thousands of users are visiting the Peru Sostenible platform in El Comercio, the biggest newspaper in the country. The goal is to inform citizens about the SDGs in a simple way by publishing news that explain the scope and impact of initiatives that promote the SDGs across the country, and also to involve and motivate them to act and contribute to the SDGs in their daily lives.
Perú Sostenible annual event: This is the largest and most important business sustainability event in Peru, where high level private sector and government leaders participated actively, such as Peru’s Prime Minister and Vice President. The event in numbers:

700+ daily participants from the private sector
200+ daily participants from the public sector, academia and civil society
85 speakers from all over the world (including James Gomme from WBCSD, Karen Dillon and Efosa Ojomo, authors of The Prosperity Paradox,, Hervé Duteil from BNP Paribas, National Authorities, and others)
25 panels on diverse sustainability topics

That said, Perú Sostenible is a useful and replicable sustainability program to connect businesses with the SDGs.