Science, Technology and Innovation for Development

E/RES/2021/29View PDF

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

A Resolution of the Economic and Social Council, under agenda item 18b Science and technology for development, published in 2021.

What other versions does this mandate have?

13 versions · 2013–2025

This is an older version — the most recent is E/RES/2025/19

Year	Symbol	Title	Word length	Text similarity
2025	E/RES/2025/19	Science, technology and innovation for development	5,273	64%Compare
2024	E/RES/2024/14	Science, technology and innovation for development	5,193	86%Compare
2023	E/RES/2023/4	Science, technology and innovation for development	4,966	5%Compare
2022	E/RES/2022/16	Science, technology and innovation for development	285	6%Compare
2021	E/RES/2021/29	Science, technology and innovation for development	4,424	97%Compare

What subjects does this mandate have?

7 subjects

Capacity Building Information Technology Innovations Science and Technology Science and Technology Policy Technical Cooperation Technology Transfer

What’s in this document?

57 operative paragraphs

Recommends the following for consideration by national Governments, the Commission on Science and Technology for Development and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development:

Governments, individually and collectively, are encouraged to take into account the findings of the Commission and to consider taking the following actions:

To closely link science, technology, innovation and strategies of sustainable development by prominently featuring capacity-building in information and communications technologies and science, technology and innovation in national development planning;

To promote local innovation capabilities for inclusive and sustainable economic development by bringing together local scientific, vocational and engineering knowledge, mobilizing resources from multiple channels, improving core information and communications technology and supporting infrastructure development, including smart infrastructure, through collaboration with and among national programmes;

iii

To encourage and support the science, technology and innovation efforts leading to the development of infrastructure and policies that support the global expansion of information and communications technology infrastructure, products and services, including broadband Internet access, to all people, particularly women, girls and youth, and persons with special needs and from remote and rural communities, catalysing multi-stakeholder efforts to bring 1.5 billion new Internet users online by 2020 and endeavouring to improve the affordability of such products and services;

To undertake systemic research, including gender-sensitive aspects, for foresight exercises, on new trends in science, technology and innovation, and information and communications technologies and their impact on development, particularly in the context of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development;

To work, with input from a variety of stakeholders, including appropriate United Nations agencies and all relevant entities and forums, such as the Commission and the multi-stakeholder forum on science, technology and innovation for the Sustainable Development Goals, to formulate, adopt and implement science, technology and innovation policies aimed at contributing to the implementation of the Goals;

To continue giving due consideration to the impact of key rapid technological changes on the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals within their respective mandates and existent resources, in accordance with General Assembly resolutions 72/242 and 73/17;

vii

To use strategic foresight exercises to identify potential gaps in education for the medium and long terms and address such gaps with a policy mix, including the promotion of gender-responsive science, technology, engineering and mathematics education, vocational training and digital and data literacy;

viii

To use strategic foresight as a process to encourage structured debate among all stakeholders, including representatives of government, science, industry and civil society and the private sector, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises, towards creating a shared understanding of long-term issues, such as the changing nature of work and building consensus on future policies, and to help to meet current and emerging demands for competence and adaptation to change;

To incorporate the provision of digital competencies, including, but not limited to, entrepreneurship and complementary soft skills, in formal education curricula and lifelong learning initiatives, while taking into consideration best practices, local contexts and needs, and ensuring that education is technology-neutral;

To address the implications of fundamental changes in the digital economy for labour markets;

To undertake strategic foresight initiatives on global and regional challenges at regular intervals and cooperate towards the establishment of a mapping system to review and share technology foresight outcomes, including pilot projects, with other Member States, making use of existing regional mechanisms, and in collaboration with relevant stakeholders;

xii

To conduct technology assessment and foresight exercises as a process to encourage structured debate among all stakeholders towards creating a shared understanding of the implications of rapid technological change;

xiii

To encourage the review of progress on integrating science, technology and innovation into the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals;

xiv

To conduct assessments, including of gender-sensitive aspects, of national innovation systems, including digital ecosystems, drawing from foresight exercises, at regular intervals, to identify weaknesses in the systems and make effective policy interventions to strengthen their weaker components, and share outcomes with other Member States, and, on a voluntary basis, to provide financial support and expertise towards the implementation of the framework for national science, technology and innovation policy reviews in interested developing countries;

To recognize the need to promote the functional dynamics of innovation systems and other relevant methodologies based on diversified policy instruments to support science, technology and innovation development priorities, in order to strengthen the coherence of such systems for sustainable development;

xvi

To encourage digital natives to play a key role in a community-based approach, including gender-responsive approaches, to science, technology and innovation capacity-building, and facilitate the use of information and communications technologies in the context of the 2030 Agenda;

xvii

To put in place policies that support the development of digital ecosystems, bearing in mind the potential of emerging digital technologies to leapfrog existing technologies for development, that are inclusive and take into account the socioeconomic and political context of countries and attract and support private investment and innovation, particularly encouraging the development of local content and entrepreneurship and making available disaggregated data sources for science, technology and innovation;

xviii

To implement initiatives and programmes that encourage and facilitate sustainable investment and participation in the digital economy;

xix

To collaborate with all relevant stakeholders, promote the application of information and communications technologies in all sectors, improve environmental sustainability, encourage the creation of suitable facilities to recycle and dispose of e-waste and promote sustainable consumption and production patterns;

To promote science, technology, engineering and mathematics education and statistical literacy, particularly among female students, while also recognizing the importance of complementary soft skills, such as entrepreneurship, by encouraging mentoring and supporting other efforts to attract and retain women and girls in those fields, as well as applying a gender lens when developing and implementing policies that harness science, technology and innovation;

xxi

To support the policies and activities of developing countries in the fields of science and technology through North-South as well as South-South cooperation, as complementary to but not substituting for each other, by encouraging financial and technical assistance, capacity-building, technology transfer on mutually agreed terms and conditions and technical training programmes or courses;

xxii

To encourage countries to progressively increase the rate of generation of high-quality skilled human resources at all levels by providing an environment for building a critical mass of human resource capacity, harnessing and effectively participating in the application of science, technology and innovation for value addition activities, solving problems and enhancing human welfare;

xxiii

To increase support for research and development activities on rapid technological change and ensure the coherence of science, technology and innovation policies and strategies on rapid technological change with the broader national development agenda;

xxiv

To consider engaging in an inclusive global discourse about all aspects of rapid technological change and its impact on sustainable development;

xxv

To design and implement science, technology and innovation policies and other relevant policies to make them responsive to building resilient communities;

xxvi

To support policies that increase financial inclusion and deepen the sources of financing and direct investments towards innovations that address the Sustainable Development Goals;

xxvii

To encourage the inclusiveness of innovation, especially with regard to local communities, women and youth, to ensure that the scaling and diffusion of new technologies are inclusive and do not create further divides;

xxviii

To support the Technology Bank for the Least Developed Countries as a mechanism to improve the scientific research and innovation base of least developed countries, promote networking among researchers and research institutions, help least developed countries to gain access to and utilize critical technologies, draw together bilateral initiatives and support by multilateral institutions and the private sector and implement projects that contribute to the use of science, technology and innovation for economic development in least developed countries;

The Commission is encouraged:

To continue its role as a torch-bearer for science, technology and innovation and to provide high-level advice to the Economic and Social Council and the General Assembly on relevant science, technology, engineering and innovation issues, and in this regard to contribute to informing the high-level thematic debate on the topic of the impact of rapid technological change on the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals and targets, to be convened by the President of the General Assembly at its seventy-fourth session, and to the discussion of progress made in the implementation of Assembly resolution 73/17 that will be held at its seventy-fifth session;

To help to articulate the important role of information and communications technologies and science, technology and innovation as enablers in the 2030 Agenda by acting as a forum for strategic planning, providing foresight about critical trends in science, technology and innovation in key sectors of the economy and drawing attention to new and emerging technologies;

iii

To consider how its work aligns with, feeds into and complements other international forums on science, technology and innovation and efforts supporting the implementation of the 2030 Agenda;

To raise awareness and facilitate networking and partnerships among various technology foresight organizations and networks, in collaboration with other stakeholders;

To promote, in the spirit of the 2030 Agenda and the Addis Ababa Action Agenda of the Third International Conference on Financing for Development,⁹ international cooperation in the field of science and technology for development, including capacity-building and technology transfer on mutually agreed terms and conditions;

⁹General Assembly resolution 69/313, annex.

To raise awareness among policymakers about the process of innovation and to identify particular opportunities for developing countries to benefit from such innovation, with special attention being placed on new trends in innovation that can offer novel possibilities for developing countries;

vii

To support multi-stakeholder collaboration in policy learning capacity-building and technology development;

viii

To support efforts to build capacity to develop, use and deploy new and existing technologies in developing countries, particularly the least developed countries, small island developing States and landlocked developing countries;

To proactively strengthen and revitalize global science, technology and innovation partnerships for sustainable development, which would entail the engagement of the Commission in (a) translating technology foresight into elaborating the scope of specific international projects for targeted research, technology development and deployment and initiatives for building human resource capacity for science, technology and innovation; and (b) exploring innovative financing models and other resources contributing to enhancing the capacities of developing countries in collaborative projects and initiatives in science, technology and innovation;

To explore ways and means of conducting international technology assessments and foresight exercises on existing, new and emerging technologies and their implications for sustainable development and building resilient communities, including discussions about models of governance for new areas of scientific and technological development;

To support countries in their efforts to identify future trends in terms of capacity-building needs, including through foresight exercises;

xii

To discuss and explore innovative financing models, such as impact investment, as a means to attract new stakeholders, innovators and sources of investment capital for science, technology, engineering and innovation-based solutions, in collaboration with other organizations, where appropriate;

xiii

To promote capacity-building and cooperation in research and development, in collaboration with relevant institutions, including appropriate United Nations agencies, working to facilitate the strengthening of innovation systems that support innovators, particularly in developing countries, to boost their efforts to contribute to the achievement of sustainable development;

xiv

To provide a forum for sharing not only success stories and best practices, but also failures and key challenges and learning from the results of foresight exercises, successful local innovation models, case studies and experience on the use of science, technology and engineering for innovation, including the application of new emerging technologies, in symbiotic relationship with information and communications technologies, for inclusive and sustainable development, and to share findings with all relevant United Nations entities, including through the Technology Facilitation Mechanism and its multi-stakeholder forum on science, technology and innovation for the Sustainable Development Goals;

To continue to play an active role in creating awareness of the potential contribution of science, technology and innovation to the 2030 Agenda through substantive inputs, as appropriate, to relevant processes and bodies of the United Nations, and to share findings and good practices on science, technology and innovation among Member States and beyond;

xvi

To highlight the importance of the work of the Commission related to the implementation of and follow-up to the areas of information and communications technologies and science, technology and innovation related to the Sustainable Development Goals, with the Chair of the Commission to report at appropriate reviews and meetings of the Economic and Social Council, the high-level political forum on sustainable development and other relevant forums;

xvii

To strengthen and deepen collaboration between the Commission on Science and Technology for Development and the Commission on the Status of Women, including sharing good practices and lessons learned in integrating a gender perspective into science, technology and innovation policymaking and implementation, and, in this context, to follow up on the work done by the Commission on Science and Technology for Development at the workshop on applying a gender lens to science, technology and innovation, held in Vienna on 18 January 2019;

xviii

To play an active role in creating awareness of the Technology Bank for the Least Developed Countries;

The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development is encouraged:

To seek funding proactively for the expansion of science, technology and innovation policy reviews, with an emphasis on the critical role of information and communications technologies in empowering science, technology and innovation and engineering capacity-building and utilization, and the implementation of the recommendations on those reviews, as appropriate, in close cooperation with United Nations agencies and international organizations;

To look into the feasibility of including elements of strategic foresight and digital ecosystem assessment in policy reviews of science, technology and innovation and information and communications technologies, possibly by including a chapter dedicated to these themes;

iii

To implement as widely as possible its framework for national science, technology and innovation policy reviews in order to integrate the Sustainable Development Goals, including a specific focus on bottom-of-the-pyramid approaches to innovation, and on social inclusion;

To plan for periodic updates on progress made in countries for which science, technology and innovation policy reviews have been performed and to invite those countries to report to the Commission on Science and Technology for Development on progress made, lessons learned and challenges encountered in implementing recommendations;

To request the Gender Advisory Board of the Commission to provide inputs to the policy deliberations and documentation of the Commission, to report on progress at the annual sessions of the Commission and to better integrate gender perspectives into science, technology and innovation policy reviews;

To also request the Gender Advisory Board of the Commission to develop proposals for an updated work programme and report thereon at the twenty-fifth annual session of the Commission;

vii

To encourage Governments to use the Technology Bank for the Least Developed Countries as a mechanism to support science, technology and innovation in least developed countries and to assist least developed countries to further develop their own technologies.

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

What other versions does this mandate have?

What subjects does this mandate have?

What’s in this document?

Table of contents