The Paris Agreement on climate change and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) provide an agenda for development to the 2030s. The 17 goals cover all aspects of development, from health and education to energy, climate change, and partnerships. Moreover, the SDGs and the Paris Agreement on climate change stress the need for coherent policies across sectors. Goal 13 of the SDG on climate change action also emphasizes the importance of ensuring policy coherence across different sectors to adequately address climate change challenges.

Ethiopia is also committed to incorporate sustainable development goals in its national development plans by adopting policies, strategies and organizational reforms that can enhance sustainable development. Ethiopia’s Vision 2025, GTPs (I and II) and the Climate Resilient Green Economy (CRGE) are the central driving plans which explicitly outlines the importance of incorporating climate change issues on the countries development path.  Many of these development paths focus on the three highly important and connected sectors relating to water, energy, and land (agriculture).

As part of this commitment, the Ministry of Water, Irrigation, and Energy (MoWIE) of the federal democratic republic of Ethiopia is determined to integrate SDGs and the associated targets into the ongoing GTP-II plan which continues until 2020 and beyond (GTP-III- 2021-2025 and GTP IV 2026- 2030). In this regard, policy coherence is required for conducive institutional arrangements.

In response to a request from the Government of Ethiopia, the United Nations Department of Economics and Social Affairs (UNDESA), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) are implementing a capacity development project to support coherence in policy formulation in the areas of climate, land, energy, and water. This support to the Government of Ethiopia will focus on two interrelated areas; i) the application of integrated quantitative analysis to address interlinkages between Climate, Land, Energy and Water systems (CLEWs); and ii) institutional arrangements and mechanisms to facilitate effective and structural coordination among stakeholders in these areas.