Italy’s Voluntary National Reviews

Italy presented to the High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF) at the United Nations its first Voluntary National Review (VNR) in 2017 and a second review in 2022.

In July 2017, during the V session of the HLPF, Italy presented its first VNR, focused on the adoption of the National Sustainable Development Strategy (NSDS), as a reference framework for the implementation and monitoring of Agenda 2030 in Italy.

In July 2022, during the X session of the HLPF, Italy presented its second VNR.

The second VNR was an opportunity both to describe the work undertaken for the implementation, monitoring and revision of the NSDS and its localization, focusing on the central role of Regions, Autonomous Provinces and Metropolitan Cities, and to propose Italian future commitments

The Italian 2022 VNR represents a very innovative approach to the review process, becoming one of the most ambitious and successful international practices. The 2022 VNR was based on three thematic insights: strengthening the policy coherence for sustainable development; the multilevel governance and NSDS localization; stakeholders and youth engagement, with particular reference to the national Forum for Sustainable Development and the National Council for Development Cooperation. Each thematic insight is addressed in a dedicated chapter of the VNR, which includes also a Position Paper specifically prepared by the Forum for the occasion.

In order to describe the level of integration among national and local process for the implementation of the 2030 Agenda, the Italian VNR is one of the first examples of integrated VNR/VLR. It presents as an attachment 12 Voluntary Local Reviews prepared by 18 institutions between Regions, autonomous Provinces and Metropolitan Cities. In the same perspective, a Voluntary Subnational Review (VSR) was attached, presented by AICCRE - The Italian Association for the Council of Municipalities and Regions of Europe, together with FEEM - Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.

Finally, 2022 VNR includes as an attachment the Three-Year Programming and Policy Planning Document for International Development Cooperation prepared by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation (MAECI) to monitor the external dimension of the Italian 2030 Agenda.