MOU set to bring progress towards sustainability goals in Indonesia

A memorandum of understanding between the Cross Sector Development Partnership Initiative (XSPI) and the Australia-Indonesia Centre (AIC) is set to contribute to progress towards sustainable development in Indonesia.

XSPI seeks to support cross-sector partnerships across the Asia Pacific that align with the United Nations sustainable development goals.

XSPI chief executive Zoey Diaz said the MoU seeks to strengthen already strong ties.

“The AIC has been a consistently very highly valued member of XSPI’s Indonesia Working Group since its early 2021 start,” Ms Diaz said.

“This formal partnership agreement now provides a structured mechanism for XSPI and AIC to closely collaborate to identify opportunities that mutually support our respective initiatives and goals. XSPI is a not for profit group of activists and organisations that seek to incubate, seed or accelerate cross-sector partnerships across Indo-Pacific providing solid, long-term, future platforms to create diverse development projects in close partnership with national partners and aligned with SDG’s.”

The MOU aims to identify potential project opportunities, ventures and areas of collaboration of mutual interests and stakeholder engagement through a process of non-binding consultation.

Priority sectors identified include engagement with private sector counterparts with a focus on advancing progress towards achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) including building capacity in improving environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) at the enterprise level.

The AIC’s Indonesia director Kevin Evans is also involved with XSPI and saw areas where the two organisations could collaborate.

The AIC have been working closely with XPSI on initiative since last year including in partnership with Monash University Indonesia beginning with a series of interesting webinars focuses on advancing the SDGs through effective partnering with key sectors of the economy, Mr Evans said.

More recently they have begun to grow this partnership with XSPI and Monash University Indonesia by growing new partnerships with business and the Indonesian capital markets with a view to advancing ESGs.

This supports wider Indonesian government efforts to improve the life of its people and the sustainability of its environment and the goals are part of their development plans,” he said.

“The universities also include sustainable goals in their strategy and given the AIC’s strong links in higher education this is something we work with them on.”

The AIC is to help XSPI identify both potential Australian and Indonesian entities for possible partnership and help network with related entities in Indonesia. AIC may also provide relevant contacts to XSPI that align with XSPI mission and shared values between parties.

Ms Diaz said they looked forward to “further strengthening our collaboration with the AIC and increasing our collective impact supporting Indonesia’s development and achievement of its Sustainable Development Goals”.

The partnership priorities and areas of focus are to remain under periodic review.

XSPI has selected Indonesia as its priority country for Southeast Asia, with Bangladesh being its equivalent in South Asia and Papua New Guinea the focus in the South Pacific region.

In relation to Indonesia, the UN SDGs of good health and wellbeing, gender equality and clean water and sanitation are areas of focus for XSPI.

XSPI founding chair Dan Evans said an example of close cooperation occurred in 2022 with four webinars focused on SDGs organised in collaboration with Monash University Indonesia with support from the AIC.

XSPI has, with the support of the Australia-Indonesia Centre, engaged with Australian Stock Exchange listed company, Nickel Industries Ltd. (NIC) to help identify potential social development projects and related partners aligned to NIC’s environmental, sustainable and governance (ESG) strategy and goals.

The partnership between XSPI and NIC was recently formalised by a corporate sponsorship agreement signed by AIC Indonesia director Kevin Evans on behalf of XSPI.

The signing took place at the recent Nickel Producers, Processors and Buyers conference in Jakarta.

Feature image from XSPI.