Upon declaring and mobilizing world leaders in a permanent development purpose, the United Nations has directed efforts to stimulate concrete actions to reduce poverty, to promote prosperity and well-being for all, to protect the environment and to address climate change.
The creation of actions aimed at sustainable development began in the year 2000, with the declaration of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which established eight guidelines to be achieved by the countries by 2015.
According to the United Nations, such unprecedented mobilization in history, with specific interventions, solid strategies, adequate resources and political will, have allowed progress even in the poorest countries. The final report on the implementation of the MDGs indicated that millions of people have closed the poverty line, women and girls have been empowered, there have been advances in health and overall well-being by offering new opportunities for a better life.
Despite the results, much effort is still needed. The Sustainable Development Goals that culminated in the elaboration of the Agenda 2030, signed by more than 170 world leaders in 2015, declare a series of guidelines and targets to be reached worldwide by 2030. This agenda details 169 goals aimed at reducing social inequalities, with the purpose of developing a resilient and sustainable future for the planet.
In this context, the so-called social technologies compose simple and effective alternatives that can contribute to the achievement of the proposed challenges. They are products, methodologies or techniques that represent solutions to the demands in diverse areas, such as food, education, energy, housing, income, water resources, health and environment. Because they are often so innovative yet simple, they are not always granted the status of technology. A widely known and widespread example is the homemade hydration solution: a low-cost, wide scaled and with proven efficacy social technology.
Social technologies differ from conventional ones insofar as they are based on a development policy that considers not only the economic, scientific and technological, but also the human, environmental and cultural dimensions.
In addition, it is assumed that social technologies are structured in flexible models, for not everything that is viable in one place can be, in the same way, in a different one. Intelligent adaptations and innovative thinking explain why we talk about reapplication, not replication of social technologies. And in this new concept of technological standard, the most important feature for the reapplication of a social technology may be, for example, a training and social organization programme, and not necessarily a mechanical or electronic component.
In Brazil, the dissemination of social technologies has shown to be an effective alternative for the development of public policies with a strong impact on the improvement of people's lives. This is because, according to the concept itself, solutions to social problems follow the "bottom-up" model of government policy implementation. Thus, it is assumed that there is participation and empowerment of communities, with their knowledge, practices and particularities, in the design and management of tools and methodologies capable of improving their living conditions. An emblematic case is the cisterns for capturing and storing rainwater for the consumption and production. When it became a public policy, this social technology brought the Brazilian semi-arid the hopes of a dignified life and of basic conditions to live with the extreme aspects of the drought, which have been aggravated in the last six years.
In this sense, studies highlight the importance of involving several social stakeholders in order for these initiatives gain visibility and scale. The social investment of companies, the endorsement of third sector entities, academy, governments and, finally, society is crucial for building a new development model, contributing to the Sustainable Development Goals and, especially, to the eradication of poverty in all of its dimensions.
Author Asclepius Ramatiz (Pepe) is President of Banco do Brasil Foundation.