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The United Nations (UN) Rio+20 summit obligated nations to develop set of universal development goals as indicated in the UN sustainable development goals (SDGs). These goals were designated to enhance and further improve strategies cope with failures of the expired millennium development goals (MDGs) (Under-Secretary-General, 2013). Researches and other official reports at present indicate that SDGs are the extension or the continuation of the expired MDGs. The MDGs were mostly relief projects toward improving human life through aid based approach. The MDGs projects did not thus so far remarkably improve the target sectors but alleviated hunger and reduced extreme poverty in some countries while countries like Somaliland, hunger and poverty are on the increase. This doesn’t mean that MDGs were totally failed projects, but to indicate that the set targets were not improved as supposed to be due to lack of context based national strategic framework. Additional monitoring and evaluation of MDGs was haphazard since there had not been specific indicators adopted to report the progress. The SDGs signed up by the Somaliland government this year (2017) would inherit challenges hindered MDGs to produce the anticipated outcomes if they are not strategically avoided.  Socioeconomic development and national sustainability are often posed as being in conflict because of tradeoffs between the growing demands of least developed counties like Somaliland as well as lower standards of living and poor capacity of the national institutions. This review paper suggests a need to adopt an indigenous integrated framework, which ensures that synergy is exploited and collaborative strategies are put in place towards achieving SDG targets. This paper proposes a comprehensive framework and key recommendations focusing on filling the gaps left in the MDGs and accelerate in achieving the new goals and targets of SDGs.

Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) is a global initiative towards transforming education for sustainability. The integration of SD into the education portfolio is considered to be an important approach that ensures strategic alignment of higher education with SDGs. A document review was used to identify and discuss the difference between transmissive and transformative education in relation to SDGs and in the context of Somali education. In this trajectory, it is expected that the concept of ‘‘transformative education is likely to become more common to meet the emerging social, economic and environmental issues, yet practical challenges remain in Somaliland HE sector. The roadmap towards addressing transformative education for sustainability is not included in the Somaliland national portfolios; particularly ESD has not been presented. In this regard, this paper proposed a generic framework that spotlights the integration of HEIs and the national development goals (NDGs) in Somaliland. Meanwhile, developed and developing countries are prioritizing structural transformation in their HEIs that are tailored to national and regional development programs. Consistent with the Rio + 20 outcomes, the authors analyzed the concept of the ‘‘sustainable university’’ and identified the fact that it is practically divided into three interrelated and complementary categories, namely social-, environmental-, and economic-oriented university in pursuit of actualizing SD. The paper recommends major reforms in the education sector including availing investment portfolios for R&D, renovation of education goals and transforming universities for sustainability

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