Foreign Minister Julie Bishop says the updating of global goals to eliminate poverty is ambitious but necessary.
Ms Bishop gave a three-minute speech on the final day of a United Nations summit in New York on Sunday which adopted 17 sustainable development goals to replace the expiring millennium development goals.
"It's an ambitious goal (to end extreme poverty by 2030) and a necessary objective," Ms Bishop said in the general assembly hall.
Ms Bishop said the goal to tackle climate change was important to the success of the anti-poverty agenda.
The World Bank estimated more than 40 per cent of the world's extreme poor lived in fragile environments and this percentage was expected to at least double by 2030, she said.
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It should be the goal of "decent governments" to deal with the issue of climate change.
Ms Bishop also mentioned the national disability insurance scheme and the "closing the gap" indigenous program as ways Australia was dealing with poverty and inequality.
