World well short of progress needed to meet UN’s 2030 sustainable development goals

[Gunnar Larson]

By — Melina Walling, Associated Press


World Jun 21, 2023 2:29 PM EDT
The world is falling well short of the progress needed to meet the United
Nations’ sustainable development goals by 2030 in areas ranging from
poverty to clean energy to biodiversity, with a growing gap between wealthy
and developing nations, according to a report Tuesday from the nonprofit
tracking the goals.

The coronavirus pandemic stalled the limited progress made in the years
after United Nations member states adopted the goals in 2015. Now, halfway
through the 15-year time frame, not a single one of the goals is on target
to be met.

“We’re at the risk of a lost decade for sustainable development,” said
Guillaume Lafortune, a lead author of the report and vice president and
head of the Paris office of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network,
the nonprofit launched by the UN to foster and track sustainable
development. “And there’s actually a risk that the gap between rich and
poor countries on sustainable development might be bigger in 2030 than it
was in 2015.”

The goals, which the authors described as “an ethical imperative,” cover a
range of areas, including threats to the climate and environment but also
basic human rights such as food, health and education.

The authors noted that goals for reducing hunger, improving health and
protecting biodiversity are particularly off-track. They said changing
global governance mechanisms and global finance architecture are critical
for improving progress on all the goals.

Lafortune pointed to the global finance summit that opens Thursday in Paris
as an important moment for the world. A main focus of the summit is how
international finance can be reformed to help the developing nations that
are often most vulnerable to climate change but least able to raise capital
for things like transitioning to renewable energy.

The report analyzed countries’ progress on the sustainability goals by
assigning them scores from zero to 100. They examined factors like poverty,
hunger, disease, carbon dioxide emissions, subjective well-being scores and
dozens of other indicators. Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Germany and Austria
ranked highest. South Sudan ranked lowest, followed by the Central African
Republic, Chad, Yemen and Somalia.

Lafortune called particular attention to the “disappointing” United States
scorecard, which he said was below average for developed countries. He said
the U.S. was one of the worst performers in terms of its commitment efforts
and was one of only five member countries that did not present action plans
and priorities to the international community. But Lafortune did note that
some U.S. cities voluntarily provided local reviews.

Kimberly Marion Suiseeya, an associate professor of political science and
environmental policy and culture at Northwestern University who did not
work on the report, said that while she sees pressing global development
shortfalls on issues like the climate emergency, she thinks the Biden
administration is taking climate seriously. She also saw signs of optimism
in China’s progress on renewable energy. Though the country ranked below
the U.S. in the report, it has invested more in clean energy, according to
research firm BloombergNEF.

Anita Ramasastry, a law professor and director of the Sustainable
International Development graduate program at the University of Washington,
said she wasn’t surprised that the sustainable development goals are off
track. Ramasastry, who had no part in the report, said she doesn’t think
many governments with more advanced economies, like the U.S., have embraced
the goals or made them relevant to citizens’ daily lives.

She questioned whether the goals were overly ambitious and added that it
will be important to examine how the 2030 agenda is financed, as well as
the role of the private sector.

“Business has been asked to fill a role. And I think there’s just an
ultimate question, which is should we have asked business to fill that
role?” she asked. “Because ultimately the SDGs are meant to be about
governments and states.”

The report made the same point repeatedly, singling out several “basic
failures” in global governance. Those included voluntary implementation of
the goals with no enforcement mechanisms when countries fall short,
international trade and finance rules not geared to sustainability, and
national governments not coordinating well with smaller units of government
on the goals.

Lafortune called for countries to keep the sustainable development goals in
mind as they approach the Paris summit and other global conferences. He
said Paris has the opportunity to act as an “accelerator” toward reforming
international institutions like the International Monetary Fund and the
World Bank, which he sees as possible elements of a global strategy for
investment in tackling climate change and other sustainable development
goals.

“Despite all the fragmentation right now in geopolitics, the many crises
and so on, we still need to keep that sort of long-term vision and this
idea of multilateralism and global cooperation alive. I think this is
absolutely crucial,” Lafortune said. “I don’t think the world will be
better off if we just forget about these goals because we won’t achieve
them.”


https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/world-well-short-of-progress-needed-to-meet-uns-2030-sustainable-development-goals
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