John W McArthur
The writer is Senior Fellow and Director of the Center for Sustainable Development at the Brookings Institution
Any reader of the daily news could be forgiven for thinking the world is in decline. Amid so many conflicts and societal strains, the United Nations regularly warns that only17 per cent of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) – the economic, social, and environmental targets all countries set in 2015 – are on track to be met by 2030, as agreed, leading many to wonder whether such goals still serve any purpose. But rather than succumb to pessimism, we would do better to examine where the world is making sound progress, where it seems stuck on autopilot, and where things are indeed moving backwards or approaching a tipping point for the worse.
This is what we set out to do in a recent study, with our colleague Odera Onyechi, estimating country-level progress around the world. One of our topline findings is that “business as usual” aptly describes many trends since 2015. Yet the SDGs must be evaluated remembering the nature of their ambition. They were not established merely to perpetuate longer-term patterns of progress toward more prosperous, inclusive, and sustainable societies. Instead, they sought to hasten such progress dramatically. SDG 5, for example, does not just call for a secular continuation of the centuries-long journey toward gender equality. It calls for rapid, transformational change to achieve full gender equality by 2030 – and rightly so.
Even if the pace of progress is not sufficient to achieve what 193 countries committed to delivering, this does not mean everything is getting worse. Our study examined 24 SDG-relevant, country-level indicators and started with a basic question: Have things improved since 2015? We found humanity-wide improvements for 18 – ranging from the enlargement of marine protected areas to expanded access to water and sanitation. Such gains do not minimise the pain of backsliding on the six remaining measures, especially those linked to hunger and food security, not to mention the horrendous health and educational consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic. But they do show why we need to differentiate progress toward the SDGs more systematically.
When we investigate which trends have changed since the SDG agreement in 2015, the results are more muted. The clearest accelerations in progress are in HIV incidence, antiretroviral coverage to treat Aids, and access to electricity. The Aids-treatment data include extraordinary breakthroughs in low-income countries with limited infrastructure, such as Sierra Leone and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. For a global issue that lacked any systematic policy response in the early 2000s, this represents remarkable progress for humanity.
For eight indicators, however, we found no change in the long-term rate of progress, and spotted signs of a slowdown in nine others. (For four indicators, we did not have sufficient pre-2015 data to assess long-term changes.) The takeaway is that there is no single overall story to tell about the SDGs. Most countries are doing better on some issues and worse on others, suggesting that the world needs a more balanced scorecard for cataloging successes and failures.
Moreover, the slowdowns do not always come as a surprise. The pandemic caused a clear short-term increase in the number of people living in extreme poverty, but most of that impact has now faded. Notwithstanding all the big global shocks of the past few years, one finds that the same core challenge persists: Extreme poverty remains concentrated in those countries that were already struggling to reduce it.
On some measures, the apparent rate of progress doesn’t tell the right story. With respect to the environment, for example, annual changes in protected areas or greenhouse-gas emissions don’t say much about the risk of hitting a catastrophic tipping point. If you are stuck in a car careening toward a cliff, you shouldn’t obsess over the readings on the speedometer; you should be focusing on pumping the brakes in time. Although tipping points cannot be predicted precisely, there is growing evidence that many planetary boundaries already have been crossed. The world is far off track from the goal of keeping global warming within 1.5° Celsius above pre-industrial levels or adequately preserving nature to halt the risk of mass extinctions.
Other individual SDG-related issues can feed into competing narratives. Consider the challenge of child mortality. From 2015 to 2022, annual child deaths under age five fell by more than one million, from 6.1 million to 4.9 million. The country-level trends driving this were a mixed bag. Twenty developing countries notched faster improvements while more than 40 had slower gains. If current trends continue, 60 countries will not meet the SDG target of no more than 25 deaths per 1,000 live births by 2030. These shortfalls will add up to more than ten million deaths by 2030.
One can feel both buoyed by the progress and anxious about the challenges. Remarkably, more than half the excess child mortality could occur in just three countries by the end of the decade – Nigeria, Pakistan, and the DRC. Thus, it is conceivable that concerted international efforts could help local leaders achieve breakthroughs that would fundamentally change the global picture.
Overall, a nuanced assessment of the SDGs can offer encouragement alongside the sober realism that current conditions demand. Breakthroughs in technology – ranging from pioneering health interventions to digital cash safety nets reaching people even in the world’s toughest environments – continue to drive new forms of progress. When the institutions, financing, and transparent governance systems align, progress can still be rapid.
The world is full of warning signs, and too much of humanity continues to carry an extraordinary burden. But despite the big global disruptions of the 2020s, we continue to make overall gains – if far too slowly – toward our common benchmarks of success. There is no reason to give up hope. The problem is not that everything is getting worse. It is that many things are not getting better any faster than they were before. @Project Syndicate, 2024
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