UN Releases Report: Times of crisis, times of change: Science for accelerating transformations to sustainable development

In September 2023, the UN released Report: 'Times of crisis, times of change: Science for accelerating transformations to sustainable development'. 

In the outcome document of the Rio+20 Conference, in 2012, entitled “The future we want”, and again in “Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development”, in 2015, UN Member States decided that the High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development would be informed by the Global Sustainable Development Report. In the Ministerial Declaration of the 2016 Forum, Member States decided that the report would be produced quadrennially by an independent group of scientists appointed by the UN Secretary-General and comprising 15 experts representing a variety of backgrounds, scientific disciplines and institutions, with geographical and gender balance.

This Report is the second quadrennial Global Sustainable Development Report prepared by an independent group of scientists. The first report, The future is now: Science for achieving sustainable development, was published in 2019.

The Global Sustainable Development Report 2023

"Times of Crisis, Times of Change: Science for Accelerating Transformations to Sustainable Development", the 2023 Global Sustainable Development Report (GSDR), finds that at this critical juncture, midway to 2030, incremental and fragmented change is insufficient to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the remaining seven years. Implementation of the 2030 Agenda requires the active mobilization of political leadership and ambition for science-based transformations. This must be achieved globally - leaving no country, society or person behind. The report is an invitation to embrace transformations with the urgency needed to accelerate progress towards the SDGs.

The GSDR 2023 highlights key transformations needed in different sectors and provides key findings from the literature, practical examples and tools for progress towards the SDGs. It provides a stylized model to help unpack and understand the transformation process over time and outline the roles of different levers in facilitating various stages of transformation through a systematic and structured approach. As history has shown, transformations are inevitable, and this report emphasizes that deliberate and desirable transformations are possible - and, indeed, necessary.

Key Messages

Context at the half-way point to 2030

• At the half-way point toward 2030 the SDGs are far off track. Of 36 targets reviewed in the report, only 2 are on track to be achieved, while progress on eight is deteriorating. 

• The crises that have wiped out years of SDG progress are interrelated, fueling intensities, but connections could be turned into opportunities. A spate of shocks - the COVID-19 pandemic, conflicts in many regions including the war in Ukraine, a cost-of-living and debt crisis, and climate related disasters – are entwined through environmental, economic and social systems that create intensifying SDG backslides. The same interconnections amplifying the crises offer opportunities for integrated recovery strategies and for addressing systemic risks.

• Leaders must address medium- and long-term trends that are having systemic effects across the SDGs while dealing with immediate crises. Addressing climate change, nature and biodiversity loss, demographic change, digitalization, economic inequalities, and violent conflict will avoid undermining advances made in the short term and build resilience.

• There is rising awareness and commitments to the SDGs, but this needs to translate into action. 

Evidence to inform the way forward

• The SDGs are interlinked and must be approached holistically based on context specific analysis. 

• New scenario studies point to actions for transformation that if applied together through the six entry points put forward in the 2019 GSDR could significantly accelerate SDG achievement. 

• Capacity building in all countries is needed to support decisive and transformative action through any entry point. 

• Strategies for the SDGs must identify and minimize impediments and support promising solutions specific to different phases of transformation – emergence, acceleration and stabilization.  

• Actions must simultaneously be taken to destabilize, break-down, and phase out unsustainable practices. 

• Transformation to sustainable pathways should be rooted in science. 

Calls to action for transformations

• Transformation is possible, and inevitable. Science driven transformations are urgently needed to enable progress toward the SDGs. 

• UN Member States are urged to establish an SDG Transformation Framework for Accelerated Action. This framework would consist of 6 elements: 1) National Plans for Transformative Accelerated Action grounded in science and inclusive processes to identify and harness SDG synergies and reduce negative transboundary spillovers; 2) local and industry-specific planning to feed into national plans; 3) initiatives through the Addis Ababa Action Agenda or otherwise to increase fiscal space, including tax reforms, debt restructuring and relief and increased engagement from international financial institutions for SDG implementation; 4) investing in SDG related data, science-based tools and policy learning with attention to closing SDG data and research and development spending gaps; 5) establishing partnerships to strengthen the science-policy- society interface and 6) investing in measures to improve accountability of governments and other stakeholders.

• All countries need to build capacities essential for transformation at individual, institutional and network levels. 

• Governments and other actors need to steer transformations by activating synergies in each of the six entry-points - human well-being and capabilities, sustainable and just economies, food systems and nutrition patterns, energy decarbonization and universal access, urban and peri-urban development, and the global environmental commons. 

• The international community needs to coordinate to improve critical underlying conditions for SDG implementation. Disruptive trends in climate change, rising inequality, biodiversity loss, demographic change and digitalization need to be countered and shaped with actions at all levels in solidarity. Coordinated action should especially focus on: 1) preventing and avoiding violent conflict; 2) opening the necessary fiscal space for action; 3) ensuring meaningful inclusion and engagement of marginalized groups; 4) making digital transformation work for the SDGs; and 5) achieving gender equality through legislation, banning harmful practices, education, and reproductive health.

• The full benefits of science as a public good should be harnessed for the SDGs. This involves increasing investment in science and innovation systems, especially in low- and middle-income countries; funding and rewarding science that enables the SDGs; as well as promoting open access to scientific research, publications and data and strengthening mechanisms for knowledge sharing including with support for the GSDR.

UN releases Report on Synergy Solutions for a World in Crisis: Tackling Climate and SDG action together

 In September 2023, the UN released the Report: Synergy solutions for a world in crisis: tackling climate and SDG action together (Report on Strengthening the Evidence Base - First Edition 2023). Co-convened by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA) and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change Secretariat (UNFCCC), this report owes its existence to this enduring and productive partnership, shared vision, and collaborative spirit. Guided by their overarching vision, this report is the culmination of the independent work of the Expert Group on Climate and SDG Synergy.

The Report brings a critical message at a critical time: We must solve the climate emergency and sustainable development challenges together, or we will not solve them at all. Halfway to the deadline for the 2030 Agenda, a mere 15 percent of SDG targets are on track. The climate crisis is worsening as greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise. Catastrophic and intensifying heat waves, droughts, flooding and wildfires have become far too frequent.

UN Secretary-General António Guterres has called for an urgent course correction, stating that “climate action is the 21st century's greatest opportunity to drive forward all the Sustainable Development Goals" and urging world leaders to come together behind a rescue plan for people and planet — a rallying cry for synergistic action.

The key messages of the Report were:

1. Seeking win-win synergies by tackling the climate and sustainable development crises together is the only way to correct the course we are on.

2. The vast pool of existing evidence underscores that the Paris goals and the SDGs are mutually re-enforcing and one cannot be achieved without the other.

3. Progress away from siloed approaches and towards integrated planning, implementation, and reporting is underway but needs to move much faster.

4. Synergies are highly dependent on national priorities and context.

5. The way forward – A 'framework for action' to foster systemic change

The recommendations of the Report were:

1. Enhance collective resilience against current and future global crises through collaboration and cooperation with international organizations and their partners.

2. Strengthen science-policy-society interaction to advance synergistic action.

3. Promote institutional capacity building and cross-sectoral and international collaboration at national, institutional, and individual levels, especially for the Global South.

4. Ensure policy coherence and coordination among policy makers across sectors and departments for enhancing climate and development synergies at the national, sub-national, and multi-national levels.

5. Develop a ‘framework for action’ that can help decision makers in public, private, and civil society sectors identify synergistic action for systems change.

6. Use the ‘framework for action’, to ensure a just transition.

7. Address the large investment gaps in the climate and development agendas to enhance the necessary synergies and lead to the effective allocation of national budgets.

8. Utilize the UNFCCC COP 28 (Climate Change Conference) in Dubai to initiate and accelerate synergistic action on climate and SDGs and make it an essential part of reporting by Parties.

9. Prioritize the role of synergies in the work of the UN and international financial institutions, including an improved system for sharing information to help countries in their reporting responsibilities, enhanced cross-sectoral engagement in the UN’s intergovernmental and capacity building efforts, and focused attention on climate and development synergies as well as climate resilient development pathways in the IPCC Assessment Report.

10. Treat cities, sites of major population growth and expansion of economic activities, as an opportunity for focusing on climate and development synergies.