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Regularly published European Sustainable Development Reports represent a regional assessment of countries’ progress towards achieving the UN-2030 Sustainable Development Goals, SDGs. The new report complements to the official SDG-indicators and the voluntary national reviews. As in previous years, present report is based on public consultations (this time during last December) and gathers internationally comparable national data.
Background: the ESDG Report-2024
The Europe Sustainable Development Report 2023/24 (the ESDR 5th edition) provides an independent quantitative assessment of the progress by the European Union, its member states and partner countries towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
The 5th Report’s edition identifies 10 priority actions for the incoming EU leadership to accelerate SDG implementation within Europe and internationally; priority actions are described below.
In the context of a fragmented and multipolar world, the present report calls for decisive action by the EU to avoid dangerous environmental and social tipping points.
According to the ESDG officials, the SDGs are not achievable in Europe and globally by the required date in 2030; however, decisive actions must be taken during this decade. Besides, long-term investments and regional cooperation are needed to boost skills and innovation: in a multipolar and fragmented world the EU leaders must work to lay the foundations for a new European Deal for the Future and play a leadership role internationally to prepare for the next decades of global sustainable development.
Source:
https://sdgtransformationcenter.org/reports/europe-sustainable-development-report-2023-24
Citation from report: “The fifth edition of the ESDR, which includes the SDG Index and Dashboards, tracks progress on the SDGs of the EU, its member states and partner countries in Europe. The report highlights that at the current rate, a third of the SDG targets will not be achieved by the EU by 2030, with significant differences across European countries; these range from a quarter in Northern and Western Europe to around half in Southern Europe and Central and Eastern Europe on average. In particular, the report underlines stagnation and reversal in progress in many European countries on social targets with growing issues around access to and quality of services for all, as well as poverty and material deprivation driven at least partly by multiple crises since 2020. Globally, the international financial architecture is failing to channel global savings to SDG investments at the needed pace and scale which leads to a reversal in SDG progress in many parts of the world, especially in the poorest and most vulnerable countries”.
Note. It is not the first time that the EU makes such a deem assessments: e.g. a previous one took place at the end of 2023; however, no positive signs since…
More in: https://www.integrin.dk/2023/12/27/monitoring-sdgs-in-the-european-union/
Reference to report at: Guillaume Lafortune, Grayson Fuller, Adolf Kloke-Lesch, Phoebe Koundouri and Angelo Riccaboni (2024). Europe Sustainable Development Report 2023/24. Paris: SDSN and SDSN Europe and Dublin: Dublin University Press. https://doi.org/10.25546/104407
The European Environment Agency, EEA acknowledged that achieving the EU-wide climate and sustainability goals would require additionally € 520 billion annually through to 2030.
Source: https://www.eea.europa.eu/en/newsroom/editorial/why-europe-needs-to-stay-the-course-to-sustainability
Monitoring SDGs: Eurostat data
The European Union’s first response to the UN Agenda-2030 for Sustainable Development (adopted at a UN summit in October 2015) occurred in the European Commission Communication “Next steps for a sustainable European future: European action for sustainability”, published in November 2016, just a year after the global SDGs were adopted.
It describes progress towards the achievement of SDGs in the EU and includes reports on SDGs in individual policy areas.
The publication builds on Eurostat’s long experience in monitoring sustainable development in the European Union.
See: https://ec.europa.eu/europeaid/sites/devco/files/communication-next-steps-sustainable-europe-20161122_en.pdf
Eurostat monitoring reports on SDGs in Europe provide essential evidences to identify the gaps which need to be closed in order to achieve SDGs and to make informed policy choices.
As to the achievements and perspectives concerning the SDGs in Europe, they mentioned that for example in the third UN goal ‘good health and well-being’ in an EU context focuses on four sub-themes:
1. ‘Healthy lives’ refers to objective and subjective measurements of health;
2. ‘Health determinants’ looks into both environmental and behavioral determinants of health;
3. ‘Causes of death’ analyses the main reasons for mortality in the EU, and
4. ‘Access to healthcare’ investigates the barriers for accessing medical care services.
Thus, monitoring SDGs in Europe goes through more complex parameters than in the “original” UN goals.
Eurostat SDG-publications
The aim of the Eurostat publication is not to exhaustively assess EU progress towards the 169 targets of the UN-2030 Agenda. Selected indicators have strong links with the Commission Communication and staff working documents.
See e.g.: European Commission “Key European action supporting the 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals”, SWD (2016) 390 final.
More on “progress” in: Sustainable development in the European Union: monitoring report on progress towards the SDGs. – Eurostat Publ., 2017, – 372pp. ISBN 978-92-79-72287-5 at: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/3217494/8461633/KS-04-17-780-EN-N.pdf/f7694981-6190-46fb-99d6-d092ce04083f.
Towards a new European Deal for the Future: ten priorities
The new Commission College and the member states’ leaders have discussed and agreed the next EU seven-year budget (2028-2035) and negotiated the next global agenda for sustainable development to continue the SDGs beyond 2030.
The EU’s leadership intends to adopt a more ambitious, integrated and coherent approach to accelerate the implementation of the SDGs in Europe and internationally.
Complementing the ESDR 2023/24 report, over 200 scientists, experts and practitioners from over 20 European countries published in June 2024 a joint Call for Action targeting political parties and the EU leadership to lay the foundation for a new European Deal for the Future with ten priority actions:
= Respond to the grave danger of negative “social tipping points” by significantly reducing the risk of poverty and social exclusion of European citizens.
= Double down efforts to achieve net-zero emissions in the EU by 2050, with major breakthroughs by 2030.
= Strengthen regional and local authorities in achieving the SDGs, including regularly monitoring and reporting SDG progress at all levels.
= Curb negative international spillovers and support the transformation towards a sustainable trade system.
= Leverage Team Europe for global SDG diplomacy and strengthen diverse and universal formats, especially through the United Nations.
= Step up Europe’s multilateral role by leading global efforts to reform the global financial architecture.
= Re-focus the EU’s international partnerships on the SDGs and move towards mutually transformative cooperation.
= Mobilize the financial means for the transformations toward a sustainable future.
= Institutionalize the integration of the SDGs into strategic planning, macroeconomic coordination, budget processes, research and innovation missions, as well as other policy instruments.
= Establish new permanent mechanisms for structured and meaningful engagement with civil society, including youth, and within the European Parliament on SDG pathways and policies.
Source and citation from: https://sdgtransformationcenter.org/news/press-release-europe-sustainable-development-report-2023-24