So, I have gone through all the SDGs…finally! I thought I could finish this a lot earlier but it took much longer than I had expected initially. After trying gathering information and summarising it for each goal for a few, I switched to just touching the basis of each goal and prioritised to go through all of the goals first. Although it was just a compilation of facts and numbers, mission statements, targets and progresses for each goal (and yes most of them are just quoted from the UN’s websites), it was still great to know the overview, basic facts and interlinks among SDGs. In this posts, I would like to leave notes on what I found through this series of SDGs posts.

Background knowledge

Sound background knowledge is needed to understand the structure of each goal

In my case, I can understand the structure behind the goal and its targets for those related to food, agricultrue and ecology (such as Goal 2, 13, 14 and 15). My background knowledge of agriculture and ecology enables me to investigate them with the latest literature as well.

However, those associated more with social aspects are difficult to look deeper into for me. I can understand the basic facts and numbers but not very well how those are derived, interlinked and projected without a good basis in the field.

Obtaining the same level of background knowledge for all the goals as those related to agriculture and ecology for me, but a little broader knowledge would greatly help me understand each goal deeper as well as the interactions among them.

Synergies and tradeoffs among SDGs

SDGs consist of three domains, Biosphere (Goal 6, 13, 14, 15), Society (Goal 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 11, 16) and Economy (8, 9, 10, 12) together with Goal 17 coordinating the other goals.

There are interactions among these SDGs and going them through allowed me to glimpse the linkages across SDGs. Achieving some SDGs and their targets can result in co-benefits and synergies, while often in tradeoffs and tensions in practice too. Such interactions as well as solutions to realise synergies and resolve tradeoffs have been extensively investigated.

Fader et al. 2018. “Toward an Understanding of Synergies and Trade-Offs Between Water, Energy, and Food SDG Targets”. Frontiers in Environmental Science. 12. https://doi.org/10.3389/fenvs.2018.00112

…a methodology where each target of the SDG 2 (food), 6 (water), and 7 (energy) was analyzed for its input requirements, infrastructure needs, and the risks and benefits for the provision of ecosystem services…For example, targets 2.5 (maintain genetic diversity), 6.5 (implement integrated water resources management) and 7.a (enhance international cooperation to facilitate access to clean energy) have no conflicts with other targets and have different levels of synergies with most of the other targets. On the contrary, various targets of SDG 2, and especially the target 2.b (correct and prevent trade restrictions), are in slight conflict with other targets by potentially overusing resources needed by other targets or threatening ecosystem services. Our approach confirms the general belief that SDG 6 (water) has the highest number of potential synergies (a total of 124). Thus, achieving the water targets will make it continuously easier to achieve other targets.

Kroll et al. 2019. “Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): Are we successful in turning trade-offs into synergies?“. Palgrave Communications. 5. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-019-0335-5

For certain goals, we find positive developments with notable synergies in our projections, especially for SDGs 1, 3, 7, 8, and 9: Poverty alleviation and strengthening the economy, rooted in innovation, and modern infrastructure, therefore continue to be the basis upon which many of the other SDGs can be achieved. However, especially SDGs 11, 13, 14, 16, and 17 will continue to have notable trade-offs, as well as non-associations with the other goals in the future, which emphasizes the need to foster innovations and policies that can make our cities and communities more sustainable, as well as strengthen institutions and spur climate action.

Nash et al. 2020. “To Achieve a Sustainable Blue Future, Progress Assessments Must Include Interdependencies between the Sustainable Development Goals”. One Earth. 2. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.oneear.2020.01.008

there is a disconnect between the apparent progress shown by indicators and long-term sustainability; for example, short-term gains in reducing hunger or poverty might be undermined by poor ocean health, particularly in countries dependent on fisheries or developing their blue economy. We suggest an extension to existing indicator assessments to integrate scenarios and social-ecological modeling.

Blanchard et al. 2017. “Linked sustainability challenges and trade-offs among fisheries, aquaculture and agriculture”. Nature ecology & evolution. 1. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-017-0258-8

…some countries are likely to face double jeopardies in both fisheries and agriculture sectors under climate change. The strategies to mitigate these risks will be context-dependent, and will need to directly address the trade-offs among Sustainable Development Goals, such as halting biodiversity loss and reducing poverty.

That is also why achieving SDGs within the planetary boundaries has been suggested.

Randers et al. 2019. “Achieving the 17 Sustainable Development Goals Within 9 Planetary Boundaries”. EarthArXiv. https://doi.org/10.1017/sus.2019.22.

Conventional efforts to achieve the 14 socio-economic goals will raise pressure on planetary boundaries, moving the world away from the three environmental SDGs.

…what’s next for me?

I would like to come back to each goal and go deeper with the latest relevant studies and reports (as I stated at the end of each post…). However, I will beforehand work on other relevant topics outside of SDGs, such as the planetary boundaries, circular economy and ESG investment. Also, I want to feature global issues related to agriculture and food systems, namely food waste, carbon & water footprint, land use, etc… probably from perspectives closer to my research contexts.

A good lesson from this series of posts is the importance of momentum (for doing many things actually!). I think it was a right decision to focus on finishing all the goals first rather than sticking with one for too long. It is a lot easier saying than doing, but just keep moving forward and constantly get progresses out even if each of them is small.

Let’s see how these go… stay tuned!