Harnessing evidence to drive SDG progress
2023 marks the midpoint of Agenda 2030. This year is also host to two significant Sustainable Development Goals events: the High-Level Political Forum (HLPF) in July and upcoming SDG Summit in September. These events are important opportunities to reflect on how far we have to go, and how best to accelerate progress.
Evidence is available on how far we have travelled along the arc of SDG fulfillment. What is urgently needed is to sift through the evidence, determine the most significant gaps in our knowledge, and discover what works best and why. These are the objectives of the Global SDG Synthesis Coalition. Our first synthesis report is soon to be completed – addressing SDG-17, and partnerships.
The Global SDG Synthesis Coalition is an initiative launched by the UNDP Independent Evaluation Office (IEO) roughly a year ago. It is co-led by UNDP and UNICEF, but counts on the close partnership and engagement of another 43 UN entities and affiliates and more than 60 Member States, alongside numerous civil society organizations and evaluation and synthesis networks. The Coalition’s work is intended to shine a light on the barriers and enablers to achievement of the SDGs, and to help set the course towards accelerated progress toward the Goals.
Preliminary lessons from the SDG-17 synthesis report were taken up at the HLPF. The lessons were delivered to an audience spanning five continents, in an event co-hosted by the IEO and the Malawian Mission to the UN. Our eminent panel of high-level government officials from Lithuania, Malawi, the Netherlands, Panama, Sierra Leone, Spain, and the United Kingdom – all of whom are engaged in the work of the Coalition - presented their perspectives on issues and priorities related to SDG-17. The Coalition will follow up on this successful first presentation with two events at the SDG Summit, during which the final Partnership Pillar synthesis report will be presented, and the Coalition will preview its work over the next 18 months to derive lessons from the rest of the SDGs, framed within the pillars of Peace, People, Planet, and Prosperity.
What value does the partnership pillar synthesis add to global efforts to achieve the SDGs?
The SDG-17 synthesis looks at what is successfully driving progress in the areas of finance, trade, technology, capacity building and systemic issues. The synthesis process involved searching through over 25,000 impact, performance and process evaluations, as well as voluntary national reviews, statistical data and systematic reviews carried out since the SDGs were launched in 2015, to find what was relevant to SDG-17. The most credible information was triangulated to arrive at a set of compelling lessons.
What do the preliminary lessons tell us?
The preliminary lessons focus specifically on the trade, finance and technology aspects of SDG-17. The following sample of emerging lessons illustrates the evidence-based results that can be expected from this synthesis when it is finalized in September, and the remaining four pillar syntheses.
Lessons on trade:
- South-South cooperation shows promise to accelerate progress toward SDG-17 results by prioritizing mutual interests, trust and ownership.
- Regional trade agreements are more effective than export subsidies in increasing the value of exports in middle-income countries.
- Entry into the World Trade Organization has a positive impact on the number of products traded, but not on the average volume of trade per product.
- EU food standards limit the ability of sub-Saharan African countries to increase their exports after entering into preferential trade agreements with the European Union.
Lessons on finance:
- While green finance initiatives positively impact innovation in large Asian countries, the effects of current investments have been insufficient to accelerate progress in green innovation.
- Tariff reductions increase exports and innovation in various settings, but they also result in significant reductions in government revenue.
- Tax reforms, community-based tax collection, and VAT can partially compensate for reductions in tariffs by increasing tax revenue in low-income and middle-income settings.
- Where tax collection capacity increases and new donors step in, low-income countries are often less dependent on historical providers of Official Development Assistance.
As my co-host, Her Excellency Ambassador Agnes Chimbiri-Molande of Malawi, put it, the preliminary findings demonstrate the importance of partnership and connection, but also expose the gaps in efforts to localize the SDGs. Changes to financial architectures, alongside triangular cooperation, will help us ensure that no country, and no person, is left behind.