The World’s Knowledge Network for the Sustainable Development Goals

www.unsdsn.org

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About the SDSN The Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN), launched in 2012, mobilizes global scientific and technological expertise to promote practical problem solving for sustainable development, including the design and implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Paris Climate Agreement. Following their adoption, we support the implementation of the SDGs at local, national, and global scales. The SDSN was established by and works under the auspices of the United Nations Secretary-General. It collaborates with UN agencies, multilateral financing institutions, the private sector, and civil society. A Leadership Council of approximately 100 global leaders on sustainable development acts as the board of the SDSN. The Leadership Council is co-chaired by

• Amina Mohammed, UN Deputy Secretary-General

• Aromar Revi, Director, Indian Institute for Human Settlements, India

• John Thwaites, Chair, Monash Sustainability Institute, Australia

• Laurence Tubiana, CEO, European Climate Foundation, France

• Virgilio Viana, Director General, Amazonas Sustainable Foundation (FAS), Brazil

• Lan Xue, Dean, School of Public Policy and Management (SPPM), Tsinghua University, China

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Professor Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University is Director of the SDSN, and the SDSN Secretariat is hosted by the SDSN Association, with offices in Paris, New Delhi, and New York.

The SDSN’s work is organized around 4 priorities:

• Implementation Tools for the Sustainable Development Goals and Paris Climate Agreement

• Networks

• Solution Initiatives

• SDG Academy

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Implementation Tools for the Sustainable Development Goals and Paris Agreement

Sustainable Development Goals The SDSN is focused on the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, including its 17 SDGs and the Paris Climate Agreement. The Secretariat and SDSN members produce a range of technical resources to support planning, policy development and implementation of these international commitments. These resources benefit from the input of our National & Regional Networks and Thematic Networks.

SDG Index & Dashboards

Every year, SDSN and the Bertelsmann Stiftung, publish the SDG Index and Dashboards Global Report that uses curr-ently available data to esta-blish country baselines for the SDGs and to help set priorities for early action. Each year the report focuses on key issues for SDG implementation, such as international spillovers. An interactive website allows in-

dividuals to explore the data, looking at specific indi-cators, country experiences, and more. Companion SDG indices are in development for US cities and regional groupings of countries.

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Getting Started With the SDGs

Getting Started with the SDGs is a first and preliminary guide on SDG implementation. It aims to help stakeholders, including governments at all levels, to understand the SDG Agenda, to start an inclusive dialogue on SDG implementation, and to prepare SDG-based national development strategies (or align existing plans and strategies

with the goals). A corresponding guide has also been developed for cities and local governments: Getting Started with the SDGs in Cities.

World Happiness Report

The World Happiness Report is a landmark survey of the state of global happiness that ranks 155 countries by their happiness levels. With millions of down-loads, it continues to gain global recognition as governments, academia, and civil society in-creasingly use happiness in-dicators to inform their policy-making decisions. In addition to

the rankings, the 2017 report includes an analysis of happiness in the workplace and a deeper look at experiences in China and Africa.

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Paris Agreement & Climate Change The SDSN has been active on climate change since the beginning, participating in UNFCCC meetings and working with many authors for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The Paris Agreement, signed in 2015, asks all countries to prepare low-emission develop-ment strategies that chart forward-looking emissions reductions pathways. SDSN played an instrumental role in developing and popularizing the concept of long-term pathways through the Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP). The Paris Agreement also emphasizes the central role of advances in low-emission technologies and their diffusion. The Low Carbon Technologies Partnerships initiative (LCTPi), spearheaded by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) and launched with support from the SDSN, aims to advance the pace of development for key technologies. Technologies are presented at Low-Emissions Solutions Conferences (LESC) held throughout the year and organized by the SDSN, WBCSD, and ICLEI - Local Governments for Sustainability. Conferences emphasize problem solving, brainstorming, and global co-creation to inform nations about the latest technology developments from business, science, and government. Participants share knowledge, exchange information, identify bottlenecks, discuss best practices, and prioritize future research in order to set common technological trajectories for a decarbonized economy.

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Networks National & Regional Networks Spanning six continents, the SDSN Networks Program currently draws upon the knowledge and educational capacity of over 600 member institutions, most of them universities, organized around 22 National and Regional Centers. They work together to address some of the world’s most pressing problems. National and Regional SDSNs support the localization of SDGs and their implementation, develop long-term transformation pathways for sustainable development, promote education around Agenda 2030, and launch solution initiatives. Each network focuses on distinct projects and priorities, in keeping with their unique local contexts and challenges.

National SDSN

Regional SDSN

Network Host Priority SDGs

Amazonia Fundação Amazonas Sustentável, Manaus, Brazil 1, 13, 15

Andes Yachay Tech University, Urcuquí, Ecuador 2, 11, 15

Australia/ Pacific

Monash University, Melbourne, Australia 4, 7, 11

Brazil Conservation International, Federal Rural University of Rio de Janeiro, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, & Instituto Pereira Passos, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

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Caribbean University of the West Indies, Kingston, Jamaica 7, 13, 14

Germany German Development Institute / Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE), Bonn, Germany

12, 13, 17

Great Lakes

University of Rwanda, College of Business and Economics, Kigali, Rwanda

1, 2, 4

Indonesia Research Center for Climate Change Universitas, Indonesia Depok, and United in Diversity (UID), Jakarta, Indonesia

4, 12, 17

Italia FondazioneEni Enrico Mattei (FEEM), Milan, Italy 4, 7, 13

Japan Keio University, supported by the University of Tokyo and UNU-IAS, Tokyo, Japan

13, 15, 17

Malaysia Malaysia Industry-Government Group for High Technology (MIGHT), Cyberjaya, Malaysia

4, 12, 17

Mediterr-anean

University of Siena, Siena, Italy 2, 4, 13

Nigeria University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria, and Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Nigeria

1, 4, 17

Northern Europe

Centre for Environment and Sustainability, University of Gothenburg, and Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden

4, 7, 17

Philippines School of Economics, University of the Philippines, Quezon City, Philippines

6, 7, 11

Russia Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), Moscow, Russia

7, 9, 13

Sahel

Université Cheikh Anta Diop, and Millennium Promise, Dakar, Senegal

2, 4, 7

Southeast Asia

United in Diversity (UID), Jakarta, Indonesia 7, 13, 17

South Asia

TERI University, New Delhi, India, and BRAC University, Dhaka, Bangladesh

12, 13, 16

South Korea

Korea University Ojeong Eco-Resilience Center (OJERI), Seoul, Republic of Korea

5, 13, 15

Spain Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Madrid, Spain 5, 7, 11

Turkey Boğaziçi University, Istanbul, Turkey 9, 11, 13

Thematic Networks Thematic Networks support SDG advocacy and implementation at the global level in specific issue areas. Each network has one or more institutional hosts, flexible membership arrangements, and the ability to work with large groups of experts. Thematic Networks act as virtual knowledge hubs, sharing new developments in research, policy, and program development, as well as educational materials (including through the SDG Academy). They also support the National and Regional SDSNs and SDSN members on advocacy for the SDGs and operationalizing the goals in each country; often this is done through the implementation of solution initiatives. Thematic Networks cover topics such as:

• Humanitarian-Development Linkages

• Gender, Human Rights, and Social Inclusion

• Sustainable Agriculture and Food Systems

• Sustainable Cities: Inclusive, Resilient, and Connected

• Good Governance of Extractive and Land Resources

• Data for Sustainable Development

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Youth Network In 2015, the SDSN launched its youth initiative. SDSN Youth educates young people about the challenges of sustainable development and creates opportunities for them to use their creativity and knowledge to pioneer innovative solutions for the SDGs. They currently work with over 120 youth organizations in 35 countries. SDSN Youth runs an annual contest for youth solutions, publishing them in the Youth Solutions Report. Their Local Pathways Fellowship provides young people globally with the tools and resources to champion local pathways to sustainable development, as well as a platform to share experiences. The Twenty Thirty initiative uses the arts as a tool for the communication of the SDGs through the organization of events, inclusion of artists in international conferences, and the promotion of new art related to the SDGs.

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Solution Initiatives

Transformation Pathways A number of the global challenges we face are so complex and interconnected that they require a new way of thinking to understand the levers for action and therefore change. The SDSN is working on long-term transformation pathways to do just that. Broadly speaking, these initiatives take a backcasting approach, where partici-pants first define a successful future, and then work back from that future to develop a concrete, achievable pathway to get there. Specific levers for change and bottlenecks are identified, leaving policymakers and other stakeholders a blueprint for the transformation of a complex system. All of these modeling projects are brought together under the umbrella project The World in 2050, which seeks to integrate the exercises together and develop science-based, transformational, and equitable pathways to sustainable development, addressing the full array of challenges and linkages between them. Land-use choices dramatically affect sustainable develop-ment through impacts on food production, greenhouse gas emissions, biodiversity loss, freshwater use, and more. Current trends in these areas are unsustainable, and therefore the SDSN is partnering with IIASA to launch the Food, Agriculture, Biodiversity, Land, and Energy (FABLE) Project to develop shared pathways integrating food production, biodiversity, greenhouse gas emissions,

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water, and other relevant dimensions to support more sustainable and equitable land use practices. Individual country teams will work from the same model and pub-lish national pathways as part of a shared project. The Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP) prepares national low-emission development pathways consistent with limiting the rise in global temperatures to well below 2°C. National research teams based in the 16 highest emitting countries have developed nationally-relevant plans to completely transform their economies to reduce dependency on fossil fuels. Additional countries are encouraged to join the initiative. The Agricultural Transformation Pathways Initiative supports countries in choosing realistic targets congruent with the SDGs and developing technological and socio-economic roadmaps to meet those targets. Pilot case studies were completed for China, the United Kingdom, and Uruguay, and the project is currently expanding to other countries.

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Data for Sustainable Development The 2030 Agenda emphasizes the critical importance of data, statistics, and technology for the achievement of inclusive sustainable development. The ability to track progress will also be vital to ensure no one is left behind. New data sources and digital solutions are critical for modernizing national statistical offices, increasing effici-ency in service delivery, and engaging the private sector. They are also a vehicle to promote inclusive, multi-stakeholder approaches to development. The SDSN’s Data for Development Thematic Network has made critical contributions on the role of big data and technology in achieving the SDGs. One of the Network’s main accomplishments has been its leadership in the establishment of the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data (GPSDD). Through reports, issue briefs, and advising opportunities, members contribute their expertise and leadership to the SDSN network and the global sustainable development community. The Network provides catalytic grants for a range of data projects that demonstrate a pathway or confront a barrier to using data to monitor or achieve the 2030 Agenda. Cross-collaborations with SDSN member institutions provide opportunities for experts to engage in locally-defined initiatives. For example, a project for public and private data sharing in Colombia brought together SDSN, the Colombian National Initiative of Stat-istics (DANE), the Bogota Chamber of Commerce, and the Colombian think tank CEPEI.

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Cities

The majority of the world’s population lives in cities, many of them facing sustain-able development challenges such as growing inequality, air and water pollution, and lack of access to services. For this reason the SDSN strongly advocated for a stand-alone SDG on cities (convening and chairing the highly successful Urban SDG Campaign), wrote

the guide Getting Started with the SDGs in Cities, and is working with cities on long-term planning to achieve the SDGs. Building on ongoing municipal sustainable development planning efforts, the USA Sustainable Cities Initiative (USA-SCI) is supporting SDG achievement strategies in three pilot US cities: New York (New York), Baltimore (Maryland), and San Jose (California). These cities are the first to develop SDG-based city-level development strategies that may serve as a model for cities worldwide. City-university collaboration is an integral part of achieving the SDGs in American cities, and SDSN is working in partnership with leading academic institutions including Columbia University, the University of Balti-more, the University of Maryland, San Jose State Univer-sity and Stanford University, to support the technical process of developing long-term SDG-based strategies in the pilot cities.

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Launched by SDSN Brazil and GIZ, Sustainable Develop-ment of Metropolitan Regions supports key stakeholders across the Rio de Janeiro Metropolitan Area (RJMA) and other metropolitan regions throughout Brazil on possible solutions for local implementation of the SDGs, through inclusive dialogue, establishing metropolitan cooperation structures, and contextualized monitoring of the SDGs. The initiative has sparked discussions between different levels of government on how to achieve sustainable development. These discussions have explored metro-politan governance structures (both formal and informal) as a fundamental base for SDG implementation, and the localization of SDG monitoring in metropolitan regions, focusing on how to institutionalize the SDGs into existing planning frameworks, the role of civil society in mon-itoring, and the use of data and indices to monitor progress towards the SDGs.

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SDG Academy The SDG Academy provides high-quality, mass online education in the field of sustainable development. We bring together the world’s foremost experts on sustainable development – including health, education, climate change, agriculture and food systems, sustainable investment, and other related fields – to offer a comprehensive core curriculum, equipping the next generation of sustainable development practitioners to take on the complex challenges facing our planet. All course materials are available free of cost to anyone with an Internet connection! In its first three years of operations, the SDG Academy garnered over 150,000 enrollments from across 130 countries and is on track to create a full program on sustainable development by the end of 2017. The SDG Academy works closely with SDSN member institutions to offer courses that can support and supplement existing programs in sustainable develop-ment. The SDG Academy is not an educational institution and does not provide credit for the educational content that it creates. However, the SDG Academy works with university departments, programs, and faculty to explore ways that courses can be part of a blended learning environment.

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Contact info@unsdsn.org

@UNSDSN

facebook.com/UNSDSN

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