SAJC Cluster 1 Lecture 2 Notes (Sustainable Development; Measuring Progress)

St Andrew’s Junior College H2 Cluster 1: Development, Economy and Environment (Topic 1.1) H2_Cluster 1_Lecture 2_2024/pg 1 Lecture 2 Sustainable Development (II): Measuring Progress KEY QUESTION: How do we know that there is progress towards sustainable development? With the completion of this lecture, attached readings and tutorial, you should be able to understand: - ways to progress towards sustainable development as defined by the SDGs - use of quantitative targets and indicators in the SDGs to measure progress - the difficulty of measuring progress towards sustainable development using quantitative indicators in the SDGs due to the lack of capacity of some countries to collect data Lecture Outline 2.1 Monitoring Development Using the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Box 1: The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2.2 Economic Growth 2.2.1 Examples of Indicators (a) Economic growth: Gross Domestic Product (b) Poverty: International Poverty Line 2.2.2 Ways to Progress towards Economic Growth 2.3 Social Inclusion 2.3.1 Examples of Indicators (a) Health: Child Mortality Rate (b) Education: Completion rate (pre-primary, primary and secondary) 2.3.2 Ways to Progress towards Social Inclusion 2.4 Environmental Protection 2.4.1 Examples of Indicators (a) Combating climate change: Greenhouse gas emissions (b) Forest conservation: Forested Area as a Proportion of Total Land Area 2.4.2 Ways to progress towards Environmental Protection 2.5 The difficulty of measuring the progress towards sustainable development 2.6 Concluding remarks Readings: (1) Sustainable Development Goals: Selected targets and indicators (2) The challenges of measuring progress on SDG 11 (3) Cartoon series on the SDGs (please obtain from shared folder) In September 2015, the United Nations formally put forward a set of 17 goals (comprising 169 targets and 231 indicators) to help stimulate global action to move the world towards sustainable development for the period 2016-2030. These SDGs share the overarching purpose to end extreme poverty in all its forms in the context of sustainable development and to have in place building blocks of sustained prosperity for all.

St Andrew’s Junior College H2 Cluster 1: Development, Economy and Environment (Topic 1.1) H2_Cluster 1_Lecture 2_2024/pg 2 2.1 Monitoring Development using the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) • With increasing research that is going into sustainable development, this spurred the global sustainable development agenda, resulting in the United Nations to develop and launch the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015. The goals aim to end poverty, reduce inequality and build more peaceful and prosperous societies by 2030, so as to create a world where no one is left behind. • The SDGs are a series of 17 Sustainable Development Goals (see Box 1), each one including several targets and indicators. In total, there are 169 targets and 231 indicators. Targets specify the goals, and indicators represent the metrics by which to track whether targets are achieved. • The SDGs address poverty in all nations (developed and developing). Since eradicating poverty is at the heart of the goals, there must be a universal and comprehensive push to find an agenda that speaks to all countries and all levels of economic development, to ensure that no one is left behind. • Eradicating extreme poverty lies at the heart of the SDGs. While each of the 17 proposed goals has its own agenda, they collectively address the many facets that complicated global poverty as political and environmental landscapes continue to change. • SDGs are integrated and indivisible and balance the three dimensions of sustainable development: the economic, social and environmental. • While ambitious, well-intended and in fact necessary for some, the SDGs have their share of criticisms. We cover some of these concerns in Section 2.5. • The large number of indicators is considered necessary to fulfill the criteria of being useful in a management context and for the purpose of evaluating the overall success in achieving sustainable development. In this section, we select only 6 indicators (out of 231). • See the relationship between its goals, examples of targets and indicators in Reading 1, classified by the broad dimensions of economy, society and environment. Box 1: The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) The SDGs were formally adopted at the General Assembly of the United Nations held in New York on 25-27 September 2015. The SDGs consist of 17 overarching goals, each to be achieved by 2030.

St Andrew’s Junior College H2 Cluster 1: Development, Economy and Environment (Topic 1.1) H2_Cluster 1_Lecture 2_2024/pg 3 Cont’d from Pg 2  Goal 1. End poverty in all its forms everywhere  Goal 2. End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture  Goal 3. Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages  Goal 4. Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all  Goal 5. Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls  Goal 6. Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all  Goal 7. Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all  Goal 8. Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all  Goal 9. Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation  Goal 10. Reduce inequality within and among countries  Goal 11. Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable  Goal 12. Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns  Goal 13. Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts  Goal 14. Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development  Goal 15. Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss  Goal 16. Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels  Goal 17. Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development You are not required to commit to memory all of the above. More important to do is to gain an overall awareness of the scope of these SDGs. There are some selected SDGs of stronger relevance to the syllabus however, and we cover these in subsequent sections of this lecture as well as other lectures. 2.2 Economic Growth • Various goals and indicators focus on the need for sustainable economic growth, consumption and production, and the need to decouple these activities from natural resource use and environmental degradation. 2.2.1 Examples of Indicators (a) Economic growth: Gross Domestic Product [Used in SDG 8] • The traditional indicator of a country’s wealth has been the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The GDP is the total value of final goods and services produced in a particular economy in a year. • GDP is a convenient and standardised metric that served an important role in evaluating economic growth and a country’s production capacity. Therefore, GDP is similarly used as a proxy for average standard of living for Goal 8 of the SDG (refer to Reading 1 Target 8.1; in the least developed countries, the SDG target aims for at least 7% real GDP growth per year).

St Andrew’s Junior College H2 Cluster 1: Development, Economy and Environment (Topic 1.1) H2_Cluster 1_Lecture 2_2024/pg 4 • There are several ways of calculating GDP. The most straightforward is to a