IB Economics Sustainable Development Goals

Five Years Left: How Close Is the World to Meeting the Sustainable Development Goals?

Target Question:

What progress has been made towards the Sustainable Development Goals in different countries?

Secondary target question:

Are the SDGs on track to be achieved by 2030?

What are the Sustainable Development Goals and how is the world performing?

The World's Most Important Report Card

In September 2015, world leaders gathered at the United Nations and made a promise.

193 countries, together, agreed on 17 goals that would transform the world by 2030. They called them the Sustainable Development Goals, or SDGs. No more extreme poverty. Zero hunger. Quality education for every child. Gender equality. Clean water. Climate action.

Fast-forward ten years to 2025 - exactly halfway between the promise and the deadline - and the world's annual progress check has been published. What is the exact situation regarding SDGs?

Of the 169 SDG targets that can actually be measured, only 17 per cent are on track to be achieved by 2030. Not a single one of the 17 goals is currently on course globally. That means about 83 per cent of the world's most important development commitments are either moving too slowly, standing still, or actually going backwards.

The world is seriously behind on its homework.

Some countries are forging ahead. Others are falling further behind. And the reasons why some succeed while others struggle come down to everything we've studied in the last two blog posts: governance, strategies, resources, and institutions.

Let's take a tour through the goals, see where the world stands, and compare how different countries are managing.

What Are the SDGs?

The Sustainable Development Goals:

Are 17 interconnected global targets adopted by 193 UN member states in 2015 as part of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

They build on the earlier Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and cover everything relevant from poverty and hunger to climate change, gender equality, and peace.

Unlike previous international frameworks, the SDGs apply to every country - not just developing ones. Rich nations have homework to do too, and in some areas (carbon emissions, consumption patterns, financial flows to developing countries), they're among the worst offenders.

Each SDG has specific, measurable targets. Which means, for the first time in history, we can actually track the world's progress against a shared scorecard - and be ruthlessly honest about how we're doing.

The Global Scorecard: Where We Are in 2025

Here's the broad picture, based on the 2025 Sustainable Development Report - the most comprehensive annual assessment of SDG progress covering all 193 UN member states:

Only 17% of SDG targets are on track globally (2025 SDG Report). Not a single one of the 17 goals is currently on course worldwide.

The good news:

• More than half the world's population now has some form of social protection, up by 10 percentage points compared to a decade ago

• Child and maternal mortality rates have fallen significantly

• More young people - especially girls - are completing secondary school

• Women now hold 27% of parliamentary seats worldwide, up from 22% in 2015

• Access to electricity and clean cooking has expanded in developing countries

• Internet connectivity has increased by 70%, opening economic opportunities

The not so good news:

• None of the 17 goals are on track globally

• Progress has been essentially stagnant since 2020 - the COVID-19 pandemic set back years of gains

• Goals on hunger (SDG 2), life below water (SDG 14), life on land (SDG 15), and peace and institutions (SDG 16) are particularly off-track

• Roughly half the world's population lives in countries that cannot invest adequately in sustainable development due to debt burdens

• Official Development Assistance (ODA) is declining, with only a handful of countries meeting the UN's 0.7% GNI target

Now let's look at the individual goals, and what's really happening on the ground.

Goal 1: No Poverty

The aim: Eradicate extreme poverty (living on less than $2.15 a day) by 2030.

The reality: Before COVID-19, the world was making steady progress. The pandemic reversed about a decade of gains virtually overnight. Projections now suggest that by 2030, around 6% of the global population will still experience extreme poverty. Southern Asia and sub-Saharan Africa are expected to face the sharpest increases, with an estimated 32 million and 26 million people respectively falling below the international poverty line as a result of the pandemic's aftershocks.

Country contrast - India vs sub-Saharan Africa:

India's progress on SDG 1 is genuinely impressive. According to the latest SDG India Index,

Approximately 248 million people in India moved out of multidimensional poverty between 2013 and 2022.

One of the largest poverty reduction achievements in human history. India's multidimensional poverty rate likely fell to 11.28% by 2022-23, down from nearly 25% in 2015. Social protection coverage rose from just 22% of the population in 2016 to 64.3% in 2025.

India's SDG 1 score moved from the "Performer" to the "Front Runner" category:

India's SDG composite score rose to 71/100 in 2023-24, up from 57 at the 2018 baseline.

Sub-Saharan Africa tells a different story.

Sub-Saharan Africa faces the widest gap from the world average SDG Index, and this gap has widened since 2015.

Despite impressive growth rates in individual countries like Ethiopia and Rwanda, the region as a whole is projected to account for the majority of the world's remaining extreme poor by 2030. Rapid population growth, conflict, climate vulnerability, and limited fiscal room to re-invest mean that progress on poverty reduction simply hasn't been fast enough.

Goal 2: Zero Hunger

The aim: End hunger and ensure everyone has access to safe, nutritious food by 2030.

The reality: This is one of the SDGs moving most sharply in the wrong direction. In 2019, nearly 690 million people faced undernourishment - a figure that had already been rising since 2014. The COVID-19 pandemic, Russia's invasion of Ukraine (which disrupted global grain and fertiliser supplies), and the escalating impacts of climate change on agricultural output have all made this worse.

Particularly alarming: obesity is rising globally (including in middle-income countries), while hunger persists among the poorest. The world is increasingly facing the paradox of a malnutrition crisis at both ends - not enough food for some, too much of the wrong food for others. Both represent food system failure.

According to the 2024 SDG Report, SDG 2 is among the most off-track goals globally, with 600 million people projected to still suffer from hunger in 2030.

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Goal 3: Good Health and Well-being

The aim: Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all ages.

The reality: Genuine, hard-won progress - then a setback. Before COVID-19, the world had made remarkable gains in reducing maternal and child mortality, increasing life expectancy, and fighting infectious diseases like malaria, HIV/AIDS, and tuberculosis. Then the pandemic arrived, strained healthcare systems globally, reversed gains in life expectancy, and disrupted vaccination programmes that had been running for decades.

The 2025 SDG Report notes that under-5 mortality rates and neonatal mortality are among the SDG targets showing the most consistent positive progress - suggesting that even during the pandemic, some of the foundational investments in child health have maintained their efficiency.

Rwanda again stands out here. It achieved a two-thirds drop in infant mortality over 30 years, largely through sustained government investment in community health workers, vaccination programmes, and primary healthcare infrastructure - much of it funded through a combination of domestic revenue, foreign aid, and NGO support.

The UK - for all its obvious advantages - saw NHS waiting lists reach record highs in 2023-24, with millions waiting over a year for treatment. Even wealthy countries with efficient institutions, can struggle with SDG 3 when healthcare systems are under-resourced relative to demand.

Goal 4: Quality Education

The aim: Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education for all by 2030.

The reality: Before the pandemic, 258 million children were projected to remain out of school by 2030, with only 60% expected to complete upper secondary education. COVID-19 then caused the largest disruption to education in recorded history - at its peak, over 1.5 billion children were kept out of classrooms simultaneously.

There are significant disparities globally in this front. Sub-Saharan Africa and central and southern Asia remain the regions with the greatest gaps in educational access and quality. Girls in many ELDCs face additional barriers: early marriage, domestic responsibilities, gender-based violence, and social norms that deprioritise female education.

However, not everything is bad news. India's education data shows significant improvements - front-runner districts for SDG 4 have more than doubled in recent years. And digital technology is creating new access routes: online learning platforms, educational apps, and mobile connectivity are reaching students who previously had no access to quality teaching. So, what is the main issue? A massive digital divide still exists - students without smartphones or reliable internet access are being left behind.

Goal 5: Gender Equality

The aim: Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls.

The reality: Progress exists, but it's painfully slow and unevenly distributed. Fewer girls are being forced into early marriage. More women are holding parliamentary and leadership roles (women now hold 27% of parliamentary seats globally). Legal protection against discrimination is more widespread globally.

But structural inequalities remain. Women and girls still perform the vast majority of the world's unpaid care and domestic work - cooking, cleaning, childcare, caring for elderly relatives. This invisible labour keeps women out of paid employment, limits their income and financial independence, and constrains their economic empowerment.

Finland:

Finland ranks 1st in the 2025 SDG Index (86.4/100). 19 of the top 20 SDG-performing countries are in Europe.

Finland Consistently performs near the top on gender equality indicators. Nordic countries have generous parental leave policies for both parents, strong childcare infrastructure, and actively legislated pay transparency. The result is that gender equality there, while not perfect, is structurally supported rather than left to cultural change alone.

By contrast, in many ELDCs where cultural and historical factors result in women lacking equal opportunities compared to men, SDG 5 progress remains among the slowest of all the goals. Rwanda is again a notable exception: its parliament is over 60% female - the highest proportion in the world - and women's economic empowerment has been a central pillar of national policy.

Goal 6: Clean Water and Sanitation

The aim: Ensure availability and sustainable management of clean water and sanitation by 2030.

The reality: Billions of people still lack access to safe drinking water and adequate sanitation - particularly in rural regions. Rivers across Africa, Asia, and Latin America are now more polluted than they were in the 1990s. Over the past century, the world has lost an estimated 50 to 70 per cent of its natural wetlands. Plastic waste found in rivers and oceans continues to accelerate.

The human cost certainly is considerable. As mentioned in the growth strategies post (check it out if you missed it): inadequate sanitation kills approximately 280,000 people a year - that's 32 lives every hour. The UN noted in 2018 that more people on Earth had a mobile phone than access to a flush toilet.

SDG 6 is one of the goals where the gap between low-income and high-income countries is considerable. In Finland, safe drinking water and sanitation are so thoroughly taken for granted that they barely register as development issues. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, or Haiti, it becomes a matter of life and death.

Goal 7: Affordable and Clean Energy

The aim: Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy for all.

The reality: Genuinely mixed, but with real progress. Access to electricity in developing countries is increasing. Renewable energy's share of global electricity generation is rising. Energy efficiency is improving across many sectors.

India is a great example here. The share of renewable energy in total installed electricity generation rose from 16% in 2015-16 to 43.3% in 2024. This is one of the greatest renewable energy transitions in the world - driven by massive government investment in solar capacity, a favourable geography, and supportive policy frameworks. India's SDG 13 (Climate Action) score recorded the highest improvement of any goal in the latest index.

On a different note, approximately 1.3 billion people still lack reliable electricity access, overwhelmingly concentrated in sub-Saharan Africa and parts of South Asia. Without electricity, economic development is severely constrained - businesses can't operate, students can't study after dark, healthcare facilities can't refrigerate medicines or power equipment.

Goal 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth

The aim: Promote inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full employment, and decent work.

The reality: Pre-pandemic, many ELDCs were recording strong growth and rising labour productivity. Then COVID-19 triggered the largest global increase in unemployment since World War II - the US alone recorded 44.2 million unemployed in July 2020.

The deeper challenge with SDG 8 is that economic growth doesn't automatically translate into decent work. Many fast-growing economies create jobs predominantly in low-wage, informal sectors without labour protection, social security, or safe working conditions. The quality of employment here is as relevant as the quantity - and measuring that requires far more data collection than just a simple unemployment rate.

Goal 10: Reduced Inequalities

The aim: Reduce inequalities within and between countries.

The reality: Income inequality has been rising globally, despite income growth among the poorest in many countries. COVID-19 dramatically widened disparities, hitting the most vulnerable the hardest - those without savings, those in informal work, those without internet access for remote working or learning.

The dual economy problem we discussed in the previous blog entry is central here. Market-led growth tends to concentrate gains at the top. Without deliberate redistribution policies - progressive taxation, transfer payments, investment in public services - growth can actually worsen inequality even as average incomes rise.

Goal 13: Climate Action

The aim: Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts.

The reality: The UNDP calls climate change "the defining issue of our time and the greatest challenge to sustainable development." Scientific research is clear: global temperatures continue to rise, extreme weather events are intensifying, and the window for limiting warming to 1.5°C is rapidly closing.

In early 2025, the United States announced its withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement - for the second time - and formally declared its opposition to the SDGs and the 2030 Agenda. As the world's second-largest emitter and historically the largest cumulative emitter of greenhouse gases, US climate policy has outstanding impact on global progress.

Meanwhile, the EU and Nordic countries continue to lead on climate commitments. Finland, Sweden, and Denmark - the top three in the 2025 SDG Index - all face their most significant challenges on climate and biodiversity goals, despite being among the world's best performers overall. Even the richest, most sustainable countries in the world are struggling to decarbonise fast enough.

Goal 17: Partnerships for the Goals

The aim: Strengthen global partnerships and the means of implementation.

The reality: International cooperation is under serious strain. ODA flows are declining - only a handful of countries (including Norway, Luxembourg, and Sweden) consistently meet the 0.7% GNI target. The digital divide remains huge. And multilateralism itself - the principle that international problems require international solutions - is facing its most significant political challenge in decades, with major powers increasingly pursuing unilateral approaches.

Having said that, there are some positive signals. Internet access has expanded rapidly, particularly through mobile networks. Mobile banking in ELDCs has created new economic opportunities (see the M-Pesa example in the economic growth strategies post). And the 2025 Sustainable Development Report notes that at the September 2024 UN Summit of the Future, member states reaffirmed their commitment to the SDGs - though commitments and actions are very different things.

The Country Comparison: Finland vs India vs Sub-Saharan Africa

The IB Economics syllabus asks you to evaluate SDG progress in the context of two or more countries. Here's a ready-made framework using three genuinely contrasting cases:

🇫🇮 Finland: Top of the Class, But Not Without Homework

Finland ranks 1st in the 2025 SDG Index (scoring 86.4/100), with Sweden (#2) and Denmark (#3) completing a Nordic clean sweep of the top positions. 19 of the top 20 countries in the Index are European.

What makes Finland so successful? Strong institutions, universal public services, high investment in education and healthcare, robust gender equality policies, and consistent good governance over decades. SDG progress in the Nordic model essentially originates from the design of their welfare state.

But even Finland faces "significant challenges" on climate and biodiversity goals, according to the 2025 report. Finland is a high-consumption, high-carbon economy comparing with global averages, and transitioning an advanced industrial economy to net-zero consumption is extremely difficult. The SDG Index also includes a "spill over index" measuring the negative impacts wealthy nations export to poorer ones - through supply chains, financial flows, and carbon emissions - and here, rich countries don't come off well.

The IB Economics lesson from Finland: good governance and strong institutions make SDG progress possible. But wealth doesn't automatically solve everything, and rich countries can't wash their hands of responsibility when it comes to global development.

🇮🇳 India: The Fastest-Improving Large Economy

India ranks 99th in the 2025 SDG Index (entering the top 100 for the first time), with an overall SDG composite score of 71/100 in 2023-24, up from 57 in 2018. The improvement pace is one of the fastest of any large economy.

Notable achievements:

• 248 million people moved out of multidimensional poverty between 2013 and 2022

• Social protection coverage rose from 22% to 64.3% of the population (2016–2025)

• Renewable energy share of electricity generation hit 43.3% in 2024

• SDG 13 (Climate Action) score jumped from 54 to 67 in three years

• Maternal and child health indicators have improved significantly

Persistent challenges:

• SDG 2 (Zero Hunger) and SDG 5 (Gender Equality) remain among the weakest areas

• Massive regional disparities - states like Kerala and Tamil Nadu perform near developed-country levels, while Bihar and Jharkhand lag far behind

• 1.4 billion people means even a modest percentage of struggling households translates into hundreds of millions of individuals in need

India's story is a powerful example of what deliberate, large-scale government intervention - combined with market-driven growth - can achieve. It's also a reminder that national averages hide enormous variation in between regions.

Sub-Saharan Africa: Most At Risk of Missing 2030

Sub-Saharan Africa as a region is the area of greatest concern in the 2030 Agenda. The gap between the world average SDG Index score and the performance of the poorest and most vulnerable countries - many of them in this region - has actually widened since 2015.

Key challenges:

• Conflict and political instability make policy implementation near-impossible in many countries

• Limited fiscal space: enormous debt burdens mean governments can't invest in development even when they want to

• Climate vulnerability: the region that has contributed least to global carbon emissions faces its most devastating consequences - droughts, floods, desertification

• Youth unemployment and rapidly growing populations create enormous pressure on labour markets and public services

• ODA cuts from donor countries are hitting the region hardest

There are success stories within the region - Rwanda, Ethiopia, Benin, and Côte d'Ivoire are all highlighted in the 2025 SDR as countries making faster-than-average progress. But the structural challenges facing sub-Saharan Africa as a whole are immense, and the 2030 deadline is looking increasingly unrealistic for most SDG targets in the region.

Why Does Progress Vary So Drastically?

The 2025 SDG Report identifies several key factors that explain why some countries progress faster than others:

1. Starting baseline: Countries that began from a lower starting point in 2015 often show faster headline progress, because improvements from a low base are relatively easier. India's dramatic SDG score improvement reflects in part this idea.

2. Fiscal space: Roughly half the world's population lives in countries that simply don't have the financial resources to invest adequately in sustainable development. Debt burdens crowd out social spending. This is why debt relief (mentioned in the strategies post) is almost a prerequisite for SDG progress in many countries.

3. Governance quality: Surprise surprise - good governance, functioning institutions, and the rule of law appear again as decisive factors. Countries with stronger institutions translate investment into outcomes more efficiently.

4. Conflict and fragility: Countries affected by war, civil conflict, or extreme political instability are essentially unable to make SDG progress regardless of external support. The data is stark: conflict-affected states account for a disproportionate share of global poverty, hunger, and human rights violations.

5. Climate vulnerability: Countries least responsible for climate change are often most vulnerable to its impacts - droughts destroying harvests, flooding displacing communities, extreme heat limiting outdoor work. Climate change is actively undoing SDG progress in some of the world's most vulnerable countries.

The 2030 Deadline: Can We Still Make It?

For most targets, in most countries, no - not if current development carries on the way it is.

But that doesn't mean the SDGs have failed. Even imperfect progress is progress. Hundreds of millions of people have better access to healthcare, education, and clean water than they did in 2015. Child mortality has fallen. Girls are staying in school longer. Renewable energy is spreading. Mobile banking is reaching the previously unbanked.

The SDGs work best not as a deadline to pass or fail, but as a direction of travel - a shared framework that keeps the world's attention on the things that actually matter for human development: people's health, dignity, opportunity, and relationship with the planet.

When you write an essay about strategies for economic growth and development, you can anchor your arguments in specific SDG targets and use country-level progress data as your evidence.

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IB Economics Exam Tip: The Two Countries Requirement

The IB Economics syllabus specifically asks you to "discuss and evaluate progress towards achieving selected SDGs in the context of two or more countries." This is AO3 - your evaluation skills.

Here's how to structure a strong response:

1. Choose two countries with genuinely different SDG profiles (e.g. Finland + India, or an ELDC vs MEDC)

2. Select 3–4 specific SDGs where you can make concrete comparisons using data

3. Explain the reasons why one country has progressed faster or slower than the other

4. Evaluate the limitations of progress even in the "successful" country

5. Reach a conclusion about what the comparison tells us about the conditions needed for SDG achievement

Don't just describe progress - that's AO1. Think critically and Evaluate it: why has it happened, what's getting in the way, and what would need to change to accelerate it?

Use specific data whenever possible - examiners reward precise, up-to-date real-world evidence.

Missed the earlier posts in this series? Go back and read the economic growth strategy guides - the SDGs connect directly to everything covered there, from foreign aid and FDI to institutional change and merit goods.

Frequently Asked Questions: Sustainable Development Goals in IB Economics

Q1: Are the Sustainable Development Goals on track to be achieved by 2030? No. According to the 2025 SDG Report, none of the 17 goals are currently on track globally. Only 17% of the 169 measurable SDG targets show adequate progress. SDG progress has been largely stagnant since 2020, with the COVID-19 pandemic, rising conflicts, and climate change reversing years of gains in many areas. However, progress is highly uneven - some countries and some goals have advanced significantly, even if the global average is concerning.

Q2: Which countries are making the most progress on the SDGs? Nordic countries - particularly Finland (#1), Sweden (#2), and Denmark (#3) - top the 2025 SDG Index. 19 of the top 20 countries are in Europe. Among developing economies, East and South Asia have made the fastest average SDG progress since 2015. India entered the top 100 of the SDG Index in 2025 for the first time, with its composite score rising from 57 in 2018 to 71 in 2023-24, driven by significant gains in poverty reduction, healthcare, climate action, and clean energy.

Q3: Which SDGs are furthest off-track? SDG 2 (Zero Hunger), SDG 14 (Life Below Water), SDG 15 (Life on Land), and SDG 16 (Peace, Justice, and Strong Institutions) are among the goals furthest off-track globally. The five SDG targets with the most widespread regression since 2015 include obesity rates, press freedom, biodiversity loss, sustainable nitrogen management, and life expectancy (due largely to COVID-19). SDG 13 (Climate Action) is structurally challenged by the continued burning of fossil fuels and the withdrawal of major emitters from international climate agreements.

Q4: Why is sub-Saharan Africa falling behind on the SDGs? Sub-Saharan Africa faces a combination of structural barriers: limited fiscal space due to debt burdens, high climate vulnerability, ongoing conflict in multiple countries, rapid population growth outpacing service delivery, and declining ODA from wealthy donor nations. The gap between sub-Saharan Africa's SDG performance and the world average has actually widened since 2015. Success stories exist within the region (Rwanda, Ethiopia, Benin), but systemic transformation requires both domestic reform and fundamentally reformed international financial support.

Q5: How can students evaluate SDG progress in IB Economics essays? For IB Economics (AO3 evaluation), the key is to compare two or more countries on specific SDGs, explain the reasons for different rates of progress (governance quality, fiscal space, conflict, institutions, starting baseline), and reach a justified conclusion. Strong essays use specific data points from the SDG Index or UN Reports, link SDG progress back to economic development strategies, and acknowledge that even "successful" countries face challenges. The IB Economics specification requires students to discuss progress in "the context of two or more countries" - country-specific evidence is essential.

Stay well,

Related Topics:

IB Economics Hub Page your IB Economics daily guide

IB Economics The Global Economy Hub Page access Sustainable Development, Sustainable development goals and Economic Development here as well as the rest of the module 4

IB Economics Activity book Page Module 4 The Global Economy Units 4.9 to 4.12 for Sustainable Development, Measuring Economic Development, Barriers to Economic Development and Strategies for economic development exam practice, activities, model answers and IB Economics Marking schemes

IB Economics Why Market Failure Happens Page → to revise notions of market failure / merit goods that may support the blog entry

IB Economics Diagrams Page Check Units 29 and 30 for All Measuring Economic Development and Barriers to Growth and/or Economic Development diagrams with explanations. Check Unit 12 for positive externalities…market failure diagram → to understand the market failure / merit goods part of the blog entry.

IB Economics Corruption Page → to expand on climate change initiatives and why some of them fail

IB Economics Paper 1 Hub Page as this topic usually appears in IB Economics Paper 1

IB Economics Paper 3 Hub Page, usually you will find some economic development questions in this paper

Read Next: IB Economics The Impact of Inflation Page

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