Europe Sustainable Development Report 2023-2024: European Elections, Europe’s Future and the Sustainable Development Goals

The Europe Sustainable Development Report 2023/24 (ESDR) reveals that decisive action must be taken in the European Union (EU) to avoid environmental and social “tipping points” and to maintain the promise of achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the 2030 Agenda and the objectives of the Paris Climate Agreement. The fifth edition of the ESDR, which includes the SDG Index and Dashboards, tracks progress on the SDGs of the EU, its Member States, and partner countries in Europe. The report highlights that at the current rate, a third of the SDG targets will not be achieved by the EU by 2030, with significant differences across European countries; these range from a quarter in Northern and Western Europe to around half in Southern Europe and Central and Eastern Europe on average. In particular, the report underlines stagnation and reversal in progress in many European countries on social targets with growing issues around access to and quality of services for all, as well as poverty and material deprivation driven at least partly by multiple crises since 2020. Globally, the international financial architecture is failing to channel global savings to SDG investments at the needed pace and scale which leads to a reversal in SDG progress in many parts of the world, especially in the poorest and most vulnerable countries. This year’s report provides essential contributions for the EU to strengthen its SDG leadership at home and internationally ahead of the June 2024 European elections and the Summit of the Future convened by the UN Secretary-General in September 2024.