Around halfway mark since the launch of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2023, the United Nations Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, while addressing the annual UN General Assembly session that year, indicated that only 15 percent of these 17 SDGs were on track. Launched in 2015, and backed by all 193 members of the United Nations, this revelation was indeed shocking to say the least, especially these SDGs cover some of the most important challenges facing humanity – from poverty, and disease to climate change. Highlighting the seriously poor performance with regard to meeting SDGs related targets, Antonio Guterres emphasized in his address in 2023 that ‘Excellencies, the SDGs need a global rescue plan.’
Two years on, not much progress has been made, even though back in 2023 at the UN General Assembly’s annual session, all the members had re-affirmed their backing of the SDGs. Speaking recently at the launch of Sustainable Development Report [SDR] 2025, UN’s secretary-general indicated that while some progress has been made with regard to meeting SDGs-related targets overall, but progress remains significantly below what is required and, therefore, much-improved effort in this regard is needed globally. He pointed out in this regard: ‘These gains show that investments in development and inclusion yield results.
But let’s be clear, we are not where, we need to be. Only 35 percent SDG targets are on track, or making moderate progress. Nearly half are moving too slowly, and 18 percent are going in reverse. We are in a global development emergency. An emergency measured in over 800 million still living in extreme poverty. In intensifying climate impacts, and in relentless debt service, draining the resources that countries need to invest in their people.’
This lack of progress also shows how much the world has lagged in coming true on its otherwise strong commitment that it made overall during the heydays of the Covid-19 pandemic to move towards a ‘new normal’ whereby effectively improving globally both with regard to adequate provision of multilateral finance, and global financial infrastructure, which included improving the governance structure of multilateral institutions like International Monetary Fund (IMF), and World Bank.
Painting a rather very show in terms of progress towards meeting SDGs by 2030, the SDR 2025 pointed out that ‘Based on the rate of progress since they were adopted by the international community in 2015, none of the17 SDGs will be achieved by 2030... At the global level, SDG 2 (Zero Hunger), SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities), SDG 14 (Life Below Water), SDG 15 (Life on Land) and SDG 16 (Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions) are particularly off track, facing major challenges… and showing no or very limited progress since 2015.’
Here, while developing countries need to improve with regard better prioritization of development expenditures and economic institutional quality in their effort towards meeting SDGs, the main responsibility lies with developed countries, especially the G-7 countries.
The much-anticipated ‘4th International Conference on Financing for Development’ (FfD4) that was recently held in Sevilla, Spain, fell significantly short of coming up with concrete and deep commitments to deal with some of the main challenges in the way of successfully meeting SDGs by the set target of 2030 like provision of adequate level of finance – where recent estimates indicate that around $1.4 trillion is needed annually for meeting SDGs in terms of finance, while what is being arranged is much lower – and effectively dealing with serious debt distress facing a number of developing countries.
With regard to the lopsided governance structure of IMF, for instance, the SDR 2025 pointed out: ‘The IMF and many other multilateral financial institutions also need to reform their governance to give due weight to developing countries. To take one example, the IMF currently allocates only 17 percent of voting power to the 10 BRICS countries, even though these countries account for 27 percent of global output measured at market prices, 39 percent of global output measured at purchasing-power prices, and 46 percent of the world’s population.’
Moreover, a July 10, ‘Center for Global Development’ published article ‘The Seville Commitment: another blast of hot air’ pointed out in this regard: ‘In terms of follow up, the [Sevilla Commitment] document “invites countries to report on progress,” and commits to “deepen substantive discussions” on financing for development — not processes that will hold governments’ feet to the fire. I have shared similar criticisms of these declarations before… but my concerns regarding the Sevilla Commitment go beyond issues of accountability.
First, the context for development finance has become much bleaker…ODA [Official Development Assistance] is expected to decline in 2025 by up to 17 percent, after falling 7 percent in 2024, thanks largely due to draconian cuts to the US assistance budget. The majority of developing countries are dealing with crippling debt burdens, crowding out vital spending on health and education, with limited relief on the horizon.’
With regard to the specific performance of Pakistan, there is a serious concern with regard to lack of progress, which is due both to lack of proper prioritization of development expenditures towards these goals, but more so most likely it is due to lack of provision of multilateral finance, and wrongly adopting pro-cyclical, and over-board austerity policies.
As per the SDR 2025, out of a total of 167 countries ranked, while Finland with a score of 87 points was at the top position as per ‘The 2025 SDG Index Ranks and Scores’, Pakistan with 57 points stood at 140th position, which was worse than some of the other countries in the region — for instance, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh stood at 93rd, and 114th positions, respectively.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
The writer holds a PhD in Economics degree from the University of Barcelona, and has previously worked at the International Monetary Fund. His contact on ‘X’ (formerly ‘Twitter’) is @omerjaved7