What is Goal Number Seven?
The UN document "Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development” (hereinafter Agenda-2030) contains 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Goal N7 is formulated as follows: "Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all".
Behind this goal there are five targets and six indicators to track the progress.
Which targets and indicators stay behind the Goal N7?
What is sustainable development?
The concept of sustainable development began to form in the 1970s. According to available estimates, by the early 1990s, there were about 60 definitions of sustainable development, by 1995 - more than 350, by 2002 - over 500. Currently, only economic scientific literature has more than 100 approaches to define sustainable development.
Until now, the 1987 definition of the World Commission on Environment and Development (Brundtland Commission) remains one of the most popular: "Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability
of future generations to meet their own needs". However, this definition has a clear intergenerational emphasis and ignores many aspects of sustainable development, in particular, social ones.
According to the 8th UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, the concept of sustainable development allows "to generate economic growth, achieve social justice, exercise environmental stewardship and strengthen governance". This can be considered as a modern definition of sustainable development.
Thus, nowadays sustainable development shall be defined as economic growth that does not exacerbate social problems and increase social tension, as well as does not lead to environmental degradation and decline in the quality of governance. In other words, sustainable development implies a balance between economic, social and environmental development that is impossible without good governance.
What are SDGs and Agenda-2030?
Sustainable development goals are a global development plan aimed at achieving universal social justice, preventing environmental degradation, ensuring well-being (including economic well-being) for all. The 17 SDGs and 169 targets were adopted by 193 UN member countries on 25 September 2015 as part of the document "Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development” (Agenda-2030). In fact, this document is a plan that can solve absolutely all global problems.
In 2017, the Inter-Agency and Expert Group on SDG Indicators (IAEG-SDGs) introduced the global SDG indicator framework.
Now the total number of indicators is 244, the number of original indicators is 232 (originally – 241 and 230); 9 indicators repeat in two or three different targets.
All SDG indicators are classified into three tiers depending on their methodological development and data availability:
1) Tier 1: Indicator is conceptually developed and has an established methodology, data are regularly produced by most countries;
2) Tier 2: Indicator is conceptually developed and has an established methodology, but data are not regularly produced by most countries;
3) Tier 3: Indicator is not conceptually developed.
As of May 2018, 93 indicators belonged to Tier I, 72 indicators – to Tier II and 62 indicators – to Tier III. The rest 5 indicators had multiple tiers.