According to a brief summary of the UN SDGs (https://sdgs.un.org/goals), “The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by all United Nations Member States in 2015, provides a shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and into the future. At its heart are the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which are an urgent call for action by all countries - developed and developing - in a global partnership. They recognize that ending poverty and other deprivations must go hand-in-hand with strategies that improve health and education, reduce inequality, and spur economic growth – all while tackling climate change and working to preserve our oceans and forest.”

Unfortunately, there is no update to 2023 of Ukraine’s SDG progress due to the ongoing war situation. However, a legitimate means of approximately indicating the environmental conditions in Ukraine prior to the Russian invasion of 2022 is to review the country’s progress in meeting the targets set for it to comply with the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The 17 SDGs are listed below, with the green-shaded SDGs being the most relevant to sustainable environmental planning.

1. No poverty

2. Zero hunger

3. Good health and well-being

4. Quality Education

5. Gender equality

6. Clean water and sanitation  

7. Affordable and clean energy

8. Decent work and economic growth

9. Industry, innovation and infrastructure

10. Reduced inequalities  

11. Sustainable cities and communities  

12. Responsible consumption and production

13. Climate action

14. Life below water

15. Life on land

16. Peace, justice, and strengthening institutions

17. Partnerships for the goals

As the above list indicates, all of the SDGs are relevant to urban and territorial planning as such planning is very broad in scope and crosscuts virtually all sustainable development. SDG 11, Sustainable Cities and Communities is notable for its focus on urban and territorial planning. Table 1 below lists the individual targets and indicators for SDG 11. Half of the SDGs relate to environmental sustainability planning in particular. 

According to the report, “UN Sustainable Development Report 2023: Implementing the SDG Stimulus, Includes the SDG Index and Dashboards”, Ukraine “is moderately improving” in achieving its targets for SDGs 6, 7, 9, 12, and 15, while it is “stagnating” relative to progress achieving SDGs 11, 13 and 14. The report notes that “The data for Ukraine correspond to the situation before February 2022. Since February 2022 many data points could not be updated for Ukraine.” As described in the following section on the impacts of the war on Ukraine’s environment, the trend toward compliance with many of the SDGs has undoubtedly worsened. Exhibit 1 below provides the Ukraine SDGs data summary, covering all targets of all SDGs, from the UN 2023 SDGs report.

A great number of projects relating to achieving SDGs in Ukraine have been funded and undertaken by UNDP, other UN agencies, and its international development partner organizations. These have been listed and described briefly in Appendix A. Over 50 projects involve achieving one or more of the several SDG 11 targets. Expenditures for the eight environmentally related SDGs total over USD 86 million for the period 2018-2022, resulting in an average of over $2 million per year for each of those SDGs. It is noteworthy that funding for SDG: 15 Life on Land decreased dramatically over the last year of that period; funding for SDG 6: Clean Water decreased dramatically over the last 2 years; and there was no funding at all during the 5 years for SDG 14: Life under the Water. 

It is unclear how much of the allocated funds have been spent or how many of the projects are still functioning during the war. Further, the SDGs information is provided only at the national level of Ukraine, whereas the aim of these guidelines is at the urban and territorial level.

References

Sustainable Development Goals Ukraine Monitoring Report. State Statistics Service of Ukraine

(SSSU), UNICEF, UN RCO. (2020).   https://www.unicef.org/ukraine/media/11501/file/SDG%20Ukraine%20Monitoring%20Report%202020%20engl.pdf

EU4Skills: Better Skills for Modern Ukraine. eu4skills. (2023, March 1). https://eu4skills.info/en/

Giz. (2023a, December 12). Promoting civic engagement beyond capital cities. Startseite. https://www.giz.de/en/worldwide/109425.html

Giz. (2023b, December 12). Promoting municipalities – reducing the distance to citizens. Startseite. https://www.giz.de/en/worldwide/124467.html

Giz. (2023c, December 12). Promoting Ukraine’s EU association through Innovation. Startseite. https://www.giz.de/en/worldwide/118427.html

Giz. (2023d, December 12). Відкриття проєкту Skills4Recovery: Навчання кваліфікованої робочої сили для відновлення України. Startseite. https://www.giz.de/en/worldwide/132119.html

Localizing the 2030 agenda through integrated urban development. (n.d.). https://www.giz.de/en/downloads/giz2019_en_localising%20-the-2030-agenda-through-Iitegrated-urban-development.pdf

Rescuing SDG 11 for a resilient urban planet. UN. (n.d.). https://unhabitat.org/rescuing-sdg-11-for-a-resilient-urban-planet

U-LEAD Local Empowerment, Accountability, and Development Programme. EU neighbors east. (n.d.). https://euneighbourseast.eu/projects/eu-project-page/?id=1235

United Nations. (n.d.-a). Sustainable development goals in Ukraine. United Nations. https://ukraine.un.org/en/sdgs

United Nations. (n.d.-b). The 17 goals | sustainable development. United Nations. https://sdgs.un.org/goals