India’s SDG Pledge Goal & the strategy to apply

In Context

• The Prime Minister recently addressed the first meeting of Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors under India’s G20 Presidency.
  • He expressed concern that “progress on Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) seems to be slowing down”. 

What is sustainable development?

• The United Nations defines sustainable development as “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. 
• It includes “harmonising” three elements: economic growth, social inclusion and environmental protection.

Sustainable Development Goals

• The United Nations Document “Transforming Our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development”.
  • This agenda contains 17 goals and 169 targets. 
• The agenda is built on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which were adopted in 2000 and were to be achieved by 2015.
• SDGs provide a shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and into the future.  
• 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 forests.

India’s current SDG progress card

• About:
  • A recent study assesses India’s progress on 33 welfare indicators, covering nine SDGs and providing a mixed picture of positive and concerning trends.
• Improvements:
  • India is ‘On-Target’ to meeting 14 of the 33 SDGs, including indicators for 
    • Neonatal and under-five mortality, 
    • Full vaccination, improved sanitation, and 
    • Electricity access, 
    • All of which have substantially improved in the last five years. 
  • Skewed nature:
    • Unfortunately, the national ‘On-Target’ designation does not apply equally across all districts. 
    • While neonatal and under-five mortality are currently both ‘On-Target’ for the country, 286 and 208 districts (out of 707 districts), respectively, are not. 
    • Similarly, significant progress on access to improved sanitation excludes 129 districts that are not on course to meet this SDG indicator.
  • Following Indicators have improved across a vast majority of the districts between the years 2016 and 2021. They are: 
    • Eliminating adolescent pregnancy, 
    • Reducing multidimensional poverty, and 
    • Women having bank accounts.
• Concerns:
  • Of concern, for 19 of the 33 SDG indicators, the current pace of improvement is not enough to meet SDG targets. 
  • Despite a national policy push for clean fuel for cooking, more than two-thirds (479) of districts remain ‘Off-Target’. 
  • Similarly, some 415 and 278 districts are ‘Off-Target’ for improved water and handwashing facilities, respectively.
• Heightened concern:
  • Of heightened concern are: 
    • SDG indicators for women’s well-being and 
    • Gender inequality. 
  • Girl child marriage:
    • No district in India has yet succeeded in eliminating the practice of girl child marriage before the legal age of 18 years. 
      • At the current pace, more than three-fourths (539) of districts will not be able to reduce the prevalence of girl child marriage to the SDG target of 0.5% by 2030. 
  • Teenage pregnancy:
    • Unsurprisingly, other critical and related indicators such as teenage pregnancy (15-19 years) and partner violence (physical and sexual) that may be tracked back to child marriage are issues that India needs to escalate as priorities. 
  • Mobile phone access for women:
    • Despite the overall expansion of mobile phone access in India (93% of households), only 56% women report owning a mobile phone, with 567 districts remaining ‘Off-Target’.

Strategy to apply

• Need of policy response:
  • Designing and implementing a policy response to a pressing issue is best viewed as an “optimisation problem” relying on political will, responsive administration, adequate resources, and sound data. 
• Mission oriented outlook:
  • Strong and sustained political leadership supported by a responsive administrative structure at all levels, from national to the district level, is critical for the success. 
  • Creating a mission-oriented ethos that is assessment-oriented and which provides adequate support for accomplishing India’s district-level SDGs is now urgently needed.
• Learning from COVID strategy:
  • India’s lessons from ‘dealing with COVID’ strategy that can inform and optimise India’s approach to its SDG targets.
  • Integrated digital platform:
    • India’s success with COVID-19 was largely possible both because of the existing digital infrastructure, as well as new, indigenous initiatives such as the Co-WIN data platform, and the Aarogya Setu application. 
    • Following these examples, India must put in place a coordinated, public data platform for population health management, by consolidating its many siloed platforms into an integrated digital resource for district administrators, as well as State and national policy makers.
  • Relief packages:
    • A targeted SDG strategy delivered at scale must be executed with the same timeliness of India’s COVID-19 relief package.

Way ahead

• India needs to innovate a new policy path in order to meet the aspirations of its people in the decade ahead — there is no historical precedent for a democratic and economically open nation on how to deliver development to a billion-plus people in a manner that is healthy and sustainable. 
• In successfully delivering a real-time response to the COVID-19 pandemic, India has proved that it is possible to deliver at scale in such an ambitious and comprehensive manner. 
• To succeed in meeting its SDG targets, especially those related to population health and well-being, basic quality infrastructure, and gender equality, a similar concerted, pioneering, nation-wide effort would be the need of the hour.