Responses to the COVID-19 pandemic have impeded progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals
Cai Li, Zhongci Deng, Zhen Wang, Yuanchao Hu, Ling Wang, Shuxia Yu, Wei Li, Zhihua Shi, Brett A. Bryan
Abstract
Abstract COVID-19 pandemic responses have brought unprecedented challenges to the United Nations 2030 Agenda for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and a quantitative, multi-dimensional assessment of the impacts of these responses on SDG progress is required. Here, we use an adaptive multi-regional input–output model to quantitatively assess the impact of pandemic responses on global and national SDG progress and show that COVID-19 pandemic responses reduced overall progress towards the SDGs by 8.2%, with socio-economic sustainability declining by 18.1% while environmental sustainability improved by 5.1% compared with the business-as-usual trend. Developing countries suffered greater reductions in overall sustainability (9.7%) than developed countries (7.1%). Under all post-pandemic futures, pandemic responses were found to impede overall progress towards the SDGs and worsened inequality between countries, particularly for socio-economic targets. A post-pandemic strategy toward the SDGs requires sustainable pandemic responses which not only address inequality among countries but also lessen the trade-offs between SDGs.