Principal indicators to monitor sustainable development goals

Chenyang Shuai; Long Yu; Xi Chen; Bu Zhao; Shen Qu; Ji Zhu; Jianguo Liu; Shelie A Miller; Ming Xu

doi:10.1088/1748-9326/ac3697

Environmental Research Letters (Jan 2021)

Principal indicators to monitor sustainable development goals

Chenyang Shuai,
Long Yu,
Xi Chen,
Bu Zhao,
Shen Qu,
Ji Zhu,
Jianguo Liu,
Shelie A Miller,
Ming Xu

Affiliations

Chenyang Shuai: School for Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan , Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America; Michigan Institute for Computational Discovery and Engineering, University of Michigan , Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America
Long Yu: Department of Statistics, Fudan University , Shanghai, People’s Republic of China
Xi Chen: College of Economics and Management, Southwest University , Chongqing, People’s Republic of China
Bu Zhao: School for Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan , Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America; Michigan Institute for Computational Discovery and Engineering, University of Michigan , Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America
Shen Qu: School for Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan , Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America
Ji Zhu: Department of Statistics, University of Michigan , Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America
Jianguo Liu: Center for Systems Integration and Sustainability, Department of Fisheries and Wildlife, Michigan State University , East Lansing, MI, United States of America
Shelie A Miller: School for Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan , Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America; Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Michigan , Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America
Ming Xu: School for Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan , Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America; Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Michigan , Ann Arbor, MI, United States of America

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ac3697
Journal volume & issue: Vol. 16, no. 12
p. 124015

Abstract

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Hundreds of indicators are available to monitor progress of countries and regions towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). However, the sheer number of indicators poses unprecedented challenges for data collection and compilation. Here we identify a subset of SDG indicators (principal indicators) that are relatively easy to collect data for and also are representative for all the indicators by considering the complex interrelationship among them. We find 147 principal indicators that can represent at least 90% of the annual variances of 351 SDG indicators in the past (2000–2017) and are expected to do so for the future (2018–2030) with the lowest difficulty of data collection. Our results can guide future investment in building the data infrastructure for SDG monitoring to give priorities to these principal indicators for global comparison.

Published in Environmental Research Letters

ISSN: 1748-9326 (Online)
Publisher: IOP Publishing
Country of publisher: United Kingdom
LCC subjects: Technology: Environmental technology. Sanitary engineering; Geography. Anthropology. Recreation: Environmental sciences; Science: Physics
Website: https://iopscience.iop.org/journal/1748-9326

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