Coalitions of civil society groups active on the SDGs in countries around the world have scored the progress on each SDG within their country. The “people’s scorecard” model was introduced to enable comparative analysis at the fifth anniversary of the SDGs’ adoption, to assess SDG progress in 20 countries.

Progress on each goal is rated from 1 (no progress) to 5 (implementation on track), referring to the time period January-July 2020.

According to Action for Sustainable Development (A4SD), this analysis represents the first overview by major CSO coalitions of country-level SDG progress.

In each country assessed, a national coalition convened stakeholders and held local consultations with community groups.

As a key conclusion of the scorecards, the report notes that economic opportunity and fairness emerges as a particular weakness, as none of the related SDGs (Goals 8, 10, and 12) had scores above 3. The authors observe, “this was already highlighted as an issue at the start of the pandemic and is likely to get even worse in coming months.”

The scores for poverty eradication (Goal 1) are very low, as are the ratings for education (Goal 4). Movement in the right direction, however, was indicated for gender equality (Goal 5), with many of the coalitions finding progress in that area, in particular in Spain and Mauritania.

The authors note that a major level to tackle climate change is Goal 7, but few countries seem to have made significant progress towards affordable and clean energy. Goal 13 (climate action) had the most low scores of any goal, suggesting limited progress in many countries. The authors stress that “energy use and the shift to renewables remains the largest shift that is required for a just and sustainable world.” [People’s Scorecard Report] [People’s Scorecard website]