In preparation for the July 2026 session of the UN High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF), the UN Secretariat has released an advance unedited version of the Secretary-General’s annual report on SDG progress. While progress “is not only possible but already happening,” the report warns that unmet financing commitments “risk putting many SDG targets beyond reach.”
Titled, ‘Progress Towards the Sustainable Development Goals,’ the report uses inputs from more than 50 international and regional organizations to assess progress made since 2015 against the global SDG indicator framework. It finds that the world is on track to meet or is making “moderate” progress on 36% of the 139 SDG targets with available trend data. Progress on 49% of the targets is “only marginal,” and 18% of the targets have regressed from the 2015 baseline, according to the report.
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The report highlights improvements in, among other areas:
- Social protection coverage, with more than half of the world’s population having at least one form of protection;
- Disaster risk reduction (DRR), with disaster-related mortality having dropped by 65% from the previous decade, and the number of countries with national DRR strategies having reached 141;
- Maternal and child mortality, HIV infections and AIDS-related deaths, access to reproductive health services, and child marriage;
- Access to safe drinking water and sanitation;
- Electricity access reaching 92% of the global population, and renewable energy capacity per capita growing 14% from 2023 to 2024 (or 2.2 times its 2015 level); and
- Internet usage reaching 74% of the global population in 2025, up from 40% in 2015.
The report notes that improved policy frameworks, increased data availability, and enhanced institutional capacity have strengthened national systems, driving progress across multiple SDGs. It highlights achievements in data availability, with coverage having expanded to nearly all SDG indicators by March 2026 – compared to approximately half of the indicators in 2016.
The report further acknowledges that as it aggregates global trends, meaningful advances at regional and national levels could be concealed. For instance, in 2024, 134 countries had met the SDG target on under-five mortality, and a further six are expected to achieve this target by 2030. Another example is that 59 countries had eliminated at least one neglected tropical disease by late 2025.
However, the report finds that progress remains insufficient – and “deeply uneven across the Goals and among countries.” Around one in ten people globally are still experiencing extreme poverty, undernourishment and food insecurity are still “well above 2015 levels,” and more than 150 million children suffer from stunting, it notes.
In addition, fiscal constraints continue to present challenges. Official development assistance (ODA), down 6.1% in 2024, has recorded its largest annual contraction in 2025 of 23.1%. Foreign direct investment (FDI) flows to developing economies shrank by 2% in 2025. External debt of low-income countries (LICs) and middle-income countries (MICs) hit a record USD 8.9 trillion in 2024. The report emphasizes the need to use the Sevilla Commitment as the framework for “a bold global investment push,” reform of the international financial architecture, a tripling of multilateral development bank (MDB) lending capacity, and “full alignment of all domestic and international public and private financing with sustainable development objectives.”
The report calls for partnerships across governments, civil society, the private sector, and the UN system to “move from aspiration to accountability” and for renewed international cooperation and effective multilateralism, as outlined in the Pact for the Future. “By building on proven successes and addressing the root causes of setbacks in the coming years, we can still deliver on the promise of the 2030 Agenda for a more equitable, peaceful, and sustainable future,” it argues.
HLPF 2026 takes place on the theme, ‘Transformative, equitable, innovative and coordinated actions for the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its Sustainable Development Goals for a sustainable future for all.’
The SDG progress report by the Statistics Division of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) and the Sustainable Development Report by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN), both forthcoming, also feed into HLPF deliberations. [Publication: Progress Towards the Sustainable Development Goals: Report of the Secretary-General] [HLPF 2026]