We are pleased to present the 2017 edition of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Index and Dashboards that have been jointly developed by the Bertelsmann Stiftung and the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN). This year’s edition includes revised and additional metrics for the SDGs bringing the total to 99 indicators. We also introduce several refinements to the methodology and extend coverage from 149 to 157 of the 193 UN member states. Results are therefore not strictly comparable with the 2016 edition. We are grateful to the many organizations and individuals who have helped us improve the SDG Index and Dashboards.
The purpose of the SDG Index and Dashboards is to assist countries to identify priorities for action, in order to achieve the 17 SDGs. The indicators and dashboards should help countries to pinpoint key implementation challenges and the overall index permits an assessment of progress towards the goals and a comparison with peer countries. We applaud the large number of countries stepping forward to make Voluntary National Reports on their progress in implementing the SDGs at the High-Level Political Forum. We also note that the design and implementation of the official SDG indicators is making significant progress following their formal adoption by the UN Statistics Commission. The SDG Index and Dashboards are complementary to official SDG monitoring. They are not an official product endorsed by any governments or the United Nations.
Based on our scrutiny of the relevant data available for tracking the SDGs, the SDG Index and Dashboards present these data in a way that we believe and hope to be informative, insightful, and interesting for policymakers and the public. Where possible we use the official SDG indicators and fill gaps in data availability with variables published by reputable sources. We have constructed the various measures for each SDG so that they immediately indicate a country’s position on a 0-to-100 spectrum from the “worst” (score 0) to the “best” (score 100).
