Unleashing Policy Coherence to Achieve the SDGs

Executive Summary

The current landscape of multiple, overlapping crises poses a major challenge to achieving sustainable development. Findings from the Global Sustainable Development Report (2023) of the United Nations (UN) highlight that the current approach of incremental and fragmented change will not be enough to achieve the 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Given the diversity of the SDGs and their specific targets, implementing them will require an integrated and coherent approach. Moreover, global environmental, economic and social challenges have caused setbacks for sustainable development. Enabling governments and institutions to tackle these interconnected challenges and design policies with multiplier effects across the SDGs is imperative to urgently accelerate progress towards the SDGs.

The OECD and its Members play a critical role in identifying and supporting progress on the SDGs. Given their potential global impact, it is increasingly important that OECD countries’ policies take into account their effects on non-Member countries, in particular on developing countries. The context of interlinked global crises and geopolitical tension provides Members with a strong political argument for giving more substantial consideration to developing countries in their policymaking. A renewed commitment to accelerated, sustained and transformative action for global sustainable development will be critical to create the conditions for achieving the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the SDGs in all countries.

Policy coherence for sustainable development (PCSD) offers a way to equip governance and institutions for sustainable transformation. There is significant yet untapped potential for making simultaneous progress across the SDGs. Applying PCSD to strengthen government capacities for an integrated and coherent approach to policy making can ensure that policies across sectors and levels of government are mutually reinforcing in pursuing sustainable development.

The OECD Recommendation on Policy Coherence for Sustainable Development is a comprehensive instrument. The Recommendation was adopted by the OECD Council in 2019 and responds to the universal commitments made under the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs. Covering all dimensions of policy making – from the need for political commitments and to tools for monitoring and reporting implementation – it equips policymakers with the institutional mechanisms and policy tools to promote coherent policies for sustainable development.

This Report takes stock of the progress made in the implementation of the OECD Recommendation on Policy Coherence for Sustainable Development by its Adherents in the last five years. This report provides the first, systematic assessment of the current state of implementation of PCSD by Adherents to the OECD Council Recommendation. Data was collected over 2023-24 primarily through questionnaires to Adherents and complemented by OECD DAC Peer Reviews. The analysis presented herein indicates that, while Adherents have made continued efforts to implement the Recommendation, significant challenges remain.

Key findings

Most countries that have adhered to the Recommendation have laid a strong foundation for PCSD through political commitment, strategic vision and stakeholder engagement. Within the last five years, most countries adhering to the Recommendation have published statements that define a high-level commitment to PCSD, for example, via national sustainable development strategies. This progress can be further enhanced by explicitly committing to considering the transboundary impacts of policies on sustainable development at all stages of policymaking, making greater use of tools for long-term planning such as strategic foresight, and by more effectively engaging marginalised and vulnerable groups in both policy coherence and sustainable development efforts.

Government co-ordination mechanisms have been strengthened to enhance PCSD, but to a lesser degree. While many countries have taken action to enhance whole-of-government co-ordination and communication for sustainable development since adherence to the Recommendation, fewer actions have been taken to support the arbitration of policy divergences and to anticipate potential transboundary impacts of policies.

The most significant gaps in efforts to enhance PCSD are those that require the development of tools to assess and address policy impacts. A key area with noticeable gaps is the monitoring and reporting of transboundary impacts, which is crucial for informing decision making and adjusting policies based on their potential impact. A similar gap can be found in the use of policy planning mechanisms and tools to integrate sustainable development into policy and finance, such as the budgeting process. These gaps correspond with challenges reported by Adherents in the availability of data and evidence and technical capacity for assessing and addressing transboundary impacts.

Integrating transboundary impacts into policymaking remains a particularly challenging area. While some Adherents have committed to considering the transboundary impacts of policies in legal and political frameworks, relatively few have identified priority issues for policy coherence for development and developed dedicated strategies or action plans to translate their commitments into action. Adherents highlight insufficient political support as a key challenge.

The Recommendation has been widely disseminated by the OECD, Adherents and other international organisations and stakeholders. The whole-of-government approach underpinning the Recommendation benefits from engagement across OECD policy communities to support Adherents in developing coherent policymaking processes. There is nevertheless room to further enhance collaboration across the OECD and outreach to non-Members to bolster both national and international efforts to improve policy coherence for sustainable development.

The multifaceted nature of recent global crises reinforces the relevance of the Recommendation. The COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution, and the escalation of regional conflicts have brought into sharp relief the interconnectedness of different policy areas, the possible synergies and trade-offs that need to be managed within countries and across borders, and the impacts on future generations. At the same time, underlining the need to address transboundary impacts more effectively, Adherents called for the OECD to increase its support for their implementation efforts and to lead by example, including through greater cross-organisational collaboration and co-ordination.

The OECD continues to support Adherents and the international community in their efforts to enhance policy coherence for sustainable development. This support includes continuous dissemination of evidence, experiences and lessons learnt, with a focus on sharing good country practices, tools, and solutions that enhance PCSD. The OECD also supports efforts to build technical capacity within public administrations as well as data availability, methodologies and tools for assessing policy impacts on sustainable development with a specific emphasis in increasing understanding on the impacts of policies on developing countries.