Global Goals That Work

About Measure What Matters

Measure What Matters (MWM) is a partnership between the Green Economy Coalition (GEC), Accounting For Sustainability (A4S), the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), and the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI).

MWM's mission is to bring greater alignment between corporate, national, and global actors in order to better measure 'progress', using the health of our planet and the wellbeing of people as the yardstick rather than Gross Domestic Product (GDP) or profit alone.

Over the last three years MWM has conducted research and convened dialogues that have brought together national statistical agencies, the private sector, civil society organizations, academics, accountancy bodies, United Nations agencies, and government to integrate sustainability Goals into decision making.

Source: Measure What Matters, https://www.greeneconomycoalition.org/assets/reports/External-Reports/Global-Goals-that-Work.pdf
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License.

In Short

A set of agreed global goals offer a new opportunity to bring coherence and purpose to measuring sustainability across different levels – global, national, local, and corporate.

2015 will be viewed in history as the year that the world changed direction. For the first time, a set of goals were agreed by all countries – rich and poor.

The 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are a statement of public interest: our health and education, our homes and cities, our natural world, our safety, and livelihoods. These things matter – to people, to business, to government, to everyone. 

The SDGs are also a universal project. Tackling climate change, inequality or unemployment is as relevant to Wall Street traders in New York as to food vendors on the streets of New Delhi. But the ultimate test of the SDGs is to improve the lives of the poorest people in the world. 

The Opportunity

In market terms, the SDGs represent a host of opportunities. As global and national policies develop to meet the SDGs so new markets will emerge: 20 million electric vehicles are expected to be on the road by 2020 (SDG 13 on climate change); Asia's 'Base of the Pyramid' has an aggregate income of $3.47 trillion (SDG 10 on Inequality). The 17 SDGs are an 'innovation map' for what the world needs.

But the SDG framework offers a much bigger opportunity to understand human progress from market value alone – it provides a dashboard of indicators to monitor the macro trends, opportunities, and risks that face our global systems. Our economies are more interconnected than ever before – mortgage defaults in Florida can result in a global financial crash; floods in Thailand can mean job losses in the UK. If the SDG framework can be made relevant and applicable at different levels of operation – global, national, corporate, local – then it can become a powerful strategic tool for identifying the connections between these compounding risks and opportunities. 

The Task

Making the SDGs relevant to policy makers (north and south), businesses, or local authorities requires tackling three barriers: 

To harmonize: The proliferation of sustainability measurement systems in recent years should be applauded – more people are gathering environmental, social, and governance data than ever before. But the result is a multitude of disconnected datasets that do not necessarily fill major knowledge gaps or help decision makers make better choices. For example, despite the global agreement to tackle climate change, there is no agreed way of measuring a nation's adaptive capacity. While there are over 34 indicator sets tracking the decline in biodiversity, they do not alert businesses as to which activities or sectors prove the most damaging, and in which locations. While data shows that more children are attending school than ever before, there are still few consistent ways to compare the results of learning assessments across different countries. 

To connect: The linkages between data suppliers and data users in most instances are tenuous at best. For example, data being produced by statistical offices is not being taken up at the national policy level. Valuable data generated by communities is not is not being fed into national surveys. Information generated by corporations for regulatory or reporting mechanisms is not being made public. 

To support: The poorest people with the hardest problems are the least well served by current data metrics. Identifying data inequalities and building the capacity of under-represented communities and issues is critical for a universal response.

The Solutions

The good news is that there are multiple initiatives underway to fill the gaps, align frameworks and connect institutions. The SDG framework now offers the opportunity to galvanize and bring coherence to these efforts. 

Based on consultation with diverse stakeholders, and in different parts of the world, Measure What Matters (MWM) has collected practical examples of how stakeholders are integrating the SDGs into their decisions across 5 principles. We hope these principles and examples can provide some guidance for taking action: 

We see how businesses and governments are using the SDGs to Set the direction by benchmarking their strategies and national plans against the framework. The 15 year SDG timeframe is helping stakeholders to think in the long term and reassess their current metrics to assess real 'value' beyond profit and progress beyond GDP.

We document how governments are using the SDGs to Connect and collaborate with their citizens through nation-wide dialogues on 'what matters': connecting the 'users' and the 'suppliers' of data to build a collective picture of success.

We find that the new opportunities to Share data between different stakeholder groups is not only helping governments make better decisions, but is also alerting businesses to what consumers, investors, or other stakeholders need. 

We track how Integrating environmental, social, and economic goals into government departments and corporate strategy, is helping decision makers to become better equipped to see the interdependencies between different issues, and more able to grasp opportunities and ward off risks. 

We highlight different strategies for Communicating progress so that it both connects to individuals and organizations, but can also tell a macro picture of change. 

Join Us

Redefining our priorities and rewiring the ways that we measure them is no small task. It is the project of a generation. But the process is already underway and the MWM partnership is committed to accelerating it. 

Looking Back

The Opportunity

The year is 2030. Fifteen years ago, in 2015, the world signed off on a set of Global Goals. Companies and governments took action – not just because the natural world depended on it, but because the future of their businesses and welfare of their societies depended on it. Civil society saw in the SDGs a way to hold government and business to account. The SDGs enabled all to think through systemwide change, to engage those who suffer from system failure and – crucially – those who hold keys to system change.

The SDG framework became a benchmark for setting priorities at all levels – corporate, national, and local. National statistics bureaus and planning departments developed alternative measures of progress, beyond GDP, to track the effectiveness of their policies. Investors benefited from environmental and social tagging systems in the capital markets to assess the quality of their investments. Corporations expanded their metrics of success to ascertain the risks and opportunities affecting their business models. Accountancy bodies played a key role in devising alternative means to value social and environmental capital. In turn, that accounting logic helped governments to work with other stakeholders in managing the portfolio of capitals that provide the foundation for development.

The health of the planet and the wellbeing of people became the yardstick of progress. 

SDG 5: Gender Equality

The global economy will grow by $28 trillion by 2025 if women participated in the labor force to the same degree as men- equivalent to the combined GDPs of the U.S. and China.

SDG 12: Sustainable Consumption And Production

Demand for biodegradable plastics will grow from 2 billion in 2015 to 3.4 billion in 2020.

SDG 10: Income Equality

The microfinance market is expected to grow by 10 – 15 % in 2016 alone.

From 2030

The year is 2030. Fifteen years ago, in 2015, the world signed off on a set of Global Goals. The Goals were worthy but deemed to be too complex, abstract, and expensive, so governments and companies continued with business as usual.

GDP initially continued to grow around the world, but came at the expense of our natural systems – oceans acidified; fish stocks plummeted; soils became depleted and crops struggled. So-called 'green' growth focused on carbon alone, and resulted in 'green grabs' of land, pushing people off their land and permanently harming biodiversity. Poorer communities, who depend on their local environment for their livelihoods, migrated in search of opportunities but found that richer countries were also facing stagnation, jobless growth, and rising inequality.

Governments and businesses were blind to the compounding risks because their performance metrics were narrowly focused and they could not work together on mutually beneficial and practical solutions. Investors were slow to identify devaluing assets and emerging risks. The price of key commodities became more volatile, insurance costs rocketed and capital markets were unpredictable. The cost of taking action escalated and undermined economic growth. Poorer groups bore the brunt of inaction, but declining natural systems and rising inequality impacted everyone.

Civil society was not able to engage, and civil disobedience intensified as the global stability that all relied upon broke down.

The Risk

Floods in Thailand:

The Reality of Systemic Risk

In 2011 Thailand experienced its worst floods for five decades. More than 800 people died and over 5 million people were impacted.

10,000 factories closed and 350,000 workers were made redundant. Damage to physical assets cost $21bn, with a further $26.5bn in lost economic opportunities. Insurers and reinsurers paid out $12bn – 70 per cent of which was written outside Thailand, including $2.2bn by Lloyd's of London. As a global supplier of consumer electronics, textiles, and automotive industries, the damage spread beyond Thailand's shores. Honda had to halt production of its Brio subcompact and halve its production as far afield as Swindon, UK, as electronic car components were not available. Thailand is one of the world's leading manufacturers of hard disk drives (HDDs).

In the six weeks after the floods, the price of these doubled: Intel lost $1bn of revenues, and the set-top box manufacturer Pace issued profit warnings.

Introduction

Why Measuring Matters

The Opportunity For Aligning Measurements Of ProgressThe Opportunity For Aligning Measurements Of Progress

For Governments: To improve decision making across horizontal and vertical divisions that until now have worked to different measures, offering a clear picture of multidimensional success.

For Business: To identify future business opportunities and risks, to strengthen stakeholder relations, to keep pace with policy developments, and to help businesses constructively engage with policy.

For Investors: To help understand the risks, trends, and opportunities in the capital markets and within their investment portfolio, helping them identify stranded assets and valuation bubbles.

For Communities: To improve the accountability and transparency of institutions that are making decisions that impact their lives.

For the Statistical Community: To improve the quality and scope of data, and help to support the use of models, forecasts, and analysis.

For Data Providers: It will create new markets and innovation opportunities.

For Civil Society: It will provide a tool for more accountable and transparent decision making, and can prompt a shift in policy.

For the Media: Aligning data and frameworks can help the media tell more informed stories of human development, and of how political decisions impact people at different scales

For Everyone: To generate more successful partnerships and multi-stakeholder fora on sustainability, different constituencies need to share a 'shared language' of success and therefore the metrics to measure it by.

Developing shared metrics

Understanding the connections between sustainability metrics - corporate, national, and global - and across borders will be an ongoing process. Governments have an opportunity to lead the process but it is a project for everyone. All organizations can start from a similar set of questions:

Business & Investment Community

• Industry regulators
• Business big, small and multinational
• Professional bodies
• Shareholders and investors
• Supply chain actors

Government

• Development practitioners
• Government departments
• National statistical agencies

Civil Society Organizations

• NGOs
• Research institutes
• Civil society
• Poor groups
• Informal economy groups

Actions

Based on MWM research and consultations we suggest the following actions to help forge alignment between different measurement systems at the corporate, national, and global levels: 

For Government

1. Benchmark national plans against the SDGs to identify gaps, alignments, and priorities.
2. Convene stakeholders including national statistical bodies, business, investors, civil society, local authorities, and cities to build consensus around priorities and the measurement of progress.
3. Strengthen the role and mandate of national statistical offices to help convene public and private organizations.
4. Create an enabling policy environment for sharing of data across business, government, and civil society.
5. Publish a multi-stakeholder national report on progress towards the SDGs with insights and data from all stakeholders.

For Business

1. Conduct a Board level strategy session to consider the relevance of the SDGs to the business, identifying opportunities and risks.
2. Benchmark current and future planned activities against the outcome of the Board strategy and define corporate goals, key performance indicators, and implementation plans in line with priorities identified.
3. Establish Board and Senior Management oversight to support integration into decision making.
4. Adopt emerging methodologies for measuring natural, social, and human capital to help identify and respond to impacts and dependencies along the value chain, sharing data with government, investors, and civil society.
5. Disclose sustainability impacts and progress on the SDGs. and integrate sustainability information into the reporting cycle.

For Investors

1. Assess portfolios against the SDGs to identify investment opportunities and respond to risks.
2. Engage with investee companies and governments to understand their strategic response to the SDGs and use the information within investment decisions.
3. Work with companies and other stakeholders to standardize approaches to measuring progress, improving data quality, comparability, and the ability to benchmark.
4. Adopt emerging methodologies to enable impact of own investments to be monitored and reported to asset owners, beneficiaries, and other stakeholders.
5. Track investment flows against the SDGs and publish evidence which demonstrates the impact of action on investment returns.

For Civil Society

1. Benchmark corporate and national frameworks for measuring sustainability against the SDGs to identify gaps and opportunities for alignment.
2. Support communities, particularly those working in the informal economy, to interpret the SDGs at a local level and define their own measurement systems and needs.
3. Identify key data inequalities within countries.
4. Partner with governments, particularly in developing countries, to build their capacity for measuring progress in alternative ways.
5. Prioritize open data initiatives to address data inequalities and needs.

Realigning Priorities

and hence measurement systems - across community, corporate, national, and global frameworks is no small task but progress is underway and gathering speed.

Here we outline 5 practical principles to help businesses, national statistical bodies, policy makers, and international institutions start that process.

1. Set the direction

In an increasingly interdependent world, the SDGs provide decision makers - national, corporate, and community - with a framework to think strategically across a range of variables over a fifteen year period.

Benchmark

The SDGs provide a common framework which governments and organizations can use to set a common direction, benefitting from opportunities in tackling the challenges faced and overcoming risks. As a first step, benchmarking existing policies and strategy against the 2030 Goals provides a baseline from which to build.

Governments have already started to benchmark their current planning priorities against the SDGs to identify gaps and alignments with their national short and long term strategies. For example, Bangladesh's benchmarking has shown that over 80% of the SDGs are covered by their national plan; while Colombia's assessment has revealed that of 169 targets, 91 are already closely aligned with their National Development Plan but there are some important gaps to consider.

Investors and businesses are also mapping their business models and strategic vision against the SDGs to inform their strategy and notions of 'value'. As early as 2014 Novozymes used the draft SDGs as inspiration when developing its new long-term strategy and purpose. The company benchmarks the SDGs against their innovation pipeline to determine which new solutions have the most promise to bring positive impact to the world.

Example Columbia Leads The Way

Even before the SDGs had been finalized, Colombia's President Juan Manuel Santos approved a Decree to establish an Inter-Agency Commission of representatives from across government to integrate the SDGs in national policy decisions. The Commission started by benchmarking the National Development Plan against the SDGs. Out of 169 targets 91 were closely aligned with their National Development Plan, but there were also gaps including targets in SDG10 on inequality, and specific targets on tropical diseases and the genetic modification of seeds.

Back-cast From The Future

Benchmarking is not enough if it is simply a mapping exercise against the SDGs, without undertaking a more fundamental review of policies and strategies to consider whether they are sufficient to meet the SDGs. The SDG framework calls for vision beyond corporate timeframes and political horizons. Starting from the future, it offers stakeholders a structure to cast backwards to see if their business models and national plans - and hence measures of progress - are fit for purpose.

At the national level, efforts to go 'beyond GDP' are well underway. Statistics Netherlands; the UK National Wellbeing Commission; the Canadian Index of Wellbeing; the OECD's Better Life Index are all helping policy makers understand what progress means to citizens. The agreement of the SDGs should do more than just galvanizing these national efforts to 'go beyond GDP', also helping to guide further emerging frameworks at a global level.

Example

The Netherlands Takes A Strategic Approach

Since 2007 the Dutch government has prioritized measuring societal development beyond GDP. The Sustainability Monitor is produced by Statistics Netherlands in cooperation with the Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis, the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, and the Netherlands Institute for Social Research. The set of indicators consist of three dashboards that encompass sustainable development now and into the future; 1. Quality of life (here and now); 2. Resources (later); 3. Netherlands in the world (elsewhere).

Lead Change

Setting a new direction requires leaders with the convening power and networks to drive institutional collaboration.

Slovenia has established a new Ministerial post for sustainable development. Ghana has established a high-level inter-ministerial commission that brings together sectoral working groups across ministries. Mexico, Bangladesh and Colombia have aligned SDG efforts with the President's Office to ensure the highest level of commitment.

The US has established an inter-agency organizational structure that includes foreign and domestic agencies.

High level leadership is equally relevant at the corporate level - only then can environmental, social and governance goals be incorporated into the core values, purpose, and the envisioned future. Financial services and industry associations can play a critical role in helping their clients and members align their strategies and reporting systems to the SDGs.

Example Investors Drive Change

The UN Principles for Responsible Business wrote to the chairmen of FTSE100 companies after the SDGs were agreed asking them to consider the relevance of the Goals for their strategy and performance, providing a signal to companies that investors would be starting to assess performance in the context of the SDGs.

Example New Tools To Help Investors Measure Alignment With The SDGs.

MSCI ESG Research is introducing tools and data designed to help institutional investors measure their alignment with the SDGs. MSCI ESG Research grouped the 17 SDGs into five actionable themes: basic needs, empowerment, climate change, natural capital and governance. The MSCI ACWI Sustainable Impact Index aims to identify companies that derive at least 50% of their revenues from products and services that address environmental and social challenges as defined by the themes outlined above. The index, which excludes companies that fail to meet minimum environmental, social, and governance (ESG) standards, weights securities by the percentage of revenue derived from products or services that address the themes.

Why Alignment Matters: The Challenges Of Water Management In India 

Water is in high demand in India. Half of India's rivers are polluted and poor quality water is costing the government US$600 million a year. MWM research has associated the current difficulties of effective water use management in India with inconsistencies within and between corporate and government frameworks used to report and monitor water sustainability.

Access to water and sanitation is moderately reported at government level, but there is less evidence of standardized corporate disclosure for two reasons:

1) Government accounting systems do not report levels of corporate compliance with water-related laws and legislation, creating an enabling environment for non-reporting of activities, over-exploitation of water resources and possible conflict between user groups.

2) Several of India's water-intensive sectors (agriculture, construction, retail, and hotels) reside in the informal economy so do not readily report their activities and impacts.

However, there are clear opportunities for data sharing between business and government to fill gaps in monitoring and reporting water sustainability. Indeed, India's government has already begun to explore such opportunities by mapping the SDGs and targets against business sector initiatives and government departments. The exercise hopes to improve national ownership of the SDG agenda, which is crucial as India's national development approach over the next 15 years will be decisive in determining the success or failure of the SDGs agenda globally. As President Narendra Modi notes:

"Sustainable development of one-sixth of humanity will be of great consequence to the world"

Figure 3: Levels of coverage of water sustainability dimensions within corporate and government reporting frameworks and within the water-related SDGs.

2. Connect and collaborate

Tackling the issues at the heart of the SDGs is a job too big for a single organization or nation. This is a chance for purposeful dialogue - for governments to engage their citizens, for businesses to find out what the public needs.

Build Collaboration Into The Institutional Response

Developing strong partnerships between policy makers, national statistical offices, businesses, and communities sits at the centre of measuring what matters and brings multiple benefits. For example, community level data can help businesses identify what society -and therefore consumers - need, while the data generated by businesses for regulatory purposes is critical for assisting national policy makers spot emerging trends or barriers to progress. Building a national dialogue involving all segments of society can build a common direction, provide a clear signal of intent and create ownership for the outcomes achieved.

Example Colombia's Partnership Approach

Colombia has adopted a multi-stakeholder approach to build consensus and create alignment around the adoption of the SDGs and the measurement of progress. This has highlighted three important lessons, critical to successful engagement:

1. Top level buy-in is needed to show the importance of the Goals and the approach adopted - in Colombia's case, this leadership comes from President Santos and is reflected in ministerial and director representation on the High Level Inter-Institutional Commission established to drive integration
2. Build a structure that facilitates dialogue and a partnership approach across all stakeholder groups - The Inter- Institutional Commission, supported by a technical committee, has the mandate to interface with stakeholders from civil society, private sector, academia, media, and international entities.
3. Set policies and indicators at a local level - Colombia's experience highlights the need to ensure national level indicators are translated into local policies and measures of progress to ensure ownership and responsiveness to community needs

Empower National Statistical Bodies

National Statistical Offices have always been a key functionary in generating data to monitor and manage sustainable development at the national level. But to respond to the SDG priorities, governments will need to empower national statistical offices to become curators of a wider data ecosystem of users and providers.

Partner With Purpose

A wide range of partnerships are being formed to help address specific challenges associated with measurement of progress against the SDGs. This ranges from data partnerships to close information gaps, for example working with telecoms companies to provide big data insights, through to multi-sector partnerships focused on driving progress towards individual SDGs.

Example New Data Partnerships Emerge

The Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data is bringing together governments, businesses, standard setters, and civil society to share knowledge and create toolkits that can help to address major data gaps that prevent progress towards the SDGs. They have established five working groups to address these gaps:

• Data collaboratives: working on filling data gaps and improving accessibility and usefulness.
• Data roadmaps and toolbox: working with national and subnational levels to develop and implement whole- of-government, multi-stakeholder data roadmaps for sustainable development.
• Data principles and protocols: producing an inventory of existing principles, standards, protocols and agreements, and emerging practice in contracts and in other relationships to understand what else is needed.
• Data architectures: catalyzing the design and development of a data infrastructure to measure SDG progress.
• Resource mobilization and alignment: tracking the available tools and resources and sharing them with all stakeholders.

Example

Accountancy Profession Shows Leadership

Professional bodies have an opportunity to help integrate the SDGs into the core of business planning. For example the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) sees the SDGs as a 'clear and compelling articulation of public interest'. ICAEW aims to support all of its 145,000 chartered accountants to help businesses value public goods and support them to measure progress in alternative ways.

Aligning Metrics To Societal Demand: Guidance For Policy Makers

Unless national metrics of 'progress' connect to what citizens need and recognise they will struggle to take hold. In-country narratives on 'what matters' and the trade-offs and synergies between environmental, social, and economic issues are highly context-specific. Based on forty years of mainstreaming sustainable development into decision making, IIED has developed some key questions to support policy makers to align new metrics of progress with what people need.

Demand For Integrated Measures:

1. Identify what national/local decisions and issues are driving demand for new, integrated 'measures that matter' (for example, national development plans, green economy plans, low-carbon development plans).
2. Who is asking for new measures (for example, planning and/or environmental authorities; national statistical bureaus, NGOs and citizens' groups calling for transparency; businesses wanting a more stable policy environment)?

Supply Of Integrated Measures:

1. Identify what (new) integrated measures are being provided e g. natural capital accounts (NCA) and wellbeing measures.
2. Identify who is supplying or is able to supply these measures (for example: government statistical offices; monitoring and evaluation bodies in government and beyond; research groups; citizens groups; accounting projects such as Wealth Accounting and Valuation of Ecosystem Services (WAVES)).

Connect Supply And Demand:

Identify what systems or initiatives currently or potentially link the 'owners' together. Multi-stakeholder fora and new policy imperatives may be the potential catalysts for linking supply and demand.

Align Supply And Demand:

In what metrics and at what levels is there alignment across different initiatives, on both demand and supply side? What drives convergence - mainstreaming initiatives, top-down policy, broad public understanding, market conditions, etc?

Where are the barriers which exacerbate unhelpful fragmentation, in e.g.: different development or sustainability narratives, legal requirements; market standards; and reporting requirements? What drives misalignment: asymmetries of understanding, information and/or power; and differences from national to local levels?

Where has fragmentation been helpful in terms of innovation or drawing attention to SDG issues uncovered by most measurements? How can this innovation be mainstreamed? Who has the mandate for alignment and/or mainstreaming, or where could a mandate be created legitimately and effectively?

A Story Aligning Data Collection With People's Needs

In India, almost two thirds of the population - more than 800 million people - live in rural areas, and many of them are small-scale farmers. Changes in climate have decimated agricultural production, with some regions experiencing unprecedented droughts in the summer of 2014, threatening the food security of millions of people and hitting poor rural areas worst of all. In 2007 Airtel, the largest mobile network operator in India, launched the Green SIM card in partnership with the Indian Farmers' Fertilizer Cooperative (IFFCO), which produces and distributes fertilizers to 330 million people through a cooperative network. Green SIM offers voice and text agricultural information to Indian small-scale farmers, often living in remote areas of the country to help them improve agricultural practices and increase their yields.

Today 3.1 million people use the Green SIM to prepare for weather patterns, diversify crops and increase their yields. The Green SIM has brought business opportunities. The company reported that 5% of new rural mobile phone acquisitions came from the Green SIM card alone. Currently, 150,000 new users acquire this card each month, and 60% of customers stay on their Green SIMs for longer than 12 months. But business opportunities go beyond agriculture. In a survey carried out during 2012, subscribers indicated that they would also like to receive information related to education, health, and employment alongside the usual agricultural content".

3. Share Information and Build Capacity

A data revolution is underway but there are major gaps in power and knowledge. This calls for creative ways of sharing information and building capacity.

Accelerate The Data Revolution

In the past national statistical institutions have produced official statistics using two main sources of data: surveys and public administrative data. With the total number of smartphone users worldwide expected to reach 2.08 billion, there is an opportunity to transform that process, generating new sources of highly temporal and widely sampled data that could supplement, improve or replace existing datasets. Social media is now used to calculate public responses to health and well-being statistics; smart meter data is used for energy statistics; satellite images for land use, agriculture, and environment statistics.

Similarly, citizen science is starting to create new datasets. Cancer Research's Cell Slider has volunteers analyzing more than two million images of cancer cells online to help identify a solution. The ebird app has become a global network of 2.5 million bird watchers who add their observations to a central database, and it is the one of the fastest growing biodiversity datasets in existence.

How many women died in childbirth in 2013? Even our best estimate could be nearly 40% too low (ODI).

Official extreme poverty numbers could be missing 350 million people (ODI).

Adopt Common Standards

Comparability is key to make data collected and reported by governments, businesses, investors, and others useful for decision making. Agreeing common standards and accelerating their adoption globally will have a key role to play in closing data gaps and encouraging actions that align with the SDGs.

Example Standardization Drives Accountability

The World Council on City Data (WCCD) has been working with the International Standards organization (ISO) to create a standard for sustainable development reporting by cities. These include standards on measuring the performance of city services and quality of life; and standards that are applicable to any city, municipality or local government to measure its performance in a comparable and verifiable manner, irrespective of size and location. The ISO standard enables city leaders to track and benchmark their progress.

The measures for SDG11 are included in the ISO standard and cities are already reporting into the WCCD Open Data Portal. The portal allows for city-to-city comparisons and displays data using cutting-edge visualizations and tailored trend analyzes. The standardization of city data is not only driving more accountability and enabling improved performance, but it is helping attract the capital markets. For example ratings agencies such as Moody's and Standard and Poor's are considered ways of building standards into the ratings process.

Create The Right Incentives

Traditionally, statistics agencies have relied on regulatory requirements to collect business and stakeholder data as a key input to national statistics. Finding ways to incentivise the sharing of information in a way that creates insight and benefit for both parties provides an alternative approach that can help to close existing data gaps and increase the value and use of information produced.

Example Learning From The Retail Industry

Lessons could be taken from how the consumer research company Nielsen obtains data from a range of retailers to analyze, provide insights and then provide to companies (including retailers) to give them industry wide consumer data.

Prioritize Open Data

Open data' is data that is published in an accessible format that allows anyone to access it, use it, and share it. When big companies or governments release non-personal data, it enables small businesses, citizens, medical researchers, NGOs, and others to develop resources which make crucial improvements to their communities. According to the Open Data Institute, open data can play a key role in supporting the achievement of the SDGs in the following ways: i) more effectively target aid money and improve development programmes, ii) track development progress and prevent corruption, and iii) contribute to innovation, job creation, and economic growth.

Example

Open Data Drives Accountability In Nigeria

The Nigerian government, with support from the Earth Institute's Sustainable Engineering Laboratory, developed the Nigeria Millennium Development Goal (MDG) Information System, an online interactive data platform. Using this system, all government health and education facilities as well as water access points were mapped across Nigeria. It reports the latest status of more than 250,000 facilities using data generated with the help of smartphones. Any Internet user can now ascertain the status of every facility across the entire country. The software tools used for the Nigeria MDG Information System are open-source. The tool is being used by local authorities to improve service delivery; it is also being used by civil society organizations to track which infrastructure facilities are fully operational or where illegal logging is occurring.

Connect To Grassroots Data

Data costs money, time, and human effort to collect. Poor people facing some of the biggest problems are often the least well served by current information. Tackling data inequality is an opportunity for new partnerships between governments and the private sector.

Example Building The Capacity For Citizen Generated Data

Civicus's Datashift initiative is supporting civil society organizations that produce and use citizen-generated data in four initial pilot locations: Argentina, Nepal, Kenya, and Tanzania. The experiences from these pilots will be used to build capacity on citizen-generated data across the world, with the aim of informing and influencing global policy processes on the SDGs and the data revolution for sustainable development, (www.civicus.org/thedatashift)

Adapting to climate change is not always a question of infrastructure or technical solutions. Rather, it is a project for households, communities, cities, institutions as well as countries. Companies will need to go beyond their own operations to engage with academics, consumers, suppliers, local groups, regulators, and customers to find out what is really happening on the ground.

4. Integrate

Integrating the SDGs into strategies and institutions is an opportunity to rewire the DNA of decision-making so that nations, businesses, and communities can minimize risk and grasp new opportunities.

Strengthen Institutional Linkages

National action on the SDGs will require three strands:

1. delivering the SDGs domestically for national citizens,
2. ensuring international development programming and policy supports the delivery of the SDGs in priority countries, c) ensuring that domestic action on the SDGs has a positive impact globally. As such, mainstreaming the Goals into government policy is an opportunity to rewire coordination across governments.

There are a number of different mechanisms for incorporating sustainable development into decision-making including councils, inter-ministerial planning units, and multi-stakeholder dialogue processes).

Example Germany's Institutional Framework For Mainstreaming Sustainable Development

The State Secretaries' Committee on Sustainable Development is a high level committee composed of all ministries' State Secretaries. Its secretariat is in the Chancellery. This committee is responsible for ensuring that sustainable development is a guiding principle of any policy of the German government. It is responsible for monitoring progress against the National Sustainable Development Strategy. The Chief Minister in the Chancellery/ Minister of Special Affairs chairs the State Secretaries Committee and is responsible for sustainable development. There are sustainability directors in each of the ministries.

Integration enables companies to understand internally, and - where relevant - communicate externally, how they create value and to better manage performance on critical issues.

Example The Benefits Of An Integrated Approach To Reporting

Early adopters of integrated reporting at a corporate level have experienced eight key benefits according to Black Sun research'

1. Improved understanding of value creation
2. Better understanding of risks and opportunities
3. Greater focus on long term success
4. Improved collaborative thinking by leaders about goals and targets
5. Better ways of assessing performance
6. Executives and management request and use a more holistic set of information to inform their decision making
7. Reduced silos and increased respect and understanding between departments
8. More collaborative thinking

UNDERSTAND INTERDEPENDENCIES

The SDGs are inextricably intertwined. They together form an integrated measurement framework that enables governments, businesses, and other actors to analyze the implications of a decision across the different impact areas. By focusing on any one Goal alone risks unintended consequences that might undermine achievement of another, and fails to take advantage of potential positive impacts across multiple Goals. For example, the OECD has established the 'Policy Coherence for Sustainable Development Partnership', an online platform which aims to bring together governments, international organizations, civil society, think-tanks, the private sector, and other stakeholders from all regions of the world committed to enhance policy coherence for sustainable development (SDG 17.14) as a key means of SDG implementation.

5. Communicate progress

Open and accessible data is not enough if we are not communicating progress. All players benefit if we can answer the question - are we on track for a sustainable future?

Produce A National Integrated Report

In a world where we 'measure what matters', a national integrated report on progress towards the SDGs should be from the whole country, not from a single ministry or department. As such it would include insights and data from all stakeholder groups - national and local government, business, and civil society to generate a 360 degree perspective of progress. There should be a strong narrative component of the report to allow stakeholders to make sense of the data.

Make It Relevant To The Individual

Progress reports and statistical machinery can seem remote from people and the issues they are facing. Wherever possible, efforts should be made to make progress reports speak to their audiences in accessible and relevant terms.

Example Linking Data To People And Their Lives

In South Africa it is the Chief Statistician's responsibility to report to the public each week - and to link statistics to livelihoods. This approach is proving a powerful tool for communicating what policy decisions mean for people. This outreach is underpinned by robust statistical machinery which helps with business intelligence, communicating progress which subsequently leads to action.

Collate Data To Show The Big Picture

Statistics Netherlands has a data portal to allow users to browse, collate and use all the data generated by government organizations. Similarly, the UK Office of National Statistics uses a traffic light system to show both long term and short term progress across 60 core sustainable development indicators. Each year it reports on the headline indicators with accompanying graphs and visuals in a range of formats.

Example The Value Of Aggregated Data

Integrating data sources can reduce costs, increase coverage and drive faster data collection. The MY World survey, run jointly by the UNDP, UN Millennium Campaign, and the Overseas Development Institute, has gathered over 5 million responses worldwide to answer a question about people's priorities for themselves and their families. Standardization of the question has meant that all the data can be aggregated into a single, open database, and allows easy disaggregation by country, gender, age, and level of education. People have used it to identify country priorities, to identify patterns of concern about specific issues, and to illustrate differences and similarities in concerns by age and gender.

Use Visualization To Overcome Complexity

With 17 goals, 169 targets, and 230 indicators to report, communicating progress towards the SDGs is not an easy task, in particular when additional layers of analysis are added to meet the ambition to leave no one behind. Visualization can play a key role to break down complexity and enable all stakeholders to understand trends and the interdependencies between the Goals, and to respond.

Align Existing Reporting Guidelines With The SDGs

Major standard setting groups are assessing how existing reporting standards align with the SDGs. The SDG Compass includes a mapping of the GRI reporting framework against the SDGs. Similarly, the UN Global Compact is exploring how the Communication on Progress prepared by over 8,000 business signatories from around the world is aligned with the SDGs. The UN Principles for Responsible Investment is undertaking a similar exercise to enable the investment community to report the contribution made towards achievement of the Goals.

Example Using The SDGs To Assess Company Performance.

The Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership's Investment Leaders Group is developing an approach to enable investors to assess performance of the companies in which they invest, taking the SDGs as the starting point. Within their recent publication 'In Search of Impact: measuring the full value of capital' they have developed 'basic', 'stretch' and 'ideal' metrics that can be used across all sectors, mapped to the SDGs in areas such as decent work.

Next steps

The Measure What Matters partnership will continue its work to promote coherent deployment, development, alignment and adoption of the SDGs. We invite you to join us.

• The GEC is committed to forging even stronger connections between 'the what of goals and their measurement'; and 'the how of green economy policy and practice', piloting this initially, in seven countries. We shall work to increase the links between SDGs and the 'capitals framework', working closely with accountancy professions, the UN, and trailblazing governments.
•  A4S is working with the finance and accounting community around the world to support the integration of sustainable development into decision making by companies, governments, and investors. Members of its Accounting Bodies Network, who collectively represent over two thirds of the world's accountants, are undertaking outreach activities to build awareness of the Global Goals. Members of the CFO Leadership Network are developing practical toolkits and guidance that enables opportunities and risks represented by the SDGs to be incorporated into finance function activities. We will continue to bring together leaders from public and private sectors to share insights, build alignment and create practical solutions.
• SEI is a founding member of the Independent Research Forum (www.irf2015.org) and has been active in the consultations leading up to the Global Goals framework.
  As an institute, we are committed to developing tools, frameworks, and critical analysis which respond to leading research and policy questions around the implementation, governance, and measurement of the Global Goals. We will continue to bridge science and policy around the challenges and opportunities the Global Goals pose to national government, business, and civil society, and where possible offer new avenues for decision-making which guarantee a sustainable future for all.

• GRI's vision is to create a future where sustainability is integral to every organization's decision-making process. GRI is committed to help companies enhance their contribution to sustainable development and offers the GRI standards for both companies and governments to understand and capture private sector contribution to sustainable development.
• After 43 years of working on sustainable development, MED has a strong appetite to work on a clear universal language that connects stakeholders in a common purpose. IIED will take the thinking forward through its project and country work with our southern partners including: WAVES work on natural capital accounting; in-country green economy diagnosis and planning; and pro-poor environmental and climate mainstreaming in development plans and budgets.