Addressing inequities within the Sustainable Development Goals: ensuring "no-one is left behind"

Solutions to the multi-faceted crises of climate change, biodiversity loss and sustainable development are not possible without concurrently addressing inequities of wealth, opportunity, health, and education, sharply divided by gender and geography - to name but a few. This is acknowledged within the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) themselves, via Goals 5 and 10 specifically and the other goals more generally. We can address inequities in sustainable development by accounting for intersectionality (the interconnections among social categories as they apply to individuals and groups) when developing climate mitigation approaches and environmental conservation. However, this requires a systems-based, transdisciplinary approach, combining methods from across the social, natural, and mathematical sciences, to develop an understanding of these "wicked" problems and to find solutions.
The COVID-19 pandemic has served to exacerbate inequalities globally. 2022/23 sees the launch of ambitious new agreements, such as the UNFCCC COP27, CBD COP15 and the UN 2030 Framework for Biodiversity. Nature-based solutions (NbS) have the potential to support these programmes to ensure they deliver transformative change through supporting sustainable livelihoods whilst enhancing the provision of ecosystem services, supporting biodiversity conservation, and providing the co-benefits of climate change adaptation and mitigation. However, success will only be assured if inequities are accounted for during their inception. This project will take a systems-based approach to evaluate nature-based
solutions as a means of implementing multiple goals across the SDGs concurrently, whilst also accounting for intersectionality. This approach will ensure that pre-existing and potential inequities are taken into consideration, inequalities that would otherwise undermine the success of international agreements and programmes that are vital to the planet's health and well-being.
Methods will include semi-structured interviews, q-methodology, focus groups, and key informant interviews alongside meta-data analysis, content analysis and social network analysis, to address four objectives:
1) To investigate the inherent trade-offs between Goals 5 and 10 and other SDGS to understand how these trade-offs may undermine the achievement of the SDGs.
2) To map the values system for different elements of intersectionality within the UN system.
3) To evaluate a series of NbS programmes in relation to their success in terms of tackling environmental challenges and sustainable development whilst concurrently addressing social inequities.
4) To develop policy guidelines for accounting for inequities in programmes aimed at achieving both sustainable development and environmental protection