The Global Sustainable Development Report 2023
"Times of Crisis, Times of Change: Science for Accelerating Transformations to Sustainable Development", the 2023 Global Sustainable Development Report (GSDR), finds that at this critical juncture, midway to 2030, incremental and fragmented change is insufficient to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the remaining seven years. Implementation of the 2030 Agenda requires the active mobilization of political leadership and ambition for science-based transformations. This must be achieved globally - leaving no country, society or person behind. The report is an invitation to embrace transformations with the urgency needed to accelerate progress towards the SDGs.

The GSDR 2023 highlights key transformations needed in different sectors and provides key findings from the literature, practical examples and tools for progress towards the SDGs. It provides a stylized model to help unpack and understand the transformation process over time and outline the roles of different levers in facilitating various stages of transformation through a systematic and structured approach. As history has shown, transformations are inevitable, and this report emphasizes that deliberate and desirable transformations are possible - and, indeed, necessary.

Science must play major role in advancing sustainable development

Science must play a major role in advancing sustainable development providing evidence to support the emergence of innovations and dismantle negative pathways or paradigms. The report calls on universities, policymakers and research funders to increase support to research guided by the 2030 Agenda, especially in the Global South. To be meaningful, science needs to be transparent, inclusive, and transdisciplinary – produced in diverse contexts by heterogeneous and multidisciplinary groups engaging all possible actors, including youth.