Progress for Every Child in the SDG Era
REPORT assessing performance toward achieving the SDG global targets that concern children and young people.
Read the full report here.
Over half a billion children live in countries unable to measure progress toward achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), according to new UNICEF data.
The UNICEF report, Progress for Children in the SDG Era, is the first thematic report assessing performance toward achieving the SDG global targets that concern children and young people.
Where sufficient data is available, the scale of the challenge posed by the SDG targets remains daunting. The report warns that 650 million children live in countries where at least two-thirds of the SDGs are out of reach without accelerated progress.
“More than half the world's children live in countries where we either can't track their SDG progress, or where we can and they are woefully off-track," said Laurence Chandy, UNICEF Director for the Division of Data, Research and Policy. “The world must renew its commitment to attaining the SDGs, starting with renewing its commitment to measuring them."
Given current trends, unless we accelerate progress to meet the child related SDG targets by 2030:
- 10 million children will die from preventable causes before their fifth birthday;
- As many as 31 million children will be stunted due to lack of adequate nutrition;
- At least 22 million children will miss out on pre-primary education;
- 150 million girls will marry before their 18th birthday;
- 670 million people, many of them children, will still be without basic drinking water.
The report calls for renewed efforts to address the global data-deficiency and identifies three principles for moving forward:
- Improve the quality, coverage, and coordination of data systems;
- Ensure all countries have minimum data coverage for children;
Develop international norms and standards for data collection and analysis.
