Sustainable Development Report 2025

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Report by the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN): “Ten years after the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), progress remains alarmingly off-track, with less than 20% of targets projected to be achieved by 2030…The SDR includes the SDG Index and Dashboards, which rank all UN Member States on their performance across the 17 Goals, and this year’s report features a new Index (SDGi), which focuses on 17 headline indicators to track overall SDG progress over time…This year’s SDR highlights five key findings:

The Global Financial Architecture (GFA) must be urgently reformed to finance global public goods and achieve sustainable development. Roughly half the world’s population resides in countries that cannot adequately invest in sustainable development due to unsustainable debt burdens and limited access to affordable, long-term capital. Sustainable development is a high-return investment, yet the GFA continues to direct capital toward high-income countries instead of EMDEs, which offer stronger growth prospects and higher returns. Global public goods also remain significantly underfinanced. The upcoming Ff4D offers a critical opportunity for UN Member States to reform this system and ensure that international financing flows at scale to EMDEs to achieve sustainable development…

At the global level, SDG progress has stalled; none of the 17 Global Goals are on track, and only 17% of the SDG targets are on track to be achieved by 2030. Conflicts, structural vulnerabilities, and limited fiscal space continue to hinder progress, especially in emerging and developing economies (EMDEs). The five targets showing significant reversal in progress since 2015 include: obesity rate (SDG 2), press freedom (SDG 16), sustainable nitrogen management (SDG 2), the red list index (SDG 15), and the corruption perception index (SDG 16). Conversely, many countries have made notable progress in expanding access to basic services and infrastructure, including: mobile broadband use (SDG 9), access to electricity (SDG 7), internet use (SDG 9), under-5 mortality rate (SDG 3), and neonatal mortality (SDG 3). However, future progress on many of these indicators, including health-related outcomes, is threatened by global tensions and the decline in international development finance.

Barbados leads again in UN-based multilateralism commitment, while the U.S. ranks last. The SDR 2025’s Index of countries’ support to UN-based multilateralism (UN-Mi) ranks countries based on their support for and engagement with the UN system. The top three countries most committed to UN multilateralism are: Barbados (#1), Jamaica (#2), and Trinidad and Tobago (#3). Among G20 nations, Brazil (#25) ranks highest, while Chile (#7) leads among OECD countries. In contrast, the U.S., which recently withdrew from the Paris Climate Agreement and the World Health Organization (WHO) and formally declared its opposition to the SDGs and the 2030 Agenda, ranks last (#193) for the second year in a row…(More)”

The Global A.I. Divide

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Adam Satariano and Paul Mozur: “Last month, Sam Altman, the chief executive of the artificial intelligence company OpenAI, donned a helmet, work boots and a luminescent high-visibility vest to visit the construction site of the company’s new data center project in Texas.

Bigger than New York’s Central Park, the estimated $60 billion project, which has its own natural gas plant, will be one of the most powerful computing hubs ever created when completed as soon as next year.

Around the same time as Mr. Altman’s visit to Texas, Nicolás Wolovick, a computer science professor at the National University of Córdoba in Argentina, was running what counts as one of his country’s most advanced A.I. computing hubs. It was in a converted room at the university, where wires snaked between aging A.I. chips and server computers.

“Everything is becoming more split,” Dr. Wolovick said. “We are losing.”

Artificial intelligence has created a new digital divide, fracturing the world between nations with the computing power for building cutting-edge A.I. systems and those without. The split is influencing geopolitics and global economics, creating new dependencies and prompting a desperate rush to not be excluded from a technology race that could reorder economies, drive scientific discovery and change the way that people live and work.

The biggest beneficiaries by far are the United States, China and the European Union. Those regions host more than half of the world’s most powerful data centers, which are used for developing the most complex A.I. systems, according to data compiled by Oxford University researchers. Only 32 countries, or about 16 percent of nations, have these large facilities filled with microchips and computers, giving them what is known in industry parlance as “compute power.”..(More)”.

In a world first, Brazilians will soon be able to sell their digital data

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Gabriel Daros: “Last month, Brazil announced it is rolling out a data ownership pilot that will allow its citizens to manage, own, and profit from their digital footprint — the first such nationwide initiative in the world. 

The project is administered by Dataprev, a state-owned company that provides technological solutions for the government’s social programs. Dataprev is partnering with DrumWave, a California-based data valuation and monetization firm.

Today, “people get nothing from the data they share,” Brittany Kaiser, co-founder of the Own Your Data Foundation and board adviser for DrumWave, told Rest of World. “Brazil has decided its citizens should have ownership rights over their data.”

In monetizing users’ data, Brazil is ahead of the U.S., where a 2019 “data dividend” initiative by California Governor Gavin Newsom never took off. The city of Chicago successfully monetizes government data including transportation and education. If implemented, Brazil’s will be the first public-private partnership that allows citizens, rather than companies, to get a share of the global data market, currently valued at $4 billion and expected to grow to over $40 billion by 2034.

The pilot involves a small group of Brazilians who will use data wallets for payroll loans. When users apply for a new loan, the data in the contract will be collected in the data wallets, which companies will be able to bid on. Users will have the option to opt out. It works much like third-party cookies, but instead of simply accepting or declining, people can choose to make money…(More)”.

The Global Data Barometer 2nd edition: A Shared Compass for Navigating the Data Landscape

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Report by the Global Data Barometer: “Across the globe, we’re at a turning point. From artificial intelligence and digital governance to public transparency and service delivery, data is now a fundamental force shaping how our societies function and who they serve. It holds tremendous promise to drive inclusive growth, foster accountability, and support urgent action on global challenges. And yet, access to high-quality, usable data is becoming increasingly constrained.

Some, like Verhulst (2024), have begun calling this moment a “data winter,” a period marked by shrinking openness, rising inequality in access, and growing fragmentation in how data is governed and used. This trend poses a risk not just to innovation but to the democratic values that underpin trust, participation, and accountability.

In this complex landscape, evidence matters more than ever. That is why we are proud to launch the Second Edition of the Global Data Barometer (GDB), a collaborative and comparative study that tracks the state of data for the public good across 43 countries, with a focused lens on Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) and Africa…

The Barometer tracks countries across four dimensions: governance, capabilities, and availability, while also exploring key cross-cutting areas like AI readiness, inclusion, and data use. Here are some of the key takeaways:

  • The Implementation Gap

Many countries have adopted laws and frameworks for data governance, but there is a stark gap between policy and practice. Without strong institutions and dedicated capacity, even well-designed frameworks fall short.

  • The Role of Skills and Infrastructure

Data does not flow or translate into value without people and systems in place. Across both Latin America and the Caribbean and Africa, we see underinvestment in public sector skills, training, and the infrastructure needed to manage and reuse data effectively.

  • AI Is Moving Faster Than Governance

AI is increasingly present in national strategies, but very few countries have clear policies to guide its ethical use. Governance frameworks rarely address issues like algorithmic bias, data quality, or the accountability of AI-driven decision-making.

  • Open Data Needs Reinvestment

Many countries once seen as open data champions are struggling to sustain their efforts. Legal mandates are not always matched by technical implementation or resources. As a result, open data initiatives risk losing momentum.

  • Transparency Tools Are Missing

Key datasets that support transparency and anti-corruption, such as lobbying registers, beneficial ownership data, and political finance records, are often missing or fragmented. This makes it hard to follow the money or hold institutions to account.

  • Inclusion Is Still Largely Symbolic

Despite commitments to equity, inclusive data governance remains the exception. Data is rarely published in Indigenous or widely spoken non-official languages. Accessibility for persons with disabilities is often treated as a recommendation rather than a requirement.

  • Interoperability Remains a Barrier

Efforts to connect datasets across government, such as on procurement, company data, or political integrity, are rare. Without common standards or identifiers, it is difficult to track influence or evaluate policy impact holistically…(More)”.

New data tools enhance the development effectiveness of tourism investment

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Louise Twining-Ward, Alex Pio and Alba Suris Coll-Vinent: “The tourism sector is a major driver of economic growth and inclusive job creation. Tourism generates a high number of jobs, especially for women (UN Tourism). In 2024, tourism was responsible for one in ten jobs worldwide, delivering 337.7 million total jobs, and accounted for 10.5 percent of global GDP . For many developing countries, it is a primary generator of foreign exchange.

The growth of this vital sector depends heavily on public investment in infrastructure and services. But rapid change, due to uncertain geopolitics, climate shocks, and shifting consumer behavior, can make it hard to know how best to spend scarce resources. Traditional data sources are unable to keep up, leaving policymakers without the timely insights needed to effectively manage mounting complexities. Only a few developing coutries collect and maintain tourism satellite accounts (TSAs), which help capture tourism’s contribution to their economies. However, even in these countries, tourist arrival data and spending behavior, through immigration data and visitor surveys, are often processed with a lag. There is an urgent need for more accessible, more granular, and more timely data tools.

Emerging Data Tools

For this reason, the World Bank partnered with Visa to access anonymized and aggregated credit card spend data in the Caribbean and attempt to fill data gaps. This and other emerging tools for policymaking—such as satellite and geospatial mapping, analysis of online reviews, artificial intelligence, and advanced analytics—now allow tourism destinations to take a closer look at local demand patterns, gauge visitor satisfaction in near-real time, and measure progress on everything from carbon footprints to women’s employment in tourism…(More)”.

Brazil’s AI-powered social security app is wrongly rejecting claims

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Gabriel Daros: “Brazil’s social security institute, known as INSS, added AI to its app in 2018 in an effort to cut red tape and speed up claims. The office, known for its long lines and wait times, had around 2 million pending requests for everything from doctor’s appointments to sick pay to pensions to retirement benefits at the time. While the AI-powered tool has since helped process thousands of basic claims, it has also rejected requests from hundreds of people like de Brito — who live in remote areas and have little digital literacy — for minor errors.

The government is right to digitize its systems to improve efficiency, but that has come at a cost, Edjane Rodrigues, secretary for social policies at the National Confederation of Workers in Agriculture, told Rest of World.

“If the government adopts this kind of service to speed up benefits for the people, this is good. We are not against it,” she said. But, particularly among farm workers, claims can be complex because of the nature of their work, she said, referring to cases that require additional paperwork, such as when a piece of land is owned by one individual but worked by a group of families. “There are many peculiarities in agriculture, and rural workers are being especially harmed” by the app, according to Rodrigues.

“Each automated decision is based on specified legal criteria, ensuring that the standards set by the social security legislation are respected,” a spokesperson for INSS told Rest of World. “Automation does not work in an arbitrary manner. Instead, it follows clear rules and regulations, mirroring the expected standards applied in conventional analysis.”

Governments across Latin America have been introducing AI to improve their processes. Last year, Argentina began using ChatGPT to draft court rulings, a move that officials said helped cut legal costs and reduce processing times. Costa Rica has partnered with Microsoft to launch an AI tool to optimize tax data collection and check for fraud in digital tax receipts. El Salvador recently set up an AI lab to develop tools for government services.

But while some of these efforts have delivered promising results, experts have raised concerns about the risk of officials with little tech know-how applying these tools with no transparency or workarounds…(More)”.

To Understand Global Migration, You Have to See It First

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Data visualization by The New York Times: “In the maps below, Times Opinion can provide the clearest picture to date of how people move across the globe: a record of permanent migration to and from 181 countries based on a single, consistent source of information, for every month from the beginning of 2019 through the end of 2022. These estimates are drawn not from government records but from the location data of three billion anonymized Facebook users all over the world.

The analysis — the result of new research published on Wednesday from Meta, the University of Hong Kong and Harvard University — reveals migration’s true global sweep. And yes, it excludes business travelers and tourists: Only people who remain in their destination country for more than a year are counted as migrants here.

The data comes with some limitations. Migration to and from certain countries that have banned or restricted the use of Facebook, including China, Iran and Cuba, is not included in this data set, and it’s impossible to know each migrant’s legal status. Nevertheless, this is the first time that estimates of global migration flows have been made publicly available at this scale. The researchers found that from 2019 to 2022, an annual average of 30 million people — approximately one-third of a percent of the world’s population — migrated each year.

If you would like to see the data behind this analysis for yourself, we made an interactive tool that you can use to explore the full data set…(More)”

Developing countries are struggling to achieve their technology aims. Shared digital infrastructure is the answer

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Nii Simmonds: “The digital era offers remarkable prospects for both economic advancement and social development. Yet for emerging economies lacking energy, this potential often seems out of reach. The harsh truths of inconsistent electricity supply and scarce resources looms large over their digital ambitions. Nevertheless, a ray of hope shines through a strategy I call shared digital infrastructure (SDI). This cooperative model has the ability to turn these obstacles into opportunities for growth. By collaborating through regional country partnerships and bodies such as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the African Union (AU) and the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), these countries can harness the revolutionary power of digital technology, despite the challenges.

The digital economy is a critical driver of global GDP, with innovations in artificial intelligence, e-commerce and financial technology transforming industries at an unprecedented pace. At the heart of this transformation are data centres, which serve as the backbone of digital services, cloud computing and AI-driven applications. Yet many developing nations struggle to establish and maintain such facilities due to high energy costs, inadequate grid reliability and limited investment capital…(More)”.

Global population data is in crisis – here’s why that matters

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Andrew J Tatem and Jessica Espey: “Every day, decisions that affect our lives depend on knowing how many people live where. For example, how many vaccines are needed in a community, where polling stations should be placed for elections or who might be in danger as a hurricane approaches. The answers rely on population data.

But counting people is getting harder.

For centuries, census and household surveys have been the backbone of population knowledge. But we’ve just returned from the UN’s statistical commission meetings in New York, where experts reported that something alarming is happening to population data systems globally.

Census response rates are declining in many countries, resulting in large margins of error. The 2020 US census undercounted America’s Latino population by more than three times the rate of the 2010 census. In Paraguay, the latest census revealed a population one-fifth smaller than previously thought.

South Africa’s 2022 census post-enumeration survey revealed a likely undercount of more than 30%. According to the UN Economic Commission for Africa, undercounts and census delays due to COVID-19, conflict or financial limitations have resulted in an estimated one in three Africans not being counted in the 2020 census round.

When people vanish from data, they vanish from policy. When certain groups are systematically undercounted – often minorities, rural communities or poorer people – they become invisible to policymakers. This translates directly into political underrepresentation and inadequate resource allocation…(More)”.

Bridging Digital Divides: How PescaData is Connecting Small-Scale Fishing Cooperatives to the Blue Economy

Curated on Posted on by Stefaan Verhulst

Article by Stuart Fulton: “In this research project, we examine how digital platforms – specifically PescaData – can be leveraged to connect small-scale fishing cooperatives with impact investors and donors, creating new pathways for sustainable blue economy financing, while simultaneously ensuring fair data practices that respect data sovereignty and traditional ecological knowledge.

PescaData emerged as a pioneering digital platform that enables fishing communities to collect more accurate data to ensure sustainable fisheries. Since then, PescaData has evolved to provide software as a service to fishing cooperatives and to allow fishers to document their solutions to environmental and economic challenges. Since 2022, small-scale fishers have used it to document nearly 300 initiatives that contribute to multiple Sustainable Development Goals. 

Respecting Data Sovereignty in the Digital Age

One critical aspect of our research acknowledges the unique challenges of implementing digital tools in traditional cooperative settings. Unlike conventional tech implementations that often extract value from communities, PescaData´s approach centers on data sovereignty – the principle that fishing communities should maintain ownership and control over their data. As the PescaData case study demonstrates, a humanity-centric rather than merely user-centric approach is essential. This means designing with compassion and establishing clear governance around data from the very beginning. The data generated by fishing cooperatives represents not just information, but traditional knowledge accumulated over generations of resource management.

The fishers themselves have articulated clear principles for data governance in a cooperative model:

  • Ownership: Fishers, as data producers, decide who has access and under what conditions.
  • Transparency: Clear agreements on data use.
  • Knowledge assessment: Highlighting fishers’ contributions and placing them in decision-making positions.
  • Co-design: Ensuring the platform meets their specific needs.
  • Security: Protecting collected data…(More)”.