crime and terrorism; promote and enforce non-discriminatory laws and policies. goal 17: partnership for the goals sdg 17 is to: "strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development". increasing international cooperation is seen as vital to achieving each of the 16 previous goals. developing multi-stakeholder partnerships to share knowledge, expertise, technology, and financial support is seen as critical to overall success of the sdgs. the goal encompasses improving north–south and south-south cooperation, and public-private partnerships which involve civil societies are specifically mentioned. this section is an excerpt from sustainable development goal 17. sdg 17 is a vision for improved and more equitable trade, as well as coordinated investment initiatives to promote sustainable development across borders. it is about strengthening and streamlining cooperation between nation-states, both developed and developing, using the sdgs as a shared framework and a shared vision for defining that collaborative way forward. it seeks to promote international trade and an equitable trading system. the goal has 17 targets to be achieved by 2030, broken down into five categories: finance, technology, capacity building, trade and systemic issues. progress towards targets will be measured by 25 indicators. all these targets are regarded as means of implementation targets. cross-cutting issues and synergies young people holding sdg banners in lima, peruto achieve sustainable development, three aspects or dimensions need to come together: the economic, socio-political, and environmental dimensions are all critically important and interdependent. progress will require multidisciplinary and trans-disciplinary research across all three sectors. this proves difficult when major governments fail to support it. cross cutting issues include for example gender equality, education, culture and health. these are just some examples of various interlinkages inherent in the sdgs. gender equality the widespread consensus is that progress on all of the sdgs will be stalled if women's empowerment and gender equality are not prioritized, and treated holistically. the sdgs look to policy makers as well as private sector executives and board members to work toward gender equality. statements from diverse sources, such as the organisation for economic cooperation and development (oecd), un women and the world pensions forum, have noted that investments in women and girls have positive impacts on economies. national and global development investments in women and girls often exceed their initial scope. gender equality is mainstreamed throughout the sdg framework by ensuring that as much sex-disaggregated data as possible are collected.: 11 education and culture training on education for sustainable development workshop in kasese district ugandaeducation for sustainable development (esd) is explicitly recognized in the sdgs as part of target 4.7 of the sdg on education. unesco promotes the global citizenship education (gced) as a complementary approach. education for sustainable development is important for all the other 16 sdgs. culture is explicitly referenced in sdg 11 target 4 ("strengthen efforts to protect and safeguard the world's cultural and natural heritage"). however, culture is seen as a cross-cutting theme because it impacts several sdgs. for example, culture plays a role in sdg targets where they relate to environment and resilience (within sdgs 11, 12 and 16), prosperity and livelihoods (within sdg 8), inclusion and participation (within sdg 11 and 16).: 2 health sdgs 1 to 6 directly address health disparities, primarily in developing countries. these six goals address key issues in global public health, poverty, hunger and food security, health, education, gender equality and women's empowerment, and water and sanitation. public health officials can use these goals to set their own agenda and plan for smaller scale initiatives for their organizations. the links between the various sustainable development goals and public health are numerous and well established: sdg 1: living below the poverty line is attributed to poorer health outcomes and can be even worse for persons living in developing countries where extreme poverty is more common. a child born into poverty is twice as likely to die before the age of five compared to a child from a wealthier family. sdg 2: the detrimental effects of hunger and malnutrition that can arise from systemic challenges with food security are enormous. the world health organization estimates that 12.9 percent of the population in developing countries is undernourished. sdg 4 and 5: educational equity has yet to be reached in the world. public health efforts are impeded by this, as a lack of education can lead to poorer health outcomes. this is shown by children of mothers who have no education having a lower survival rate compared to children born to mothers with primary or greater levels of education. synergies synergies amongst the sdgs are "the good antagonists of trade-offs".: 67 with regards to sdg 13 on climate action, the ipcc sees robust synergies particularly for the sdgs 3 (health), 7 (clean energy), 11 (cities and communities), 12 (responsible consumption and production) and 14 (oceans).: 70 to meet sdg 13 and other sdgs, sustained long-term investment in green innovation is required: to decarbonize the physical capital stock – energy, industry, and transportation infrastructure – and ensure its resilience to a changing future climate; to preserve and enhance natural capital – forests, oceans, and wetlands; and to train people to work in a climate-neutral economy. challenges too many goals and overall problems scholars have pointed out flaws in the design of the sdgs for the following aspects: "the number of goals, the structure of the goal framework (for example, the non-hierarchical structure), the coherence between the goals, the specificity or measurability of the targets, the language used in the text, and their reliance on neoliberal economic development-oriented sustainable development as their core orientation".: 161 the sdgs may simply maintain the status quo and fall short of delivering an ambitious development agenda. the current status quo has been described as "separating human wellbeing and environmental sustainability, failing to change governance and to pay attention to trade-offs, root causes of poverty and environmental degradation, and social justice issues". it has further been argued that the sdgs do not do enough to directly engage with key pressure points such as, "illicit financial flows, debt, unfair trade rules and corporate power" in order to meaningfully challenge the current neoliberal economic system. a commentary in the economist in 2015 argued that 169 targets for the sdgs is too many, describing them as sprawling, misconceived and a mess compared to the eight millennium development goals (mdgs). trade-offs not explicitly addressed the trade-offs among the 17 sdgs might prevent their realization.: 66 for example, these are three difficult trade-offs to consider: "how can ending hunger be reconciled with environmental sustainability? (sdg targets 2.3 and 15.2) how can economic growth be reconciled with environmental sustainability? (sdg targets 9.2 and 9.4) how can income inequality be reconciled with economic growth? (sdg targets 10.1 and 8.1)." the sdgs do not specifically address the tensions between economic growth and environmental sustainability. instead, they emphasize "longstanding but dubious claims about decoupling and resource efficiency as technological solutions to the environmental crisis".: 145 for example, continued global economic growth of 3 percent (sdg 8) may not be reconcilable with ecological sustainability goals, because the required rate of absolute global eco-economic decoupling is far higher than any country has achieved in the past. weak on environmental sustainability sdg wedding cake model: a way of viewing the economic, social and ecological aspects of the sustainable development goals (sdgs). further information: sustainability scholars have criticized that the sdgs "fail to recognize that planetary, people and prosperity concerns are all part of one earth system, and that the protection of planetary integrity should not be a means to an end, but an end in itself".: 147 the sdgs "remain fixated on the idea that economic growth is foundational to achieve all pillars of sustainable development".: 147 they do not prioritize environmental protection.: 144 the sdgs include three environment-focused sdgs, which are goal 13, 14 and 15 (climate, land and oceans), but there is no overarching environmental or planetary goal.: 144 the sdgs do not pursue planetary integrity as such.: 144 environmental constraints and planetary boundaries are underrepresented within the sdgs. for instance, the way the current sdgs are structured leads to a negative correlation between environmental sustainability and sdgs. the sdgs have been criticized for their inability to protect biodiversity. they could unintentionally promote environmental destruction in the name of sustainable development. certain studies also argue that the focus of the sdgs on neoliberal sustainable development is detrimental to planetary integrity and justice. both of these ambitions (planetary integrity and justice) would require limits to economic growth.: 145 scientists have proposed several ways to address the weaknesses regarding environmental sustainability in the sdgs: the monitoring of essential variables to better capture the essence of coupled environmental and social systems that underpin sustainable development, helping to guide coordination and systems transformation. more attention to the context of the biophysical systems in different places (e.g., coastal river deltas, mountain areas) better understanding of feedbacks across scales in space (e.g., through globalization) and time (e.g., affecting future generations) that could ultimately determine the success or failure of the sdgs. ethical aspects there are concerns about the ethical orientation of the sdgs: they remain "underpinned by strong (western) modernist notions of development: sovereignty of humans over their environment (anthropocentricism), individualism, competition, freedom (rights rather than duties), self-interest, belief in the market leading to collective welfare, private property (protected by legal systems), rewards based on merit, materialism, quantification of value, and instrumentalization of labor".: 146 some studies warn that the sdgs could be used to camouflage business-as-usual by disguising it using sdg-related sustainability rhetoric. a meta-analysis review study in 2022 found that: "there is even emerging evidence that the sdgs might have even adverse effects, by providing a "smokescreen of hectic political activity" that blurs a reality of stagnation, dead ends and business-as-usual".: 220 difficulties with tracking qualitative indicators regarding the targets of the sdgs, there is generally weak evidence linking the means of implementation to outcomes. the targets about means of implementation (those denoted with a letter, for example, target 6.a) are imperfectly conceptualized and inconsistently formulated, and tracking their largely qualitative indicators will be difficult. monitoring mechanism world map showing countries that are closest to meeting the sdgs (in dark blue) and those with the greatest remaining challenges (in the lightest shade of blue) in 2018. un high-level political forum on sustainable development (hlpf) main article: high-level political forum on sustainable development the high-level political forum on sustainable development (hlpf) replaced the united nations commission on sustainable development in 2012.: 206 it should be a "regular meeting place for governments and non-state representatives to assess global progress towards sustainable development".: 206 the meetings take place under the auspices of the united nations economic and social council. in july 2020 the meeting took place online for the first time due to the covid-19 pandemic. the theme was "accelerated action and transformative pathways: realizing the decade of action and delivery for sustainable development" and a ministerial declaration was adopted. high-level progress reports for all the sdgs are published in the form of reports by the united nations secretary general. the most recent one is from april 2020. however, the hlpf has a range of problems. it has not been able to promote system-wide coherence. the reasons for this include its broad and unclear mandate combined with a lack of resources and divergent national interests. therefore, this reporting system is mainly just a platform for voluntary reporting and peer learning among governments. monitoring tools and websites the online publication sdg-tracker was launched in june 2018 and presents data across all available indicators. it relies on the our world in data database and is also based at the university of oxford. the publication has global coverage and tracks whether the world is making progress towards the sdgs. it aims to make the data on the 17 goals available and understandable to a wide audience. the sdg-tracker highlights that the world is currently (early 2019) very far away from achieving the goals. the global sdg index and dashboards report is the first publication to track countries' performance on all 17 sustainable development goals. the annual publication, co-produced by bertelsmann stiftung and sdsn, includes a ranking and dashboards that show key challenges for each country in terms of implementing the sdgs. the publication also shows an analysis of government efforts