It has been mandated that the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) currently under negotiation at the United Nations should achieve an appropriate balance between the economic, social and environmental dimensions of sustainable development.

As a timely contribution to the post-2015 development agenda negotiations taking place at UN Headquarters in New York this week, Stakeholder Forum, in a study commissioned by the German Council for Sustainable Development, has examined integration in the proposed SDGs.

The draft set of SDGs presented in the final report of the United Nation’s Open Working Group (OWG) include most of the highest priority objectives of the world’s economic, social and environmental agendas and in that sense achieves a degree of balance. The individual goals are not, however, so well balanced within themselves. Some are clearly primarily economic goals, others social and some environmental.

Using stakeholder proposals, this paper puts forward options for building upon the proposed SDGs and achieving better balance of the three dimensions of sustainable development within the goals.

The report is featured below...