Measuring UK Progress Towards Sustainable Development Goals

1. Sustainable Development Goals James Evans James.Evans@ons.gov.uk SustainableDevelopment@ons.gov.uk

2. What are the Sustainable Development Goals? The sustainable development goals are a ‘to do list for the planet that will transform the world’. – Ban Ki-Moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations

3. The Goals

4. The role of ONS Geography Ethnicity Sex Migratory status • To • Inform global reporting • Indentify UK-focused indicators • Explore and develop new data sources Age Income Disability

5. Engagement Activities In order to help ONS meet the challenge of measuring and reporting UK progress toward the SDGs, we have actively engaged with policy making departments, businesses, civil society and international NSIs and organisations. 

6. National and International Engagement Desk Research - Analysis of SDPs -Other developed countries practices Peer Networking - OGDs (Consultation phase 1 and 2) - OGD one-to-ones - Conferences and seminars - Other developed countries’ practices Methodological Constraints* - Data availability - Metadata Expert Advice - OGDs (Consultation phase 1 and 2) - Internal - Non Gov Groups (UKSSD Information Gathering Exercise) ONS (one-to-ones) - International (UN SDSN) Draft set of nationally relevant indicators developed for Autumn Consultation 2016 *would only apply to the development of temporary/proxy measures Nationally Relevant Indicators

7. Preparations for Autumn consultation Independently assess all suggested UK indicators. Put forward indicator recommendations for consultation. Liaise across ONS to inform Social, Economic and Environmental indicators. Partner with RSS to launch consultation and hold series of events.

8. How will ONS fulfil its role? We intend to measure UK progress on SDGs by utilising existing corporate programmes and projects, namely: • Data collection and transformation • Big and admin data • Data Science

9. How will we harness these developing capabilities? • Data collection, validation and dissemination mechanism • Data visual & analytical development • Web scraping • PDF reading • Format • Cloud storage and security • Filling data gaps • Company reports • Internet sites • Admin data sources • Data implementation • Web downloads • Excel • CSV Files • SAS Outputs

10. Feasibility Study The SDG Branch will work with a team of Data Scientists addressing three main challenges: • How to utilise existing but varied data sources. • How to fill data gaps where no known data sources exist. • How to collect, validate and disseminate data.

11. Existing data sources • ONS survey data • Administrative data • Other government department data • Civil society data • Trade organisation data • Many more

12. Filling data gaps • Google maps • Data scraping • Semantic analysis • Machine learning classification • Pattern recognition • Social media

13. Example 1 - Goal 3 / Target 1: By 2030, reduce the global maternal mortality ratio to less than 70 per 100,000 live births Death Register (Admin Data) Coroner Reports (Admin Data) (Semantic Analysis) (Machine Learning) Data visualisations onto Google Maps Medical Accessibility (Admin Data) Transportation Network (Admin Data)

14. Possible policy impacts • Regional specific medical accessibility • Regional specific transport infrastructure

15. Data collection, validation and dissemination

16. Putting the pieces together Managing and securing data Managing permissions and access Consistent approach to cataloguing and publishing data across GSS Developing methodology for non survey data Methodology framework for processing non survey data Quality assuring data Digital Economy Bill infrastructure

17. We are striving for the capability to: Import external data in different formats Update data in real time Link and compare SDG data sets Create data visualisations Quality interrogation techniques Be accessible to statistical modelling Access a safe sandpit environment

18. Next Steps • Consultation will go live in autumn 2016. • The Data Science feasibility study will be completed by December 2016. • Agreed indicators will be in place by spring 2017. • Favourable findings will inform a specification and build beginning January 2017. • We are aiming for a platform at alpha stage by summer 2017. • Our aspiration is to collaborate internationally, use open source code and incorporate UN guidance.

19. Questions?

20. France… …have an inter-ministerial Representative for Sustainable Development and a General Commissioner for Sustainable Development. …highlighted their high quality of life, but noted that there is work to be done, particularly around inequalities, healthy ecosystems and natural resources. …are developing a national action plan and have established a participatory internet platform, agenda2030.gov.fr.

21. Germany… Their work is monitored by the Parliamentary Advisory Council on Sustainable Development and an independent Council for Sustainable Development. …have a State Secretaries Committee for Sustainable Development, chaired by the head of the Federal Chancellery. …are revising their National Sustainable Development Strategy in light of Agenda 2030's ambition and goal structure, to be completed in autumn 2016. The strategy contains national goals and indicators that allow them to 'measure progress and identify any wrong turns in policy'.

22. Finland… Their national Sustainable Development Indicators will be revised to complement the global indicators. …are drafting a national action plan, which will identify strengths as well as gaps and challenges. …are setting up an Indicator Network, comprising representatives from statistics, research, policy and stakeholder groups.

23. Norway… The government has identified issues across the 3 pillars - economy, society, environment - that need addressing nationally. The Prime Minister is co-chair of the UN Secretary General's SDG Advocacy Group.