Trade in Transforming Our World: Options for follow-up and review of the trade-related elements of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development

The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development adopted in September 2015 commits all United Nations Member States to an ambitious and wide-ranging set of objectives requiring an integrated approach to environmental, social, and economic development concerns. 

Trade and trade policy tools are referenced throughout the Sustainable Development Goals and even more fulsomely in the Addis Ababa Action Agenda on financing for development. The many references reflect the important contribution trade is expected to make to objectives as diverse as ending hunger, the sustainable use of marine and terrestrial ecosystems, and ensuring healthy lives. How trade is managed and trade policy crafted will be crucial to the achievement of this new agenda for sustainable development.  

This paper draws on the experience of IISD and ICTSD in trade, sustainable development, and international governance to provide an overview of how and where the trade elements of the 2030 Agenda might best be reviewed. The paper maps where trade and trade policy are referenced, explicitly or implicitly, in the 2030 Agenda, identifying six clusters of commitments. It then suggests a range of indicators that could be used to measure progress against these commitments and shows how existing policy review mechanisms could be used to review and galvanise progress. The discussion in the text is supported by a detailed annex that provides a range of options for both measurement and review of the relevant elements.