Data extracted in April 2025.
Planned article update: June 2026.
Highlights
This article is a part of a set of statistical articles, which are based on the Eurostat publication ’Sustainable development in the European Union — Monitoring report on progress towards the SDGs in an EU context — 2025 edition’. This report is the ninth edition of Eurostat’s series of monitoring reports on sustainable development, which provide a quantitative assessment of progress of the EU towards the SDGs in an EU context.
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), adopted by the United Nations (UN) in September 2015, is the world’s roadmap for achieving sustainable development in this decade. The European Union (EU) has fully committed itself to delivering on the 2030 Agenda, and the SDGs form an intrinsic part of the European Commission’s work programme and its Political Guidelines for the period 2024 to 2029.
Monitoring and communicating about the progress made towards the 17 SDGs is essential in realising the 2030 Agenda’s vision, both globally and in the EU. Since 2017, Eurostat monitors the EU’s progress based on the EU SDG indicator set and presents the assessment of the past 5- and 15-year periods in annual reports. This is the ninth edition in the series, covering data up to 2023 or 2024.
How has the EU progressed towards the SDGs?
The overview arrow (overleaf) shows the pace at which the EU has progressed towards each of the 17 goals over the most recent five-year period of available data.
Significant progress has been made towards the objectives and targets related to reduced inequalities (SDG 10), decent work and economic growth (SDG 8) and quality education (SDG 4). The EU has also made progress towards most of the other SDGs, but at a slower pace. Among the group of goals with moderate progress, the EU has performed best for gender equality (SDG 5), responsible consumption and production (SDG 12), industry, innovation and infrastructure (SDG 9) and zero hunger (SDG 2). By contrast, the assessment shows no significant progress for life below water (SDG 14), due to the slow expansion of marine protected areas and the worsening health of the ocean.
A movement away from the sustainable development objectives has been observed for clean water and sanitation (SDG 6) and life on land (SDG 15). Progress towards SDG 6 has been unfavourably affected by water stress, whereas development in SDG 15 has been negatively impacted by land degradation and loss of biodiversity.
Summary at goal level
This section provides an overview of the development of individual indicators for each of the goals over the most recent five-year period of available data (mostly 2018–2023 or 2019–2024). The method for assessing indicator progress and aggregating them at the goal-level is explained in Annex II in the printed publication.
The EU’s situation regarding SDG 1 ‘No poverty’ has generally improved. Developments of multidimensional poverty show that fewer people were affected by monetary poverty, suffered from severe material and social deprivation or lived in (quasi-)jobless households. The share of people overburdened by their housing costs or facing severe housing deprivation has fallen as well. Despite these improvements, more needs to be done to meet the EU’s multidimensional target of lifting at least 15 million people out of poverty or social exclusion by 2030.
Monitoring SDG 2 ‘Zero hunger’ in the EU context focuses mainly on the sustainability of agricultural production and its environmental impacts, but also on malnutrition. The economic viability and sustainability of agricultural production has developed favourably. Labour productivity of the EU’s agricultural sector has improved and public investments in agricultural R&D have increased. In addition, organic farming has grown steadily, although stronger progress will be required to meet the target for it to cover 25% of the EU’s total farmland by 2030. The use and risk of chemical pesticides has decreased strongly, and the EU is on track to meet its respective 2030 target. Ammonia emissions from agriculture and nitrate concentrations in EU groundwater bodies have also fallen. However, agricultural production still has negative effects on nature in the EU, which are visible in the continued and dramatic decline of common farmland birds. No progress has been made on malnutrition, with the share of obese people in the EU stagnating.
SDG 3 ‘Good health and well-being’ shows both positive and negative developments. While the EU’s healthy life expectancy was on the rise until 2019, it fell below pre-pandemic levels in 2021. People’s self-perceived health has also declined recently. The avoidable mortality rate had increased due to COVID-19 related deaths, but the situation improved in 2022. The share of smokers continued its downward trend in 2023. However, the share of obese people has stagnated. Trends in health care have been even more unfavourable. The share of people reporting unmet needs for medical care has risen strongly, mainly because of increasingly long waiting lists. Additionally, the consumption of antibiotics in the community and hospital sectors has fallen only slightly, meaning the EU is not on track to meet its 2030 target.
Significant progress was made for SDG 4 ‘Quality education’. The EU is well on track to meet its 2030 targets for participation in early childhood education, early leavers from education and training and tertiary educational attainment. Adult learning (referring to the four weeks before the data was collected) has also increased, showing particularly strong growth since 2020. However, trends have been unfavourable for educational outcomes. The proportion of low achieving pupils in reading, mathematics and science as measured in the OECD’s PISA study increased strongly from 2018 to 2022, moving the EU further away from its target of reducing these shares to 15% by 2030. In addition, the share of adults with at least basic digital skills stood just above 55% in 2023 and thus remains far from the target of 80% by 2030.
SDG 5 ‘Gender equality’ is characterised by largely favourable developments. While the gender gap for early school leaving has narrowed, men continue to lag behind women in tertiary educational attainment. Women’s hourly earnings are catching up with those of men. The gap between men and women who are outside the labour force due to caring responsibilities has also narrowed. Similarly, the gender employment gap has decreased, even though stronger progress will be necessary for the EU to meet its target of halving this gap by 2030. More women obtained leadership positions, as shown by the growth in both the shares of women in national parliaments and in senior management positions of the largest listed companies. Despite these improvements, more efforts are needed to reach gender parity in the labour market and in leadership positions.
The EU has moved away from the desired direction on SDG 6 ‘Clean water and sanitation’. While the sanitation situation evolved favourably, the picture is mixed regarding water quality and unfavourable when it comes to water scarcity. On the positive side, the share of people without appropriate sanitation facilities in their households has steadily decreased, and connectivity to at least secondary wastewater treatment has improved slowly. Regarding water quality, the biochemical oxygen demand in rivers and the nitrate concentrations in EU groundwater bodies have decreased, but phosphate concentrations in EU rivers have risen strongly. Additionally, the share of inland bathing waters with excellent quality has declined in the EU. The water exploitation index shows that the pressure on the EU’s freshwater resources increased strongly in 2022. EU ecosystems are also increasingly affected by water scarcity, with the ten-year moving average showing a strong increase in the EU area affected by drought.
Most of the indicators of SDG 7 ‘Affordable and clean energy’ have improved compared with 2018, though further acceleration is required in certain areas to ensure the EU reaches its 2030 targets. The EU achieved reductions in both its primary and final energy consumption, but further progress is needed to meet the respective 2030 targets. Households managed to further decrease their final energy consumption, and energy productivity has improved strongly. The share of renewable energy has grown, but it needs to grow faster to meet the respective 2030 target. In 2023, the EU’s energy import dependency fell back to the levels recorded in earlier years after the exceptional year of 2022 that was marked by the refilling of gas stocks. Access to affordable energy remained problematic, as the share of the population unable to keep the home adequately warm saw another strong rise in 2023 due to the continued high energy prices.
SDG 8 ‘Decent work and economic growth’ shows improvements in almost all indicators monitored. GDP per capita has improved, but the investment share of GDP has fallen slightly. The EU’s employment rate reached a new record high of 75.8% in 2024. Additionally, both the EU’s long-term unemployment rate and the share of young people neither in employment nor in education and training (NEET) fell to new record lows in 2024. In the area of decent work, both the incidence of fatal work accidents and the share of ‘working poor’ continued to decline.
Most of the indicators of SDG 9 ‘Industry, innovation and infrastructure’ developed favourably, except in the area of sustainable transport. The air emissions intensity of the manufacturing sector declined further, and the gross value added (GVA) of the environmental goods and services sector has continued to grow strongly. The share of research & development (R&D) personnel in the labour force has increased considerably. Patent applications to the European Patent Office have grown slightly. By contrast, the EU’s R&D expenditure has increased at a slower pace than GDP since 2020. Stronger efforts will thus be necessary for the EU to meet its 2030 target of dedicating 3% of its GDP to R&D. Developments are mixed for sustainable infrastructure. The share of households enjoying high-speed internet connections has grown considerably. The use of public passenger transport modes (buses and trains) increased strongly in 2022 compared with the COVID-19 related lows in 2020 and 2021, but overall remained below the levels seen before the pandemic. The share of rail and waterways in inland freight transport has further decreased.
The EU has continued to make significant progress towards SDG 10 ‘Reduced inequalities’. Income inequalities within countries have reduced, as the income gap between richer and poorer population groups has diminished. Similarly, the distance of incomes below the poverty threshold to the threshold, and the poverty gap between rural and urban areas, have narrowed in the EU. Data on economic disparities between EU countries also shows a continued convergence of Member States in terms of GDP per capita and household income. Furthermore, the gap between non-EU citizens and EU home country nationals has narrowed for all the indicators, indicating better integration of migrants. Due to all these positive developments SDG 10 is the goal with the strongest EU progress.
SDG 11 ‘Sustainable cities and communities’ shows a mixed picture. While the quality of life in cities and communities has improved, sustainable mobility and impacts on the environment show a number of unfavourable trends. The severe housing deprivation rate has decreased considerably. Likewise, the number of premature deaths due to exposure to fine particulate matter has fallen significantly. The perceived exposure to noise, however, has stagnated. Moreover, road traffic deaths stagnated between 2021 and 2023 after a lockdown-induced low in 2020, and stronger efforts will be necessary for the EU to meet its 2030 target. Soil sealing with impervious materials has increased continuously. The growth in the EU’s recycling rate of municipal waste has slowed in recent years, putting the EU at risk of not meeting its respective target by 2030. The rate of connecting households to wastewater treatment has slowed.
Developments in SDG 12 ‘Responsible consumption and production’ have been largely positive. The material footprint, meaning the global extraction of materials induced by the consumption of goods and services in the EU, has fallen slightly. Moreover, the consumption of hazardous chemicals has decreased considerably. The environmental goods and services sector has continued to outperform other economic sectors. Total waste generation has risen slightly since its COVID-19 related low but has remained below 2018 levels. However, the EU’s circular material use rate has stagnated below 12%, indicating that the EU will not be able to achieve its 2030 target at the current pace.
Many of the indicators for SDG 13 ‘Climate action’ have improved significantly, but stronger progress is needed to ensure the EU reaches its 2030 targets on mitigating climate change. The EU’s greenhouse gas emissions decreased strongly in 2023, reaching a 36% reduction relative to 1990. Stronger progress will be required though to meet the 55% reduction target for 2030. The carbon removals achieved through land use, land use change and forestry (LULUCF), which partly offset the overall net greenhouse gas emissions, have declined slightly, and the EU remains far from its 2030 target. In support of the EU’s climate-neutrality objective, the share of renewables in the EU’s energy consumption has grown, and the average CO2 emissions efficiency of EU car fleets has improved. Nevertheless, stronger progress will be required in both areas to meet the 2030 targets. Concerning climate change impacts and adaptation, the monetary losses from climate-related disasters rose sharply in recent years. On a positive note, more green bonds were issued to finance the transition towards climate-neutrality. Additionally, climate-related expenditure for developing countries has increased strongly.
The EU has made insignificant progress towards SDG 14 ‘Life below water’. Even though the extent of marine protected areas has grown, the designation of new areas would need to speed up significantly to meet the target of 30% of protected marine waters by 2030. Trends on ocean health are mixed. Due to the absorption of CO2 into the world’s oceans, the mean surface seawater acidity reached another unprecedented high in 2024. Likewise, the share of EU marine waters affected by eutrophication has increased strongly. On a more positive note, the share of coastal bathing sites with excellent water quality has increased slightly in the EU. Additionally, model-based indicators on sustainable fisheries show improving developments of fish stock biomass and fishing pressure in EU marine waters.
The assessment of SDG 15 ‘Life on land’ remains unfavourable and shows a further worsening of the situation compared with previous years. This is mainly due to continued land degradation and the decline in biodiversity. Progress is only visible with regard to the slow growth in forest area and an improvement in the biological oxygen demand in EU rivers. By contrast, phosphate pollution of EU rivers continues to be on the rise. Land degradation as described by soil sealing with impervious materials and the EU area affected by drought has steadily grown. Moreover, the EU continues to face dramatic long-term declines in common bird and grassland butterfly populations. The designation of new terrestrial protected areas has stagnated, meaning that, at the current pace, the EU will not achieve the target of protecting at least 30% of its land area by 2030.
The EU’s progress towards SDG 16 ‘Peace, justice and strong institutions’ has slowed in recent years and shows a mixed picture in the different areas. The perceived occurrence of crime, violence and vandalism in EU neighbourhoods has fallen continuously, and the number of deaths due to homicide or assault has fallen slightly. At the same time, the number of detected victims of trafficking in the EU – mostly for sexual or labour exploitation – has grown strongly. Government expenditure on law courts has increased, but the perceived independence of justice systems in Member States has slightly deteriorated in recent years. Additionally, the EU’s rating in the Corruption Perceptions Index worsened in 2024, but perceived corruption levels in EU countries are still lower than in most other parts of the world.
SDG 17 ‘Partnerships for the goals’ shows both favourable and unfavourable developments. Regarding global partnership, EU financing to developing countries has increased, and the EU moved closer to the target of raising its official development assistance (ODA) to 0.7% of gross national income (GNI) by 2030. EU trade with the world’s least developed countries has grown, even though these countries still account for only about 2% of total extra-EU imports. Regarding access to technology, the share of EU households enjoying high-speed internet connection has grown considerably. Even though the EU’s overall debt-to-GDP ratio has fallen since 2020, it remained above pre-pandemic levels in 2024. Moreover, the already low share of environmental taxes in total tax revenues declined even further and reached a new low in 2023.
Footnotes
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Database
Thematic section
Methodology
More detailed information on EU SDG indicators for monitoring of progress towards the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), such as indicator relevance, definitions, methodological notes, background and potential linkages can be found in the introduction as well as in Annex II of the publication ’Sustainable development in the European Union — Monitoring report on progress towards the SDGs in an EU context — 2025 edition’.