1. Sustainable Development Goals
James Evans

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 To Inform global reporting
231 Indicators
169 Targets
17 Goals
Geography
Ethnicity
Sex
Migratory status To
Inform global reporting
Indentify UK-focused indicators
Explore and develop new data sources
Age
Income
Disability
Globally, there are 17 goals, 169 targets and 231 global indicators which must be disaggregated (where appropriate) for multiple time periods by 8 key groups: income, sex, age, race, ethnicity, migratory status, disability and geographic location, or other characteristics.

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

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. Data visualisations onto Google Maps
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 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.