CDS (II) 2023 General Knowledge · Question 67 of 120

Correct — B, Reduced unemployment. The reason it is not in the index is simple: it is not a Sustainable Development Goal at all. The seventeen goals adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in September 2015 include Goal 8, Decent Work and Economic Growth, which is where employment lives, and Goal 10, Reduced Inequalities — and 'reduced unemployment' is a plausible-sounding blend of the two that appears on neither list. The other three options are goals by their exact official names: Goal 2 is Zero Hunger, Goal 12 is Responsible Consumption and Production, and Goal 14 is Life Below Water. Since NITI Aayog's SDG India Index is built directly on the seventeen goals and scores States and Union Territories against indicators mapped to them, anything that is not a goal cannot be in the index.

• (a)Zero hunger — Goal 2, and one of the most heavily tracked in the Indian index because of the nutrition, stunting and anaemia indicators that sit under it.
• (c)Life below water — Goal 14. It is a genuine goal, though in practice the index scores it only for the coastal States and Union Territories, since landlocked States have no marine indicators to report.
• (d)Responsible consumption and production — Goal 12, covering waste, recycling and resource efficiency. It is fully part of the framework and of the index.

The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted in September 2015 and effective from 1 January 2016, sets out seventeen goals and one hundred and sixty-nine targets, succeeding the eight Millennium Development Goals. NITI Aayog is India's nodal institution for the goals and publishes the SDG India Index, which scores every State and Union Territory on indicators mapped to the goals and places them in bands — Aspirant, Performer, Front Runner and Achiever. The first edition appeared as a baseline report in December 2018 and editions have followed at intervals since.

The trick here is a name that sounds official because it is assembled from real vocabulary. Goal 10 is Reduced Inequalities and Goal 8 is Decent Work and Economic Growth; take the first word of one and the subject of the other and you get 'Reduced unemployment', which no goal is called. The defence is to hold the seventeen titles as titles rather than as themes, because the examiner tests the wording. One honest qualification on the stem itself: it says the index includes seventeen goals for each State, whereas in practice the composite score has been computed on sixteen, with Goal 17 on partnerships assessed qualitatively and Goal 14 scored only where there is a coast. That looseness does not affect the answer, since the option offered is not a goal in the first place.

• There are seventeen Sustainable Development Goals and one hundred and sixty-nine targets, adopted in September 2015 for the period to 2030.
• Goal 2 is Zero Hunger, Goal 8 is Decent Work and Economic Growth, Goal 10 is Reduced Inequalities, Goal 12 is Responsible Consumption and Production, Goal 14 is Life Below Water.
• NITI Aayog is India's nodal institution for the goals and publishes the SDG India Index.
• The index places States in bands — Aspirant for scores up to 49, Performer 50 to 64, Front Runner 65 to 99, and Achiever at 100.
• The baseline SDG India Index appeared in December 2018 and covered thirteen of the goals; later editions widened the coverage.

• Accepting an invented goal title that blends two real ones. Employment belongs to Goal 8; inequality to Goal 10.
• Confusing the SDG India Index, published by NITI Aayog, with the National Indicator Framework, maintained by the statistics ministry.
• Assuming every goal is scored for every State. Goal 14 applies only where there is a coastline.

As an odd-one-out over goal titles, as a statements item on which of several named goals exist, or as a ranking question on States in the index.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Which Sustainable Development Goal is titled 'Reduced Inequalities'?

  • (a)Goal 8
  • (b)Goal 10
  • (c)Goal 12
  • (d)Goal 16

  Answer(b) Goal 10 — Goal 8 is Decent Work and Economic Growth, Goal 12 is Responsible Consumption and Production and Goal 16 is Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The SDG India Index that ranks States and Union Territories on the Sustainable Development Goals is published by

  • (a)the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation
  • (b)the Reserve Bank of India
  • (c)NITI Aayog
  • (d)the Finance Commission

  Answer(c) NITI Aayog — India's nodal institution for the goals; the statistics ministry maintains the separate National Indicator Framework.