The Sustainable Development Goals as a framework for COVID-19 recovery in cities and regions

The policy paper presents the results of an OECD-European Committee of the Regions joint survey on how local and regional governments are leveraging the SDGs to shape their recovery strategies from the COVID-19 pandemic. Findings underline a solid engagement of local and regional governments in the implementation of the SDGs through actions ranging from measurement systems to track progress, awareness raising and dedicated strategies to multi-level co-operation, and a promising uptake of the SDGs as a guiding framework for place-based recovery. Yet, the survey reveals that more efforts are needed to engage local and regional governments in Voluntary National Reviews, address funding gaps caused by the pandemic and strengthen human and technical capacities. The results of the survey also show that local and regional governments could further harness the SDGs to develop holistic recovery strategies that address pressing local sustainability priorities such as decarbonising electricity production, mitigating and adapting to climate change, accelerating digitalisation and building trust.