Climate Policy In The Broader Sustainability Context: Joint Implementation Of Agenda 2030 And The European Green Deal

The European Green Deal was approved in December 2019 by European Union Leaders, laying out a broad set of objectives for a climate-neutral, resource-efficient, technologically sophisticated, and socially equitable continent. The EU has also decided to integrate the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of UN Agenda 2030 in the European Semester, the EU's main mechanism for coordinating national economic and employment strategies. Further, the EU responded to the enormous consequences of Covid-19 by enacting a robust "Next Generation EU" package of policies and resources to help Europe's economy recover while pursuing its green transformation. To link these four major policy initiatives the SDGs, the European Green Deal, the European Semester, and the EU recovery plan we co-authored the report: "Transformations for the Joint Implementation of Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development and the European Green Deal: A Green and Digital, Job-Based and Inclusive Recovery from the COVID-19 Pandemic", which was released in February 2021 by the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network Europe (SDSN Europe). In this article, we use part of the work performed in that report to present how the objectives of Agenda 2030 and the European Green Deal can be aligned and provide actionable recommendations to policymakers for this purpose.