Noise and the UN SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals)

Sustainable development involves the simultaneous pursuit of economic prosperity, environmental quality, and social equity, and the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) describe the major development challenges in these pursuits. The SDG Framework comprises 17 broad goals, that cover a wide range of issues including poverty, hunger, health, education, climate, sustainable cities and communities, amongst others. They were conceived as an indivisible whole, in that the goals relate to and depend on each other. In this context, one might have expected that noise, and its well established interconnected links to adverse economic, environmental and social impacts, might feature as a target of the SDGs. But this was not the case. Although noise and its management are not clearly identified in any of the 17 goals, this paper posits that noise is an issue cross-cutting through all of the goals. By analysing the issue of noise through the lens od the SDGs, the paper demonstrates the pervasiveness of adverse impacts associated with noise, and concludes that a failure to adequately address noise presents a significant challenge to the realization of sustainable development. The effects of noise need to be better integrated into concepts related to sustainable development, and commitments to meeting the SDGs must not be at the expense of the sonic environment.