Sustainable development goal interactions: an analysis based on the five pillars of the 2030 agenda

The 2030 Agenda calls for a change in thinking in order to implement sustainable development goals (SDGs) and targets as a system. To achieve this goal, the 2030 Agenda established five pillars (“5 Ps”): people, planet, prosperity, peace and partnership. Here, we present a classification of these SDGs and their targets based on the five pillars. Our aim is to improve our understanding of interactions by assessing whether potential synergies and trade‐offs are related to the classification of the targets. We surveyed 30 people and asked them to associate the content of target labels with the pillars. We classified SDG and targets according to an original quantification system. We determined whether the interactions were linked to similar or different classifications of the targets. We observed that the more similar the targets were in terms of classification, the more positive the interactions. We also noted that synergies exist between targets of different classifications. Our findings are useful for applying a systemic approach for policy coherence in sustainability analysis.