When Vinnova, Sweden’s innovation agency, sought to change the country’s food systems in 2020, it started by looking at school meals and funding several projects around menus, procurement, and how cafeterias were organised.

Breaking down a big goal into smaller component parts and bringing together different interested parties, as Vinnova did, is key to delivering the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), says Kate Roll, a political scientist based at the Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose at University College, London.

Roll’s particular focus is the last of the 17 SDGs with its focus on strengthening the means of implementation. Roll calls it an “enabling SDG,” its success ultimately measured when the other 16 “big, wooly, hairy SDG goals,” as she terms them, are achieved. These straddle poverty, hunger, education, gender equity, clean water and energy, among others.

Roll explains that one approach to tackling SDG 13’s climate change targets, for example, might be to aim for 100 carbon-neutral cities in Europe by 2030, approaching it from both a transport and energy perspective, but also the built environment, real estate, and people’s behaviour, and bringing together relevant stakeholders, as Vinnova did for its food systems goal.

This is the penultimate episode of How to Save Humanity in 17 Goals, a Working Scientist podcast series that profiles scientists whose work addresses one or more of the SDGs. Episodes 13–18 are produced in partnership with Nature Sustainability, and introduced by Monica Contestabile, its chief editor.

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