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Abstract

To fulfill the 2030 Agenda, the complexity of sustainable development goal (SDG)interactions needs to be disentangled. However, this understanding is currently lim-ited. We conduct a cross-sectional correlational analysis for 2016 to understand SDGinteractions under the entire development spectrum. We apply several correlationmethods to classify the interaction as synergy or trade-off and characterize themaccording to their monotony and linearity. Simultaneously, we analyze SDG interac-tions considering population, location, income, and regional groups. Our findingshighlight that synergies always outweigh trade-offs and linear outweigh non-linearinteractions. SDG 1, 5, and 6 are associated with linear synergies, SDG 3, and 7 withnon-linear synergies. SDG interactions vary according to a country's income andregion along with the gender, age, and location of its population. In summary, toachieve the 2030 Agenda the detected interactions and inequalities across countriesneed be tracked and leveraged to“leave no one behind.”