Abstract
The United Nations has adopted 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with 169 targets. International trade has substantial influences on global sustainability and human well-being. However, little is known about the impacts of international trade on progress towards achieving the SDG targets. Here we show that international trade positively affected global progress towards achieving nine environment-related SDG targets. International trade improved the SDG target scores of most (65%) of the evaluated developed countries but reduced the SDG target scores of over 60% of the evaluated developing countries. The SDG target scores of developed countries were higher than those of developing countries when trade was accounted for, but those scores would be lower than those of developing countries if trade were not a factor. Furthermore, trade between distant countries contributed more to achieving these global SDG targets than trade between adjacent countries. Compared with adjacent trade, distant trade was more beneficial for achieving SDG targets in developed countries, but it more negatively affected SDG target scores in developing countries. Our research suggests that enhancing the accounting for and management of virtual resources embedded in trade is essential for achieving and balancing sustainable development for all.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Access options
Access Nature and 54 other Nature Portfolio journals
Get Nature+, our best-value online-access subscription
$29.99 / 30 days
cancel any time
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 12 digital issues and online access to articles
$119.00 per year
only $9.92 per issue
Buy this article
- Purchase on Springer Link
- Instant access to full article PDF
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout
Similar content being viewed by others
Data availability
All the source data described in the ‘Data’ section can be obtained from the World Input–Output Database (WIOD) and World Bank. The intermediate data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request. Source data are provided with this paper.
Code availability
All computer code used in conducting the analyses summarized in this paper is available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
References
Global Indicator Framework for the Sustainable Development Goals and Targets of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Report No. A/RES/71/313 (United Nations Statistics Division, 2017).
Steen-Olsen, K., Weinzettel, J., Cranston, G., Ercin, A. E. & Hertwich, E. G. Carbon, land, and water footprint accounts for the European Union: consumption, production, and displacements through international trade. Environ. Sci. Technol. 46, 10883–10891 (2012).
Blanco, E. & Razzaque, J. Ecosystem services and human well-being in a globalized world: assessing the role of law. Hum. Rights Q. 31, 692–720 (2009).
Dalin, C., Konar, M., Hanasaki, N., Rinaldo, A. & Rodriguez-Iturbe, I. Evolution of the global virtual water trade network. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 109, 5989–5994 (2012).
Feng, K. et al. Outsourcing CO2 within China. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 110, 11654–11659 (2013).
Lenzen, M. et al. International trade drives biodiversity threats in developing nations. Nature 486, 109–112 (2012).
Liu, J. Forest sustainability in China and implications for a telecoupled world. Asia Pac. Policy Stud. 1, 230–250 (2014).
Smith, R. D. Trade and public health: facing the challenges of globalisation. J. Epidemiol. Community Health 60, 650–651 (2006).
Laboy-Nieves, E. N., Schaffner, F. C., Abdelhadi, A. & Goosen, M. F. A. Environmental Management, Sustainable Development and Human Health (CRC Press, 2009).
Givens, J. E., Huang, X. & Jorgenson, A. K. Ecologically unequal exchange: a theory of global environmental injustice. Sociol. Compass 13, e12693 (2019).
Asheim, G. B. Hartwick’s rule in open economies. Can. J. Econ. 19, 395–402 (1986).
Proops, J. L., Atkinson, G., Schlotheim, B. F. V. & Simon, S. International trade and the sustainability footprint: a practical criterion for its assessment. Ecol. Econ. 28, 75–97 (1999).
Atkinson, G., Agarwala, M. & Muñoz, P. in Inclusive Wealth Report 2012: Measuring Progress Toward Sustainability (eds UNU-IHDP & UNEP) 87–117 (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2012).
Pendrill, F., Persson, U. M., Godar, J. & Kastner, T. Deforestation displaced: trade in forest-risk commodities and the prospects for a global forest transition. Environ. Res. Lett. 14, 055003 (2019).
Harris, J. & White, A. The sociology of global health: a literature review. Soc. Dev. 5, 9–30 (2019).
Anderson, E. W. International Boundaries: A Geopolitical Atlas (Routledge, 2003).
Colson, D. A. & Smith, R. W. International Maritime Boundaries Vol. 5 (Martinus Nijhoff, 2005).
Liu, J. et al. Systems integration for global sustainability. Science 347, 1258832 (2015).
Liu, J. et al. Framing sustainability in a telecoupled world. Ecol. Soc. 18, 26 (2013).
Liu, J. Integration across a metacoupled world. Ecol. Soc. 22, 29 (2017).
Gao, L. & Bryan, B. A. Finding pathways to national-scale land-sector sustainability. Nature 544, 217–222 (2017).
Chaudhary, A., Gustafson, D. & Mathys, A. Multi-indicator sustainability assessment of global food systems. Nat. Commun. 9, 848 (2018).
Singh, R. K., Murty, H. R., Gupta, S. K. & Dikshit, A. K. An overview of sustainability assessment methodologies. Ecol. Indic. 15, 281–299 (2012).
Moran, D. D., Wackernagel, M., Kitzes, J. A., Goldfinger, S. H. & Boutaud, A. Measuring sustainable development—nation by nation. Ecol. Econ. 64, 470–474 (2008).
Siche, J. R., Agostinho, F., Ortega, E. & Romeiro, A. Sustainability of nations by indices: comparative study between environmental sustainability index, ecological footprint and the emergy performance indices. Ecol. Econ. 66, 628–637 (2008).
Cord, A. F., Seppelt, R. & Turner, W. Monitor ecosystem services from space. Nature 525, 33 (2015).
Chen, B. et al. Global land–water nexus: agricultural land and freshwater use embodied in worldwide supply chains. Sci. Total Environ. 613–614, 931–943 (2018).
Oita, A. et al. Substantial nitrogen pollution embedded in international trade. Nat. Geosci. 9, 111–115 (2016).
Wiedmann, T. O. et al. The material footprint of nations. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 112, 6271–6276 (2015).
Jorgenson, A. Environment, development, and ecologically unequal exchange. Sustainability 8, 227 (2016).
World Bank Open Data (World Bank Group, 2017); https://data.worldbank.org/
Meyfroidt, P., Lambin, E. F., Erb, K.-H. & Hertel, T. W. Globalization of land use: distant drivers of land change and geographic displacement of land use. Curr. Opin. Environ. Sustain. 5, 438–444 (2013).
Peters, G. P., Minx, J. C., Weber, C. L. & Edenhofer, O. Growth in emission transfers via international trade from 1990 to 2008. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 108, 8903–8908 (2011).
Le Quéré, C. et al. Trends in the sources and sinks of carbon dioxide. Nat. Geosci. 2, 831–836 (2009).
Kanemoto, K., Moran, D., Lenzen, M. & Geschke, A. International trade undermines national emission reduction targets: new evidence from air pollution. Glob. Environ. Change 24, 52–59 (2014).
Weinzettel, J., Hertwich, E. G., Peters, G. P., Steen-Olsen, K. & Galli, A. Affluence drives the global displacement of land use. Glob. Environ. Change 23, 433–438 (2013).
Afionis, S., Sakai, M., Scott, K., Barrett, J. & Gouldson, A. Consumption‐based carbon accounting: does it have a future? WIREs Clim. Change 8, e438 (2017).
Liu, J. et al. Spillover systems in a telecoupled Anthropocene: typology, methods, and governance for global sustainability. Curr. Opin. Environ. Sustain. 33, 58–69 (2018).
Vandenbergh, M. P. & Gilligan, J. M. Beyond Politics: The Private Governance Response to Climate Change (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2017).
Sachs, J., Schmidt-Traub, G., Kroll, C., Durand-Delacre, D. & Teksoz, K. SDG Index and Dashboards Report 2017 (Bertelsmann Stiftung and SDSN, 2017).
Timmer, M. P., Dietzenbacher, E., Los, B., Stehrer, R. & Vries, G. J. An illustrated user guide to the world input–output database: the case of global automotive production. Rev. Int. Econ. 23, 575–605 (2015).
Kander, A., Jiborn, M., Moran, D. D. & Wiedmann, T. O. National greenhouse-gas accounting for effective climate policy on international trade. Nat. Clim. Change 5, 431–435 (2015).
Zhong, W., An, H., Fang, W., Gao, X. & Dong, D. Features and evolution of international fossil fuel trade network based on value of emergy. Appl. Energy 165, 868–877 (2016).
Genty, A., Arto, I. & Neuwahl, F. Final Database of Environmental Satellite Accounts: Technical Report on their Compilation WIOD Deliverable 4.6, Documentation (WIOD, 2012); https://go.nature.com/3g9Bb05
Report of the Inter-agency and Expert Group on Sustainable Development Goal Indicators (UN, 2016); https://unstats.un.org/unsd/statcom/47th-session/documents/2016-2012-IAEG-SDGs-E.pdf
Zhao, X. et al. Physical and virtual water transfers for regional water stress alleviation in China. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 112, 1031–1035 (2015).
Wood, S. A., Smith, M. R., Fanzo, J., Remans, R. & DeFries, R. S. Trade and the equitability of global food nutrient distribution. Nat. Sustain. 1, 34–37 (2018).
Yang, H. & Zehnder, A. “Virtual water”: an unfolding concept in integrated water resources management. Water Resour. Res. 43, W12301 (2007).
Allan, J. A. Virtual water: a strategic resource. Ground Water 36, 545–547 (1998).
Xu, Z. et al. Evolution of multiple global virtual material flows. Sci. Total Environ. 658, 659–668 (2019).
Xu, Z. et al. Assessing progress towards sustainable development over space and time. Nature 577, 74–78 (2020).
Handbook on Constructing Composite Indicators: Methodology and User Guide (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Joint Research Centre, 2016).
Fullman, N. et al. Measuring progress and projecting attainment on the basis of past trends of the health-related Sustainable Development Goals in 188 countries: an analysis from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2016. Lancet 390, 1423–1459 (2017).
Schmidt-Traub, G., Kroll, C., Teksoz, K., Durand-Delacre, D. & Sachs, J. D. National baselines for the Sustainable Development Goals assessed in the SDG Index and Dashboards. Nat. Geosci. 10, 547–555 (2017).
Sachs, J., Schmidt-Traub, G., Kroll, C., Lafortune, G. & Fuller, G. Sustainable Development Report 2019 (Bertelsmann Stiftung and SDSN, 2019).
Human Development Data (UNDP, 2017); http://hdr.undp.org/en/data
Nielsen, L. Classifications of Countries Based on Their Level of Development: How It Is Done and How It Could Be Done IMF Working Paper (IMF, 2011).
Timmer, M. P., Dietzenbacher, E., Los, B., Stehrer, R. & de Vries, G. J. An illustrated user guide to the world input–output database: the case of global automotive production. Rev. Int. Econ. 23, 575–605 (2015).
Indicators and a Monitoring Framework for the Sustainable Development Goals: Launching a Data Revolution for the SDGs (SDSN, 2015).
R Core Team R: A Language and Environment for Statistical Computing v.3.4.4 (R Foundation for Statistical Computing, 2018).
Acknowledgements
We thank R. M. Scarrow and S. Nichols for their constructive comments that have greatly helped improve the paper. We are grateful for financial support from the National Science Foundation (grant nos DEB-1924111 and DEB-1340812), Michigan State University, Michigan AgBioResearch, the Environmental Science and Policy Program (ESPP) Doctoral Recruiting Fellowships and the China Scholarship Council.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Contributions
Z.X., Yingjie Li and J.L. designed the research. Z.X. and Yingjie Li contributed the data. Yingjie Li and Z.X. performed the data analysis and interpreted the results with support from S.N.C., J.L., T.D., C.L., L.W., J.Z., L.Z., Yunkai Li and M.G.C. Yingjie Li, Z.X. and J.L. wrote the manuscript with contributions from S.N.C. and T.D. All authors reviewed and commented on the manuscript.
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Competing interests
The authors declare no competing interests.
Additional information
Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Supplementary information
Supplementary Information
Supplementary Figs. 1–7 and Tables 1 and 2.
Supplementary Data 1
Excel sheets for Supplementary Tables 1 and 2.
Source data
Source Data Fig. 1
Numerical source data.
Source Data Fig. 2
Numerical source data.
Source Data Fig. 3
Numerical source data.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Xu, Z., Li, Y., Chau, S.N. et al. Impacts of international trade on global sustainable development. Nat Sustain 3, 964–971 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-020-0572-z
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-020-0572-z
This article is cited by
-
Intranational synergies and trade-offs reveal common and differentiated priorities of sustainable development goals in China
Nature Communications (2024)
-
Global transboundary synergies and trade-offs among Sustainable Development Goals from an integrated sustainability perspective
Nature Communications (2024)
-
The asymmetric impacts of international agricultural trade on water use scarcity, inequality and inequity
Nature Water (2024)
-
Effect of trade on global aquatic food consumption patterns
Nature Communications (2024)
-
Indian interstate trade exacerbates nutrient pollution in food production hubs
Communications Earth & Environment (2024)