SDG Push Insight Report

Guinea Bissau

Guinea Bissau
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Integrated SDG Insights

Guinea Bissau

UNDP’s Integrated SDG Insights explore how to achieve the SDGs by 2030. So that no one is left behind.

How To Read This Report

‘SDG Insights’ playbooks transcend development “as usual,” and leverages data innovation, AI and systems analysis to chart credible pathways that help countries meet the 2030 Agenda.

SDG Moment — This section provides an overview of a country's economic growth trajectory, with new insights on sustainability and inclusiveness of growth pathways.‍

SDG Trends & Priorities — This section builds from the foundation of national SDG progress and uses machine learning to analyse national development ambition with an SDG lens.
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SDG Interlinkages — Combined, these insights are mapped against SDG interlinkages to define policy choices the accelerate SDG progress, tailored to national context.
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‍Finance & Stimulus — These policy choices are made against fiscal constraints and opportunities for stimulus mapped in this section to ensure choices translate to development impact and leave no one behind.

1. SDG Moment

While economic growth is a key element in achieving the SDGs, many countries are intent on moving beyond growth as a yardstick for progress. In the short run, growth enables the SDGs; but in the long run, the SDGs aim to transform the pattern of growth itself.

GDP Growth Pathways

People

Poverty: Percentage of the population under each threshold (PPP$ a day).

Data not available.

Planet

Carbon Intensity: CO2 emissions intensity of GDP (tCO2 per PPP $1,000).

Guinea Bissau’s economy is in mitigation mode in 2023 but is expected to transition into acceleration mode by 2024-2025. This pace of growth is characterized by being 64% higher, on average, than that of the world, and converging to the country’s growth trajectory forecast before the pandemic. Accordingly, Guinea Bissau’s commitments to achieving the SDGs are focused on increasing people’s well-being.

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This pace of growth would exert a moderate positive impact on reducing poverty, though there are still challenges to accelerate poverty reduction from its relatively high prevailing levels when using stringent thresholds. The economic expansion, on the other hand, would be less dependent on carbon emissions from fossil fuels as the country’s fossil emissions intensity of GDP is projected to decrease at an annual rate of 1.2%.

3. SDG Interlinkages

Maps synergies and trade-offs of national priorities to the most relevant SDG targets to chart policy pathways with most potential to accelerate progress.

3.8: Achieve universal health coverage, including financial risk protection, access to quality essential health-care services and access to safe, effective, quality and affordable essential medicines and vaccines for all

Health-related results for Guinea-Bissau are found in improved COVID-19 responsiveness, improved access to quality health services, epidemiological surveillance, the fight against HIV, tuberculosis and malaria and improved skills of staff

Indicator SDG 3.8.1, which is the coverage of essential health services, based on tracer interventions it is off track. The tracer conditions include reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health, infectious diseases, non-communicable diseases, and service capacity and access.

8.5: By 2030, achieve full and productive employment and decent work for all women and men, including for young people and persons with disabilities, and equal pay for work of equal value

Like many countries on the continent, Guinea-Bissau is trying to address the challenge of creating jobs. The focus is to increase the competitiveness of companies and investment in human capital for its citizens.

One innovative effort Guinea-Bissau has embarked on is to pay special attention to the transition mechanisms between qualifications and employment. This is being made possible in close collaboration with professional training institutions, which ensures greater involvement of the youth, women and the private sector.

9.2: Promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and, by 2030, significantly raise industry’s share of employment and gross domestic product, in line with national circumstances, and double its share in least developed countries

Value addition is considered a critical path for Guinea-Bissau’s drive for inclusive and sustainable industrialization. That means creating value in agriculture and mining.

Given the fiscal constraints that the country faces, it may be useful for Guinea-Bissau to consider exploring new industries, industries of the future – including green technologies.

15.1: By 2020, ensure the conservation, restoration and sustainableuse of terrestrial and inland freshwater ecosystems and their services.

By prioritizing Target 15.1 in its 2021-2025 National Development Plan, Ecuadorreaffirmed the significance of protecting and preserving terrestrial ecosystems andtheir biodiversity. This includes recognizing that the investment projects intendedto fulfil Target 15.1 will not only contribute to achieving the SDGs 13, 14 and 15, butwill also help restore ecosystems that underpin the availability and comprehensivemanagement of water resources (SDG 6) and promote their sustainable use (Target12.2). Additionally, it will also foster the generation of new energy from renewablesources (Target 7.2).

To this end, Ecuador seeks to strengthen the management of the National Systemof Protected Areas through its 2022-2032 Strategic Plan and the implementationof the National Forest Restoration Plan 2019-2030. These instruments serve as thetechnical, legal and financial foundation for executing local forest restorationprocesses with a landscape vision, with an overall goal of covering 30,000hectares through its projects. Considering that the proportion of national territoryunder conservation or environmental management, as of 2022, stands at 22.1%, itis necessary to mobilize additional financial resources from various sources andestablish robust governance (Target 17.3) to intensify the care of protected areas.This ensures the conservation of natural and cultural resources, genetic flows, theprovision of environmental services for the benefit of the population and thealignment of policies on the ground.

Futures Scenarios

SDG Push is a futures scenario based on 48 integrated accelerators in the areas of Governance, Social Protection, Green Economy and Digital Disruption. It uses national data to explore the impact on human development by 2030 and 2050 across key SDG indicators. It does this by using ‘International Futures,’ a systems model designed to explore interactions across development systems.

Poverty <$1.90 Per Day (Number of People)
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Malnourished Children Under 5 (Number Of Children)

Malnourished Children Under 5 (Number Of Children)

4. Finance and Stimulus

Many countries are facing reduced fiscal space, high debt levels, rising interest rates and downgrades on credit ratings. Fiscal and financial constraints tend to slow or even reverse SDG progress.

Guinea Bissau's gross government debt, projected at 76.5% of GDP in 2023, is more than 1.5 times higher than the low-income developing countries’ (LIDC) average of 48.3%. The country is projected to collect 16.5% of GDP in revenue this year, thus slightly more than the LIDC average of 14.9%.

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Guinea Bissau's external debt servicing this year is projected to be at 18.7% of revenue compared to 14.1% for the LIDC average. Due to the upward trajectory of external debt, high fiscal deficits and its susceptibility to export shocks, the latest World Bank and IMF DSA from July 2021 rated the country as at ‘high risk of debt distress’.

SDG Stimulus

The UN Secretary General’s SDG Stimulus Plan lays out a blueprint for action within the existing financial architecture. It includes:

  • Providing liquidity to support recovery in the near term
  • Enhance debt relief for vulnerable countries.​
  • Expanding development financing by MDBs
  • Align financial flows with the SDGs and Paris Agreement, according to country-level priorities and needs, for example through the rollout of the UN Integrated National Financing Framework (INFFs).

Given the projected fiscal and financial constraints faced by

Guinea Bissau

possible funding options for the investments derived from the identified interlinkages are as follows:

  • Tax and revenue reform
  • Debt for SDGs
  • Climate finance
  • Remittances, philanthropy and faith-based financing

Methodology & Data Sources

Click here to view the Methodological Note for the Integrated SDG Insights.

This report is the result of a global exercise carried out using artificial intelligence to identify SDG priorities based on 10 national government documents, together with SDG progress and SDG interlinkage analysis. The implementation and monitoring of the 2030 Agenda in Argentina should be consulted in the Country Reports and National Voluntary Reports.

SDG Moment

Methodology
Assesses challenges and opportunities in national growth trajectories with insights on environmental sustainability and inclusiveness.

Data Sources
Future trajectories to 2025 are based on IMF-WEO GDP projections, distributions of per capita income or consumption from the World Bank, and CO2 emissions from the Global Carbon Budget 2022 and EDGAR (JRC and IEA).​

Trends & Priorities

Methodology
SDG trends tracks progress from 2015 to date for the 231 indicators. National priorities are analysed using machine learning to reveal the most prominent SDGs referenced in national policy documents.

Data Sources
SDG trends tracks progress from 2015 to date for the 231 indicators. National priorities are analysed using machine learning to reveal the most prominent SDGs referenced in national policy documents.

Interlinkages

Methodology
SDG trends tracks progress from 2015 to date for the 231 indicators. National priorities are analysed using machine learning to reveal the most prominent SDGs referenced in national policy documents.

Data Sources
The exercise globally considered a total of 454 documents published from 2015 to August 2022. (Miola et al., 2019 updated in 2021-2022)​

Finance & Stimulus

Methodology
Provides insight into indicators of fiscal and financial stress with options (INFF) for stimulus and other means to accelerate progress.

Data Sources
Most recent resource data from UNU-WIDER GRD (between 2018 and 2021), debt and revenue from IMF WEO (between 2020 and forecasts for 2023), external debt from IDS (2023), yields from Haver Analytics (8 June 2023), credit ratings from S&P, Moodys and FITCH (2023), and DSA ratings from World Bank/IMF (31 May 2023).