Sustainable development and science in Russia and other BRICS countries: a scientometric perspective

For over a decade, the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted by the UN General Assembly have guided collective global action toward greater economic, environmental, and social sustainability by 2030. A new study by the HSE Institute for Statistical Studies and Economics of Knowledge (ISSEK) represents the first attempt to measure the contribution of science to achieving all SDGs, using the ten BRICS countries as a case study, and to assess how balanced each country’s research efforts are across the goals.

Key findings:

✔Among the BRICS nations, China leads in terms of the number of research publications linked to sustainable development, followed by India and Brazil. Russia ranks fourth.

✔All ten BRICS nations show similar overall SDG index scores, with only minor variations. The most challenging goals to achieve are Goal 14 (Life Below Water), Goal 15 (Life on Land), and Goal 16 (Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions).

✔Russia records the highest SDG index scores within #BRICS for Goal 1 (No Poverty), Goal 4 (Quality Education), and Goal 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities). However, it also shows the lowest balance between research effort and socio economic progress toward the goals, as well as the smallest share of publications dedicated to SDG topics among total scientific output (25%). This may reflect that Russia’s core research agenda lies outside the SDG framework as well as point to its advanced position in achieving some of the goals.

#NEWS #HSEUniversity #sustainability

🕊🕊🕊