Since 2015, Pompeu Fabra University has been working on 43 research projects geared towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). The latter are a set of milestones that were approved in September 2015 at a summit of the UN member states and will be valid until 2030.

The research projects are linked to the University’s eight departments, but especially the Department of Information and Communication Technologies (DTIC), which has been allocated a total of fourteen projects. This department is followed by the Departments of Experimental and Health Sciences (CEXS) with eight; Economics and Business (6), Law (5), Political and Social Sciences (4), Humanities (3), Communication (2) and Translation and Language Sciences (1).

The aims of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) under the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda are divided into seventeen areas ranging from the eradication of poverty, good health and the fight against hunger, through quality education, gender equality, decent employment and economic growth, to reducing inequality, promoting renewable energy and combating climate change, among others.

The projects undertaken by the University are linked to seven different SDG and highlight the Health goal, on which 22 projects are based; Peace and Justice (10 projects) Education (5), Life on Land (2), Gender (2), Work and the Economy  (2) (there is one project that deals with these two areas simultaneously), and Energy (1).

Some examples of UPF projects representing various SDG

Some of the University’s research projects representing the various sustainable development goals are, in Health, “Bilingualism as a contributor to cognitive reserve in healthy and pathological aging”, by Albert Costa (DTIC), which aims to identify factors related with bilingualism involved in aging.

In this same area, and as a project falling within the Department of Translation and Language Sciences, is “JUNTS. Superant barreres socioeducatives i afavorint l’alfabetització en salut: intervenció sobre les interferències i dificultats de comprensió d’informació i documentació dirigida a famílies d’infants afectats per malalties minoritàries” (TOGETHER. Overcoming socioeducational barriers and promoting literacy in health: intervention on the interferences and difficulties in understanding information and documentation addressing the families of children affected by rare diseases), by Rosa Estopà.

A sample of the projects focusing on the Education SDG is “Transalfabetismos. Competencias transmedia y estrategias informales de aprendizaje de los adolescentes (Transaplhabetisms. Transmedia competencies and learning strategies of teenagers”, coordinated by Carlos A. Scolari (Department of Communication), which aims to bring together the education system and young people’s technocultural life, creating specific spaces for interaction and feedback.

“Estereotipos, prejuicios y discriminación: tres estudios sobre trayectorias laborales de mujeres con hijos pequeños” (Stereotypes, prejudices and discrimination: three studies on the working careers of women with small children) by María José González, professor of the Department of Political and Social Sciences, hinges around the Gender SDG. If we focus on Energy, the only UPF project that is linked to it is “History of Nuclear Energy and Society” (HONEST), by Albert Presas, professor with the Department of Humanities, which aims to promote the current debate on future energy sources and the transition to the production of affordable, safe and clean energy sources.

Other examples of the four SDG dealt with by UPF are, in Work and the Economy (and also in Gender), “Audio Commons: An Ecosystem of Audio for Creative Reuse Content”, by Xavier Serra (DTIC), which promotes the use of open audio content and the development of technologies with which to support sound and music repositories, audio production tools and audio content users.

In Life on Land, “Intelligent Assessment of Pharmaceuticals in the Environment”, coordinated by Manuel Pastor (CEXS), which studies the environmental impact of potential new drugs, discarding those that are potentially dangerous.

Finally, in Peace and Justice is “L’auge de l’Estat islàmic: estratègies polítiques per fer front al desafiament gihadista” (The rise of the Islamic State: political strategies to deal with the Jihadist challenge”, by Catalina García (Department of Law), which explores this challenge from different perspectives, to identify and design political strategies with an appropriate response. And in this same area, “La prevención de crisis y conflictos: el papel de las instituciones, el capital humano, la regulación y las redes sociales” (The prevention of crises and conflicts: the role of the institutions, human capital, regulation and social networks), a project by Marta Reynal Querol (Department of Economics and Business), which analyses the role of various factors in the prevention of economic crises and social conflicts.

Seventeen broad-based goals addressing all countries in the world

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), which will be valid from 2015 to 2030, replace the Millennium Development Goals (MDG), which expired at the end of 2015.

They include a total of 169 specific milestones and are the result of a negotiation process that involved 193 states in addition to the unprecedented participation of civil society, with a broad representation of viewpoints of the various stakeholders, NGOs, enterprises, etc. 

The goals target all countries and are broad-based (the previous MDG only encompassed issues on the social agenda and addressed developing countries) and they deal with the various elements of sustainable development interconnectedly.