PAGE today has released a key tool for policymakers, analysts and other stakeholders for understanding how green economy is progressing. PAGE developed the Green Economy Progress (GEP) Measurement Framework to help countries evaluate their overall progress towards
an Inclusive Green Economy and to enable a cross-country comparison of progress. The GEP Measurement Framework complements UN Environment’s previously developed green economy indicators framework (UNEP, 2012; UNEP, 2014; and UNEP, 2015), which uses several types of indicators at different stages of a typical policymaking cycle.

The GEP Measurement Framework has four objectives:

• To support the assessment
of progress in achieving a selection of the SDGs within the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda and establishing direct links with them;
• To help countries monitor progress against nationally set targets in priority areas;
• To introduce greater levels of transparency to policymaking and provide policymakers with the tools necessary to set-up policies that support the transition to an Inclusive Green Economy; and
• To measure and compare green economy efforts across countries.

The GEP Measurement Framework aims to understand the extent to which an inclusive green economy addresses three main global challenges, namely: (a) persistent poverty; (b) overstepped planetary boundaries; and (c) inequitable sharing of growing prosperity.

It includes measurements of accumulation of capital – be it natural, low carbon and resource efficient, human, or social – which serves as input for producing goods and services in an environmentally friendly manner. It also attempts to capture the transition of consumption, investment, government spending and trade towards such goods and services. The GEP Measurement Framework also includes measurement of the outcome of enabling policies that are conducive to an Inclusive Green Economy.

Progress in improving these outcomes is then analysed against specific planetary boundaries, such as greenhouse gas emissions, water and land use.

In its initial version, the GEP Measurement Framework is composed of a GEP Index and a companion Dashboard of Sustainability indicators. These components can be both analysed individually and combined to allow the ranking of progress by country (GEP+).

The first component, the GEP Index, measures the progress made in improving the well-being of current generations
in relation to economic opportunities, social inclusiveness and environmental protection. It is composed of 13 indicators that capture critical issues faced in achieving an Inclusive Green Economy transition, such as material footprint and inequality. The GEP Index focuses on the progress achieved by countries with respect to a target set for each individual indicator. Construction of the GEP Index utilizes a weighting system that allows for the assessment of how far off a country is from the global threshold on a specific component of
an Inclusive Green Economy (an indicator) and
an evaluation of the relative importance of one component (an indicator) with respect to the others from the country’s perspective.

The Dashboard
of Sustainability includes six indicators that track the sustainability of any progress that has been achieved as measured by the GEP Index. Its role
is to monitor the long-term sustainability of the factors underpinning humanity’s current and future well-being.

The GEP Measurement Framework Methodology, along with the GEP Measurement Framework Application package are now available to download here.