Urban-rural linkages are an integral part of fostering development in both urban and rural communities. However, the focus on development tends to have an urban bias toward Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) with an increase in urbanization. Ghana is one of the fastest urbanizing countries in SSA. This paper sought to identify the challenges of urban-rural linkages, their corresponding solutions, and contributions to Agenda 2030 that are context-specific to Ghana through a stepwise solution scanning technique. In step 1, the study applied a scoping process to identify the urban-rural challenges. In step 2, a solution for the identified urban-rural challenges in step 1 was co-designed. In step 3, each identified solution was assessed based on its potential to contribute to all three pillars of sustainability by ranking and prioritization. In step 4, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) interlinkages of the top five prioritized potential solutions were analyzed. The identified challenges were (1) inequality and gender gaps, (2) poor and lack of basic and economic infrastructures, (3) the limited effectiveness of decentralization, and (4) food and nutrition security dynamics. The prioritized potential solutions were gender inclusiveness, investment in infrastructures, sustainable agricultural systems, effective decentralization, and financial inclusion. This study recommends maximizing the synergies and minimizing the trade-offs between the SDGs of the potential solutions identified.

The integrated and indivisible nature of the SDGs is facing implementation challenges due to the silo approaches. We present the three interconnected foci (SDG interactions, modeling, and tools) at the science-policy interface to address these challenges. Accounting for them will support accelerated SDG progress, operationalizing the integration and indivisibility principles.

While the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) are broadly framed with 17 goals, the goals and their targets inherently connect with each other forming a complex system. Actions supporting one goal may influence progress in other goals, either positively (synergies) or negatively (trade-offs). Effective managing the synergies and trade-offs is a prerequisite for ensuring policy coherence. This is particular relevant at the river basin scale where the implementation of national policies may generate inequalities at the sub-basin levels, such as the upstream and the downstream. In the existing literature, there is still a lack of methodologies to assess the SDG interlinkages and their differences at the subnational levels. This paper presents a methodology on the development of an SDG interlinkages analysis model at the basin scale and its application to a case study in China’s Luanhe River Basin (LRB). Seven broad areas, namely land use and land cover change, climate change, ecosystem services, flood risks, water sector, urbanisation, and energy, were set as the scope of study. Through a systematic review, key elements of the SDG interlinkages system were identified and their interactions were mapped. The resulting generic SDG interlinkages model were validated with expert survey and stakeholders’ consultation and tailored to the LRB. Quantification of the SDG interlinkages was conducted for 27 counties in the LRB and demonstrated by the results of 3 selected counties located in the upstream, midstream and downstream areas, respectively. The methodology and its applications can be used to support integrated water resource management in river basins.

Availability of water in the Ganges River basin has been recognized as a critical regional issue with a significant impact on drinking water supply, irrigation, as well as on industrial development, and ecosystem services in vast areas of South Asia. In addition, water availability is also strongly linked to energy security in the region. Hence, quantification of spatial availability of water resources is necessary to bolster reliable evaluation of the sustainability of future thermal power plants in the Ganges River basin. This study focuses on the risks facing existing and planned power plants regarding water availability, applying climate change scenarios at the sub-basin and district level up to 2050. For this purpose, this study develops an integrated assessment approach to quantify the water-energy nexus in four selected sub-basins of the Ganges, namely, Chambal, Damodar, Gandak, and Yamuna. The results of simulations using Soil and Water Assessment Tools (SWAT) showed that future water availability will increase significantly in the Chambal, Damodar, and Gandak sub-basins during the wet season, and will negligibly increase in the dry season, except for the Yamuna sub-basin, which is likely to experience a decrease in available water in both wet and dry seasons under the Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) 8.5 scenario. Changes in the water supply-demand ratio, due to climate change, indicated that water-related risks for future power plants would reduce in the Chambal and Damodar sub-basins, as there would be sufficient water in the future. For 19 out of 23 districts in the Chambal sub-basin, climate change will have a moderate-positive to high-positive impact on reducing the water risk for power plants by 2050. In contrast, existing and future power plants in the Yamuna and Gandak sub-basins will face increasing water risks. The proposed new thermal power installations, particularly in the Gandak sub-basin, are likely to face serious water shortages, which will adversely affect the stability of their operations. These results will stimulate and guide future research work to optimize the water-energy nexus, and will inform development and planning organizations, energy planning organizations, as well as investors, concerning the spatial distribution of water risks for future power plants so that more accurate decisions can be made on the location of future power plants.