The City of Helsinki’s first Voluntary Local Review (VLR) of sustainable development was handed over to the UN in 2019. It described the Helsinki City Strategy 2017–2021 and its implementation in the SDG framework.
For reporting purposes, mapping was carried out by cross-tabulating the goals of the Helsinki City Strategy, the monitoring meters and the goals of the Carbon-neutral Helsinki 2035 Action Plan with the UN Sustainable Development Goals. In addition, at this stage, links between the seven key projects implementing the strategy and the UN goals were mapped, and examples of concrete measures taken or under way in the city were gathered.
In line with the New York model, the actual reporting was limited to the UN HLPF priorities for 2019. At the same time, key indicators were selected which best describe the development in Helsinki in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
Having committed to the Agenda 2030 SDGs, Helsinki initiated city-level reporting on sustainable development for the second time. The report, which was completed in May 2021 and was published as this web site, emphasises concrete actions and aims to identify development themes as well as issues highlighted by the coronavirus pandemic. The end goal is for the city to be able to recover from the crisis in a sustainable manner.
Helsinki’s reports
2023
From Agenda to Action – Implementation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals in Helsinki 2023 PDF
2021
From Agenda to Action – Implementation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals in Helsinki 2021 PDF