- Firm
- Provisional
- Coming soon
- Revised
- Firm
- Provisional
- Coming soon
- Revised
How well are we doing?
Editor's note: We have recently refreshed and updated our data for all countries on the platform, as we revised the 21 policies we cover.
Sectoral plans in across countries will map out slightly different policies, targets and regulations for each key sector, with the key feature being identifying the cross-cutting dependencies and barriers to transition. Support for cross-sectoral planning was amongst the strongest of all our policy areas (second only to national green economy planning and tied with ocean and land conservation). Across the 41 countries included in the Tracker, progress towards cross-sectoral planning and sustainability policies for key economic sectors indicates a strong and growing momentum towards successful implementation.
A large and diverse group of strong performers in this area is made up of France, Japan, Morocco, Uganda, and Portugal. Uganda’s Green Growth Development Strategy, which provides strong strategic direction for sectors towards green growth and continues to mandate a multi-sectoral implementation body, has been further solidified by the recent enactment of the Climate Change Act of 2024. Meanwhile, Japan has seen sectoral targets become more ambitious and launched a more comprehensive and integrated Green Transformation (GX) Policy in 2023 that included the establishment of a GX Promotion Council and GX Execution Council, strengthening their inter-sectoral coordination across key economic sectors.
Brazil has seen notable improvement in this policy area through a series of national programmes focused on sectoral sustainability planning which includes its 2021 Green Growth Programme and its 2023 cross-ministerial agenda to promote ecological transitions.
Relatively low-scoring countries include Mexico, which continues to lack a comprehensive planning body with real authority and a cohesive roadmap across sectors, and the USA, which is characterised by fragmented federal sectoral coordination and recently experienced major setbacks through the dismantling of interagency coordination and the rollback of clean sector policies and clean energy tax credits.
A green new deal requires changing how public and private interact: no more handouts and subsidies but catalytic investments with strong conditionalities tied to the transformation of all sectors in a green direction.
About this policy
Cross-sectoral planning will prioritise different sectors from country to country. Food, transport, buildings, waste and energy are likely to be critical everywhere, but sectors like mining or fisheries may be even more important for some countries. Sectoral plans will map out different policies, tagrets and regulations for each key sector, but also identify the interconnections and cross-cutting issues that bind different industries into a coherent whole.
The priority for planning should be sectors with the highest environmental impact, where reform is essential – most often energy and transport, but potentially also sectors like forestry or manufacturing. Sectors which are ready to transition quickly, thanks to mature technology or political will, are also key. Once priority areas are identified, setting a clear path for both public and private sector investment to contribute to sustainability is essential.
The strongest policies will establish an inter-sectoral agency to oversee planning, backed at ministerial level and empowered to set enforceable regulations. Weaker approaches may focus on decarbonisation for only a few sectors, lack details on implementation or investment, or limit agencies to only an advisory or coordinating role. Many countries are only just starting to scope priority sectors with high environmental footprints, and have yet to develop robust transition planning.
Case Study: Uganda
Uganda’s strong sectoral planning approach to a green economy transition sets it apart from its peers, not to mention richer countries with much greater technical capacity. The new Uganda Green Growth Development Strategy (2018) is the core of this approach and lays out five priority sectors for attention: agriculture, natural capital, cities, transport and energy. Implementation is overseen by a multi-sectoral group of advisory agencies, ministries and local government actors, which is in turn steered by a coordination framework with ministerial buy-in and led by the national planning authority, ensuring financial accountability and delivery. The final piece of this three-pillar framework is civil society, community and cooperative groups, who are empowered to report up from the local level to ensure accountability and citizen oversight.
Uganda Country Profile