The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and human capital: the case of Azerbaijan

Abstract

PurposeThis article aims to relate investments in human capital to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs), and examine the spending levels necessary to achieve high performance in related SDG sectors for Azerbaijan.Design/methodology/approachEmploying data from the World Bank, the empirical approach undertaken in this study relies on peer analysis by examining spending levels for nations exhibiting similar income levels and geographical proximity to Azerbaijan.FindingsThis study estimates that total spending in education would need to increase by 0.4 percentage points of GDP by 2030, while total spending in health would need to increase by 5.9 percentage points of GDP by 2030 for Azerbaijan.Originality/valueThis study contributes to the literature by conducting an empirical analysis in which other nations can emulate in measuring their relative progress on human capital investments and related UN SDGs.Peer reviewThe peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-02-2023-0137