Applications of Geospatial and Information Technologies Toward Achieving Sustainable Development Goals

Abstract

Sustainable development is possible by holistically prioritizing urban and rural development activities by capturing many complexities, constraints, and livelihood opportunities. In this context, United Nations (UN) designed a blueprint containing seventeen interlinked Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to address the global challenges, including climate change, environmental degradation, peace, poverty, inequality, and justice. The achievement of SDGs and their universality would be possible through readily available data from affordable sources such as remote sensing images and readily available sources. The spatio–temporal data analysis is crucial for assessing, monitoring, and decision-making and becomes integral in addressing SDG indicators. However, the advancement and availability of an enormous amount of earth observation data increased the need for new methods and techniques. Nowadays, the integration of geospatial technologies along with information and communication technology (ICT) like the Internet of Things (IoT), big data, machine learning (ML), artificial intelligence (AI), advanced sensor networking, and crowdsourcing has made a powerful analytic platform for Spatial Decision Support System (SDSS). This chapter comprehensively reviews and documents the scope and application of geospatial and information and communication technology and its role in action plan formulation toward achieving SDGs.