On 10 December 2025, United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) organized the launch of the UN Decade of Sustainable Transport 2026 – 2035 and its associated Implementation Plan as a special event in the Trusteeship Council Chamber at the UN Headquarters. The well-attended event brought together Member States, UN entities, civil society, and private sector partners to showcase commitments to sustainable transport, share good practices, and to announce actions for the Decade ahead. The UN Decade is a unique opportunity to raise the profile of sustainable transport in multilateral arenas and to highlight its importance in peoples’ lives, for our planet and for sustainable development at large. Several workstreams are already in place to make the UN Decade as impactful as possible, as the General Assembly invited DESA to lead and facilitate the implementation and observance of the UN Decade, in collaboration with the United Nations regional economic commissions and other relevant organizations.
The United Nations Decade of Sustainable Transport, proclaimed by the General Assembly in 2023 (resolution 78/148), provides a global framework to accelerate the transition towards sustainable, inclusive, and resilient transport systems across all modes. The Implementation Plan outlines six focus areas and associated means of implementation, emphasizing the importance of policy coherence, financing, innovation, and data in advancing sustainable transport solutions.
A central pillar of the Decade is the ability to effectively monitor and assess progress. In its 2025 resolution (A/RES/80/132), the General Assembly underscored the importance of developing data-driven tools and methodologies, including the establishment of a joint Atlas of Transport Sustainability, to track implementation and support evidence-based decision-making. The resolution also mandates periodic reporting to the General Assembly and foresees a midterm review in 2030 and a final review in 2035. General Assembly requested DESA to coordinate the establishment of visual and data-driven tools to track and trace progress in the implementation of the Decade.
At the same time, the call for voluntary Sustainable Transport Action Commitments has generated strong engagement, with numerous stakeholders pledging concrete actions and investments. These commitments provide an important basis for tracking implementation and enabling peer learning across countries and sectors. As implementation of the UN Decade moves forward, there is a growing need to take stock of existing approaches to monitoring progress, including reporting practices, policy tracking, indicator frameworks, and tools for assessing the impact of commitments. Strengthening alignment across these approaches will be essential to ensure coherent, transparent, and effective monitoring at global, regional, and national levels.
In this context, the International Transport Forum plays a key role as a global platform for transport policy dialogue, data collection, and evidence-based analysis. The ITF Annual Summit brings together transport ministers and leading stakeholders from around the world, offering a unique opportunity to connect the objectives of the UN Decade with ongoing analytical work, statistical systems, and policy discussions within the transport community.
