Fig. 1: Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and their targets that are relevant to nutrient pollution in water systems in China.

Three levels of the relevance of targets to nutrient pollution in water systems are considered: “high”, “moderate” and “low”. Targets classified as having “high” relevance address the direct sources of nutrient losses to the Chinese water systems. Targets classified as having “moderate” relevance address the impacts of nutrient pollution on aquatic ecosystems and human health or influence the resilience of ecosystems to nutrient pollution. Targets classified as having “low” relevance refer to technological, social, administrative or economic interventions indirectly related to nutrient pollution in water systems. The approach to assessing the relevance of the SDGs is described in the “Methods” section. The relevance of these SDGs is explained in Supplementary Table 1.