Citation: Renzi, M.F.; Ungaro,V.; Di Pietro, L.; Guglielmetti Mugion, R.; Pasca, M.G. Agenda 2030 and COVID-19: A Young Consumer’s Perception of Sustainable Consumption. Sustainability 2022, 14, 15627. https://doi.org/10.3390/ su142315627 Academic Editor: Flavio Boccia Received: 11 October 2022 Accepted: 21 November 2022 Published: 24 November 2022 Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affil- iations. Copyright: © 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/). sustainability Article Agenda 2030 and COVID-19: A Young Consumer’s Perception of Sustainable Consumption Maria Francesca Renzi 1, *, Veronica Ungaro 1 , Laura Di Pietro 1 , Roberta Guglielmetti Mugion 1 and Maria Giovina Pasca 2 1 Department of Business Studies, Roma Tre University, 00146 Rome, Italy 2 Faculty of Economics, Niccolò Cusano University, 00166 Rome, Italy * Correspondence: mariafrancesca.renzi@uniroma3.it Abstract: COVID-19 threatens sustainable development and is a potential opportunity for downsizing the consumer economy. The virus’s impacts on society are still unclear and additional contributions are required to investigate its effects on sustainable consumer behaviours. The paper aims to evaluate consumers’ awareness regarding the emergency impacts on the 2030 Agenda SDGs achievement and sustainable consumption (SDG 12) in terms of societal and environmentally responsible behaviour. A qualitative study is planned to reach the research goal and 133 in-depth consumer interviews are performed. The sample is composed of young students informed on sustainability topics and issues. The thematic analysis is used to assess the data. The paper contributes to the existing literature about the 2030 Agenda and young consumers’ sustainable behaviours by identifying the goal perceived by respondents as most negatively and positively impacted by the crisis and detecting those that can help overcome the emergency. Five themes (Social factors, Knowledge, Habits, Values, and Price) describing the main young consumer behaviour dimensions influenced by COVID-19 and lockdown in sustainability and social responsibility are detected. A theoretical framework is proposed to describe the effects of the five themes on sustainable behaviours. Finally, a roadmap for future research is identified. Keywords: sustainable consumer behaviour; sustainability; social responsibility; sustainable consumption; COVID-19; 2030 agenda 1. Introduction The COVID-19 infection originated in Wuhan, Hubei province, China, in December 2019 [1]; it spread rapidly across the world and on 11 March 2020, it was characterised as a pandemic by the World Health Organization. Since then, many countries have adopted a lockdown strategy and introduced measures to guarantee social distancing, movement, and travel restrictions to contain the virus diffusion [2]. Italy was the first Western country to face this threat and implement lockdown measures and they were also considered one of the most restrictive [3]. The first total shutdown in Italy started on 8 March 2020 and lasted until 3 May 2020. The COVID-19 pandemic is considered both a health and economic crisis [4]; its im- pacts on the global economy are unprecedented since the 1930s Great Depression [5] and are worse and more long-lasting than that of the 2007–2009 crisis [6]. COVID-19 has negatively impacted the economy and health but has brought some environmental improvements due to the quarantine measures [7–9], showing the real effects of human activities. An association between better air quality, environmental noise reduction, clean beaches, and improvement in surface water quality was identified [10]. It registered a decrease in CO 2 emissions [11], a lower concentration of particulate matter [2,12] and a decline in global energy demand [11]. COVID-19 diffusion shows that the planet has a limited capacity to satisfy our unlimited needs and desires [13]. Moreover, Fattorini and Regoli [14] showed Sustainability 2022, 14, 15627. https://doi.org/10.3390/su142315627 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability