Millennium Development Goals

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The Millennium Development Goals were a UN initiative.
The MDGs in the United Nations Headquarters in New-York

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are eight international development goals that 192 United Nations member states and at least 23 international organizations have agreed to achieve by the year 2015. They include reducing extreme poverty, reducing child mortality rates, fighting disease epidemics such as AIDS, and developing a global partnership for development.[1]

Contents

[edit] Background

Heads of State at the Millennium Summit

In 2001, recognizing the need to assist impoverished nations more aggressively, UN member states adopted the targets. The MDGs aim to spur development by improving social and economic conditions in the world's poorest

They derive from earlier international development targets[2], and were officially established at the Millennium Summit in 2000, where all world leaders present adopted the United Nations Millennium Declaration, from which the eight goals were promoted.

[edit] Goals

The percentage of the world's population living on less than $1 per day has halved in twenty years. Most of this improvement has occurred in East and South Asia. The graph shows the 1981-2001 period.

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) were developed out of the eight chapters of the United Nations Millennium Declaration, signed in September 2000. There are eight goals with 21 targets,[3] and a series of measurable indicators for each target.[citation needed]

[edit] Goal 1: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger

  • Target 1: Halve the proportion of people living on less than $1 a day
    • Proportion of population below $1 per day (PPP values)
    • Poverty gap ratio [incidence x depth of poverty]
    • Share of poorest quintile in national consumption
  • Target 2: Halve the proportion of people who suffer from hunger
    • Prevalence of underweight children under five years of age
    • Proportion of population below minimum level of dietary energy consumption

[edit] Goal 2: Achieve universal primary education

  • Target 3: Ensure that, by 2015, children everywhere, boys and girls alike, will be able to complete a full course of primary schooling
    • Net enrollment ratio in primary education
    • Proportion of pupils starting grade 1 who reach grade 5
    • Literacy rate of 15-24 year olds

[edit] Goal 3: Promote gender equality and empower women

  • Target 4: Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education preferably by 2005, and at all levels by 2015
    • Ratios of girls to boys in primary, secondary and tertiary education
    • Ratio of literate females to males 15–24 years old
    • Share of women in wage employment in the non-agricultural sector
    • Proportion of seats held by women in national parliament

[edit] Goal 4: Reduce child mortality

  • Target 5: Reduce by two-thirds, between 1990 and 2015, the under-five mortality rate
    • Under-five mortality rate
    • Infant (under 1) mortality rate
    • Proportion of 1-year-old children immunised against measles

[edit] Goal 5: Improve maternal health

  • Target 6: Reduce by three quarters, between 1990 and 2015, the maternal mortality ratio
    • Maternal mortality ratio
    • Proportion of births attended by skilled health personnel

[edit] Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases

  • Target 7: Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS
    • HIV prevalence among 15-24-year-old pregnant women
    • Condom use rate of the contraceptive prevalence rate
    • Number of children orphaned by HIV/AIDS
  • Target 8: Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the incidence of malaria and other major diseases
    • Prevalence and death rates associated with malaria
    • Proportion of population in malaria risk areas using effective malaria prevention and treatment measures
    • Prevalence and death rates associated with tuberculosis
    • Proportion of tuberculosis cases detected and cured under DOTS (Directly Observed Treatment Short Course)

[edit] Goal 7: Ensure environmental sustainability

  • Target 9: Integrate the principles of sustainable development into country policies and programmes; reverse loss of environmental resources
    • Proportion of land area covered by forest
    • Ratio of area protected to maintain biological diversity to surface area
    • Energy use (metric ton oil equivalent) per $1 GDP (PPP)
    • Carbon dioxide emissions (per capita) and consumption of ozone-depleting CFCs (ODP tons)
    • Proportion of population using solid fuels
  • Target 10: Halve, by 2015, the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation (for more information see the entry on water supply)
    • Proportion of population with sustainable access to an improved water source, urban and rural
  • Target 11: By 2020, to have achieved a significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum-dwellers
    • Proportion of urban population with access to improved sanitation
    • Proportion of households with access to secure tenure (owned or rented)

[edit] Goal 8: Develop a global partnership for development

  • Target 12: Develop further an open, rule-based, predictable, non-discriminatory trading and financial system [Includes a commitment to good governance, development, and poverty reduction – both nationally and internationally]
  • Target 13: Address the Special Needs of the Least Developed Countries (LDC) [Includes: tariff and quota free access for LDC exports; enhanced programme of debt relief for HIPC and cancellation of official bilateral debt; and more generous ODA (Overseas Development Assistance) for countries committed to poverty reduction]
    • Net ODA, total and to LDCs, as percentage of OECD/DAC donors’ GNI
    • Proportion of total bilateral, sector-allocable ODA of OECD/DAC donors to basic social services (basic education, primary health care, nutrition, safe water and sanitation)
    • Proportion of bilateral ODA of OECD/DAC donors that is untied
  • Target 14: Address the Special Needs of landlocked countries and small island developing States (through the Programme of Action for the Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing States and the outcome of the 22nd special session of the General Assembly)
    • ODA received in landlocked countries as proportion of their GNIs
    • 'ODA received in small island developing States as proportion of their GNIs
  • Target 15: Deal comprehensively with the debt problems of developing countries through national and international measures in order to make debt sustainable in the long term
    • Proportion of total developed country imports (by value and excluding arms) from developing countries and from LDCs, admitted free of duties
    • Average tariffs imposed by developed countries on agricultural products and textiles and clothing from developing countries
    • Agricultural support estimate for OECD countries as percentage of their GDP
    • Proportion of ODA provided to help build trade capacity
    • Total number of countries that have reached their HIPC decision points and number that have reached their HIPC completion points (cumulative)
    • Debt relief committed under HIPC initiative, US$
    • Debt service as a percentage of exports of goods and services
  • Target 16: In co-operation with developing countries, develop and implement strategies for decent and productive work for youth
    • Unemployment rate of 15-to-24-year-olds, each sex and total
  • Target 17: In co-operation with pharmaceutical companies, provide access to affordable, essential drugs in developing countries
    • Proportion of population with access to affordable essential drugs on a sustainable basis
  • Target 18: In co-operation with the private sector, make available the benefits of new technologies, especially information and communications
    • Telephone lines and cellular subscribers per 100 population
    • Personal computers in use per 100 population and Internet users per 100 population

[edit] Progress

Progress towards reaching the goals has been uneven. Some countries have achieved many of the goals,[4] while others are not on track to realize any.[5] The major countries that have been achieving their goals include China (whose poverty population has reduced from 452 million to 278 million) and India due to clear internal and external factors of population and economic development. [6] However, areas needing the most reduction, such as the Sub-Saharan Africa regions have yet to make any drastic changes in improving their quality of life. In the same time as China, the Sub-Saharan Africa reduced their poverty about one percent, and are at a major risk of not meeting the MDGs by 2015. [6] Fundamental issues will determine whether or not the MDGs are achieved, namely gender, the divide between the humanitarian and development agendas and economic growth, according to the Overseas Development Institute. [7]

To accelerate progress towards the MDGs, the G-8 Finance Ministers met in London in June 2005 (in preparation for the G-8 Gleneagles Summit in July) and reached an agreement to provide enough funds to the World Bank, the IMF, and the African Development Bank (ADB) to cancel an additional $40–55 billion debt owed by members of the HIPC. This would allow impoverished countries to re-channel the resources saved from the forgiven debt to social programs for improving health and education and for alleviating poverty.[8]

Backed by G-8 funding, the World Bank, the IMF, and the ADB each endorsed the Gleaneagles plan and implemented the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative ("MDRI") to effectuate the debt cancellations. The MDRI supplements HIPC by providing each country that reaches the HIPC completion point 100% forgiveness of its multilateral debt. Countries that previously reached the decision point became eligible for full debt forgiveness once their lending agency confirmed that the countries had continued to maintain the reforms implemented during HIPC status. Other countries that subsequently reach the completion point automatically receive full forgiveness of their multilateral debt under MDRI.[8]

While the World Bank and ADB limit MDRI to countries that complete the HIPC program, the IMF's MDRI eligibility criteria are slightly less restictive so as to comply with the IMF's unique "uniform treatment" requirement. Instead of limiting eligibility to HIPC countries, any country with annual per capita income of $380 or less qualifies for MDRI debt cancellation. The IMF adopted the $380 threshold because it closely approximates the countries eligible for HIPC.[8]

Many organizations are working to bring U.S. political attention to the Millennium Development Goals. In 2007, The Borgen Project worked with Sen. Barack Obama on the Global Poverty Act, a bill requiring the White House to develop a strategy for achieving the goals. As of 2009, the bill has not passed, but Barack Obama has since been elected President.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ Background page, United Nations Millennium Development Goals website, retrieved 16 June 2009.
  2. ^ About the Millennium Development Goals, OECD Development Co-operation Directorate website, retrieved 16 June 2009.
  3. ^ http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/poverty.shtml etc.
  4. ^ http://www.mdgmonitor.org/country_progress.cfm?c=BRA&cd=
  5. ^ http://www.mdgmonitor.org/country_progress.cfm?c=BEN&cd=
  6. ^ a b http://econ.lse.ac.uk/staff/rburgess/wp/jep11.pdf
  7. ^ "Achieving the MDGs: The fundamentals". Overseas Development Institute. September 2008. http://www.odi.org.uk/resources/odi-publications/briefing-papers/43-mdgs-fundamentals-poverty-social-protection.pdf. 
  8. ^ a b c E. Carrasco, C.McClellan, & J. Ro (2007), "Foreign Debt: Forgiveness antetretetred Repudiation" University of Iowa Center for International Finance and Development E-Book

[edit] External links

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