Millennium Development Goals

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)- What are they?

Meeting at the United Nations General Assembly in 2000, world leaders made a commitment to eradicate poverty, promote human dignity and equality and achieve peace, democracy and environmental sustainability.

This commitment was framed in a set of 8 goals called the Millennium Development Goals. The target for achieving these goals is 2015.

'We will spend no effort to free our fellow men, women and children from the abject and dehumanising conditions of extreme poverty, to which more than a billion of them are currently subjected. We are committed to making the right to development a reality for everyone and to freeing the entire human race from want'.

United Nations Millennium Declaration, Resolution 55/2

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are:

1. Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger

• Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people whose income is less than one dollar a day
  
  
• Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people who suffer from hunger

2. Achieve Universal Primary Education

• Ensure that, by 2015, children everywhere, girls and boys alike, will be able to complete a full course of primary schooling

3. Promote gender equality and empower women

• Eliminate the gender disparity in primary and secondary education preferably by 2005 and to all levels of education no later than 2015

4. Reduce child mortality

• Reduce by two-thirds, between 1990 and 2015, the under five mortality rate

5. Improve maternal health

• Reduce by three quarters, between 1990 and 2015, the maternal mortality ratio

6. Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases

a. Have halted, and begun to reverse, the spread of HIV/AIDS

b. Have halted by 2015, and begun to reverse, the incidence of malaria and other major diseases

7. Ensure Environmental Stability

a. Integrate the principles of sustainable development into country policies and programmes and reverse the loss of environmental resources

b. Halve by 2015, the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water

c. By 2020, to have achieved a significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers

8. Develop a Global Partnership for Development

Although the millennium development goals have been criticised for aiming too low (merely halving poverty by 2015), they have the potential to transform the lives of millions of people, and make the planet a better and safer place for our future generations.

The goals also set targets against which progress towards eliminating poverty can be measured. This puts the spotlight on rich countries and international bodies such as the United Nations (UN), International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank - questioning whether they are playing their full part in meeting the commitment they made in 2000.

People in developing countries can also use the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to monitor action taken by their governments in combating poverty.

Debt and the Millennium Development Goals

Debt cancellation is essential if the MGDs are to be achieved. UNDP has identified 59 countries that face huge obstacles in reaching these goals - thirty-one of these are heavily indebted poor countries. This means that these countries are exporting badly needed finance on debt payments at the cost of human life and dignity.

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