Number 1, February 2008
briefing paper
The Millennium Development Goals:
Reason for Hope, Call to Action
by Eric Muñoz
Undernourished People and the Millennium Development Goal Target
1990-92
1995-97
2001-03
2015: MDG Target Date
40
Percentage of Population
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
Developing
World
Asia/
Pacific
Latin America/
Caribbean
Near East and
North Africa
Sub-Saharan
Africa
Source: The State of Food Security in the World, 2006, FAO.
Key Points
• The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) represent the consensus of
the global community on the basic conditions needed to improve the lives
and prospects of the world’s poorest people.
• The MDGs set specific targets and measure progress along the way toward
reaching those targets.
• The MDGs require developing and developed countries to form a global
partnership to reduce hunger and poverty around the world.
• Developing countries are increasingly taking the lead in determining their
own development agendas.
• Developed countries need to follow through on their commitments—to
increase development assistance to help achieve the MDGs and to ensure
that their domestic policies support rather than undermine development
efforts.
• Citizens around the world are speaking up and holding their governments
accountable so that the political will to achieve the MDGs remains strong.
Eric Muñoz is a policy analyst for Bread for the World Institute.
Bread for the World Institute provides
policy analysis on hunger and strategies
to end it. The Institute educates its advocacy network, opinion leaders, policy
makers and the public about hunger in
the United States and abroad.
www.bread.org
Abstract
The Millennium Development
Goals (MDGs) represent an unprecedented effort on the part of the world
community to better the lives of hungry and poor people across the globe.
Taken together, the MDGs serve as
a comprehensive vision of human
development—one marked by dignity,
equality and opportunity for all.
The goals commit all countries in
a partnership to eradicate hunger and
poverty, ensure that all children have
access to a primary school education,
reduce child mortality, improve maternal health, promote gender equality, combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and
tuberculosis, and ensure environmental sustainability. The MDGs also require developed countries to provide
additional development assistance,
grant debt relief to low-income countries and reform global trade rules to
promote sustainable development.
By including measurable targets,
the MDGs provide benchmarks to use
in assessing progress and determining whether adjustments are needed
in national and international strategies. The goals provide a framework
for coordinating development efforts,
and they build on decades of success
in development programming around
the world.