UN MDG Report, 2012, stresses need for a true global partnership

Three important targets on poverty, slums and water have been met three years ahead of 2015, says this year’s Report on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), launched today by UN Secretary‐General Ban Ki‐moon. Meeting the remaining targets, while challenging, is possible ─ but only if Governments do not waiver from their commitments made over a decade ago.

In his foreword to the 2012 MDG Report, Mr. Ban says that further success depends on fulfilling MDG‐8 – the global partnership for development. “The current economic crises besetting much of the developed world must not be allowed to decelerate or reverse the progress that has been made. Let us build on the successes we have achieved so far, and let us not relent until all the MDGs have been attained”, said Secretary‐General Ban.

Background: Millennium Development Goals

In September 2000, building upon a decade of major United Nations conferences and summits, world leaders came together at United Nations Headquarters in New York to adopt the United Nations Millennium Declaration, committing their nations to a new global partnership to reduce extreme poverty and setting out a series of time-bound targets - with a deadline of 2015 - that have become known as the Millennium Development Goals.

The eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) – which range from halving extreme poverty to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing universal primary education, all by the target date of 2015 – form a blueprint agreed to by all the world’s countries and all the world’s leading development institutions. They have galvanized unprecedented efforts to meet the needs of the world’s poorest.

Useful links:

United Nations MDG website

MDG 2012 Report

UN News Centre: Global partnership key to achieving Millennium Development Goals by 2015 – UN report

Online platform, “Integrated Implementation Framework”, was launched in June by the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to track the progress on the financial and policy commitments made by countries towards realizing the MDGs.