The Millenium Summit, Millenium Declaration and the Millenium Development Goals
On 17 December 1998, the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted resolution 53/202 by which it decided to convene the Millennium Summit of the United Nations as an integral part of the Millennium Assembly of the United Nations.
Millenium Summit and Declaration : The Millenium Summit took place between 6 - 8th September, 2000. Its purpose was to consider "The Role of the United Nations in the twenty-first century". At its conclusion the 189 member states of the United Nations agreed the Millenium Declaration, which was an agreement to help citizens of the world's poorest countries to achieve a better life by the year 2015.
Millenium Development Goals : The Report of the Summit sets out the procedings and the declaration as well as identifying the priorities for action. It is from these that the the Millenium Development Goals were identified.
The 8 Millenium Development Goals are to
- Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
- Achieve universal primary education
- Promote gender equality and empower women
- Reduce childhood mortality
- Improve maternal health
- Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases
- Ensure environmental sustainability
- Develop a global partnership for development
Fundiing : Funding support for the Millenium Declaration was made clearer in 2002 through the Monterry Conference on Financing for Development, which agreed an international target of 0.7% of rich countries GNP to be allocated for development assistance. This was re-affirmed at the 2005 World Summit and the EU-15 countries have all committed themselves to achieving the 0.7% target by no later than 2015. Also in 2005 at the Gleneagles Summit, the G8 countries committed to provide $50 billion per year in Overseas Development Aid to Africa by 2010.
Millenium Project and Task force Recommendations
In order to come up with recommendations about how to achieve the Millenium Goals, a Millenium Project was established in 2002 and with its report in 2005 "Investing in Development : A Practical Plan to Achieve the Millenium Development Goals".
The bulk of the Millenium Project's work was carried out by 10 thematic Task Forces comprising a total of more than 250 experts from around the world including: researchers and scientists; policymakers; representatives of NGOs, UN agencies, the World Bank, IMF and the private sector. The reports were on
- Hunger - Halving Hunger can be done
- Education and Gender Equality - Universal Primary Education : investments, incentives and institutions
- Education and Gender Equality - Taking Action : Achieving gender equality and empowering women
- Child Health and Maternal Health - Who's got the power? : Transforming health systems for women and children.
- HIV/AIDS, Malaria, TB and Access to Essential Medicines - Working Group on Malaria : Coming to grips with malaria in the new millenium
- HIV/AIDS, Malaria, TB and Access to Essential Medicines - Working Group onf TB : Investing in strategies to reverse the global incidence of TB
- HIV/AIDS, Malaria, TB and Access to Essential Medicines - Working Group on Access to Essential Medicine - Prescription for health development ; Increasing access to medicines.
- Environmental Sustainability - Environment and Human Wellbeing : A Practical Strategy
- Water and Sanitation - Health, Dignity and Development - Health, Dignity and Development : What will it take?
- Improving the Lives of Slum Dwellers - A Home in the city
- Trade for Development
- Science, technology and innovation - Innovation: Applying Knowledge in Development
The work of the Project was led by a secretariat housed at UNDP headquarters in New York. Then in January, 2007, the Millennium Project's work was incorporated into the Bureau for Development Policy under the leadership of the United Nations Development Program, forming the MDG Support group. This works at the regional, national and global level to support the preparation and implementation of MDG-based national development strategies.