UN REPORT CALLS FOR CUT IN WORLD POVERTY BY 2015

On January 17 the Millennium Project  presented a final 3,000 page report to Secretary-General Kofi Annan that recommends how the UN should proceed in order to achieve its ultimate goal of decreasing global poverty in half by 2015. After nearly three years, the UN Millennium Project, a group comprised of 265 scientists, academics, and development experts from across the world led by Columbia University economist Jeffrey Sachs, published its findings in a report entitled Investing in Development: A Practical Plan to Achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The eight MDGs, as established in the United Nations Millennium Declaration in 2000, include: combating disease, universal primary education, eradicating extreme poverty, and environmental sustainability.

The release of the Millennium Project finding comes only a month after the December UN High Level Panel report on Threats, Challenges and Change. These two reports are meant to be taken as parallel recommendations on how to fix what is arguably a broken global collective security system. Sachs said, “Breaking the poverty trap of the poorest countries is a matter of extreme urgency for our security. When people lack access to food, medical care, safe drinking water, and a chance at a better future, their societies are likely to experience instability and unrest that spills over to the rest of the world.” The Millennium Goals are considered crucial to the success of international efforts to reign in terrorism and violent instabilities within and between countries.

With this goal in mind, the Millennium Project recommends that the funding be allocated to countries that have proven their commitment to change by demonstrating “good governance and financial transparency.” The report continues to say that the money should not be distributed among “lawless countries led by corrupt leaders incapable of investing resources in health, education and roads.” This suggestion is one which will surely meet the approval of the U.S. administration.

The tremendous outpouring of donations towards tsunami relief proves that individuals are more than willing to help as long as they know that their money is directly benefiting people in need and not being squandered. But currently “only about 30 cents of each dollar of international aid actually reaches on-the-ground investment programs in poor countries aimed at extreme poverty, hunger and disease, the Project’s research shows.” The Millennium Project repeatedly emphasizes cost efficiency in the implementation of these goals and goes as far as to call for a “major overhaul of the international development system” in order to remedy the problems that slip through the cracks of our existing system.

The Project announced, “The question is not whether or not aid works. Ample evidence shows that it does when it is sufficient and well directed. The problem has been how and when the aid has been delivered, to which countries and in what amounts.” The report assures that the MDGs are attainable. However the realization of the goals necessitates both that steps towards implementation begin immediately and that nations fulfill the monetary commitment they made at the Millennium Summit in 2000. UN nations pledged 0.7% of their GDP (70 cents out of every $100 in the U.S.).

Thus far the average contribution from developed nations has been 0.25% per country. The U.S. has given only 0.15% of its GDP towards global development. Sachs suggests that President Bush embrace the MDGs and promote them to Americans as a practical means to combat the many “silent tsunamis” - such as malaria which kills over 150,000 people each month in Africa, maternal mortality, extreme poverty and hunger - that are threatening developing nations around the globe.

The next steps in fulfilling the Millennium Development Goals will come in March 2005 when Secretary-General Annan draws from both the Millennium Project and the High Level Panel report on Threats, Challenges and Change to present his comprehensive Report on the Millennium Review. The March report will, according to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, “cover the whole range of issues set out in the Declaration and will indicate where … bold decisions need to be taken by Member States at the summit in September 2005 in order to realize its objectives.”

The September summit, on the occasion of the UN’s 60th anniversary is viewed by many UN observers as a critical meeting of world leaders that will determine the architecture of a twenty-first century collective security system able to meet the needs of all of the United Nations’ member states and their citizens.

Updated January 24, 2005

Further Reading:
A link to the Millennium Project's 'Quick Wins'