“The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are achievable and failure is not acceptable,” stressed the President of the General Assembly Ali Treki at the closing session of the informal and interactive hearings of the General Assembly held on 14-15 June 2010 in New York.

“So little time is left before the 2015 deadline for the MDGs. Much more needs to be done” and “the MDGs cannot be achieved by any single actor alone – We are all in this together,” said Dr. Treki.

Representatives of non-governmental organizations (NGOs), civil society and the private sector participated in these interactive hearings to discuss MDGs in preparation for the High-level Plenary Meeting, also referred to as the “MDG Summit,” which will be held on 20-22 September 2010.

Presiding over the hearings, the President of the General Assembly strongly urged member states to redouble their efforts in preparation for the MDG Summit, in order to present member states and governments with a draft outcome document and to use the hearing‘s testimonies and recommendations as a “source of inspiration.”

One of the fifty-three selected representatives was Ms. Constance Okollet, of the Osukuru United Women’s Network in Uganda, who voiced her development concerns, in particular, about the impact of climate change on her community. Noting that climate change has been significantly detrimental to the advancement of women she urged that “women at the grassroots level should be helped directly”, especially through financial support..

The need for financial assistance was also stressed by Anne-Françoise Lefèvre of the World Savings Banks Institute who said that “access to financial services is the key element to accelerate the achievement of the MDGs…It is a cross cutting support vehicle.”

Echoing the expectations among participants for the September summit, Ms Okollet said that “We would like to see suggestions made by civil society reflected in decisions made at the summit”.

This year, 2010, will be a critical year in determining lessons learned during the past 10 years since the adoption of the Millennium Declaration and how to accelerate progress towards achieving the internationally agreed development goals by the 2015 deadline.