Following on a proposal by the UN Secretary-General, the General Assembly decided to convene the MDG Summit (High-level Plenary Meeting) on 20-22 September 2010, with the primary objective to accelerate progress towards all the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015.
The 2010 MDG Summit will see world leaders gather at United Nations Headquarters in New York to examine what needs to be done to meet each of the eight MDGs by 2015.
“Our world possesses the knowledge and the resources to achieve the MDGs,” states the Secretary-General in his report preparing for the September summit. However, achieving the MDGs remains a complex global challenge, especially for equal progress to be made across each of the eight goals.
Great progress has been made, but as the 2010 MDG Report indicates, it is not even. The report specifically points out concern for the slow progress in improving maternal health conditions and the development of women and children. These issues will be more thoroughly explored during the summit.
Making it happen by 2015
The September High-level Meeting will consist of six plenary meetings and six interactive round-table sessions which will be held in concurrence with the plenary meetings. The six roundtable sessions will convene within the framework of “Making it happen by 2015”, with at least fifty seats in each meeting, and co-chaired by two Heads of State or Government.
The six roundtables will specifically address development goals and have been divided into the discussions of the challenge of poverty, hunger and gender equality, meeting the goals of health and education, promoting sustainable development, addressing emerging issues and evolving approaches, addressing the needs of the most vulnerable and finally, widening and strengthening partnerships.
Actors and their roles
According to the Report of the Secretary-General Keeping the promise: a forward-looking review to promote an agreed action agenda to achieve the MDGs by 2015, the “MDGs represent a pact, not just among governments, but among all development stakeholders. Each actor must focus on the best use of its assets, acting efficiently, effectively and collectively to fulfil specific roles”.
More specifically, these roles include the need for developing countries to establish policies and institutions to accelerate progress, the importance of civil society actors to ensure government accountability, the help of private business to create work to support the goals as well as private philanthropists to foster innovation. The roles of developed countries are to fulfil commitments and finally, the multilateral system, and especially the UN, needs to improve coherence and effectiveness.
The MDGs are an eight-point road map with measurable targets and clear deadlines for improving the lives of the world’s poorest people.
The MDGs also embody basic human rights — the rights of each person on the planet to health, education, shelter and security. The Goals are ambitious but understood to be achievable and, together with the comprehensive United Nations development agenda, the world’s efforts to eradicate poverty are feasible.
Only five years remaining
Five years remain before the 2015 deadline for the achievement of the MDGs, and as the Director of DESA’s ECOSOC Support and Coordination Division Nikhil Seth explains, “The Summit provides us with a critically-important occasion to address major and interconnected development challenges and to give the MDGs a final push,” noting the event a “historic opportunity”.
Coming amid mixed progress and new crises that threaten the global effort to halve extreme poverty, “the summit will be a crucially important opportunity to redouble our efforts to meet the Goals,” he said, referring to the targets adopted at the UN Millennium Summit of 2000, aimed at slashing poverty, hunger, disease, maternal and child deaths and other world issues by a 2015 deadline.
“Our challenge today is to agree on an action agenda to achieve the MDGs” Mr. Ban added on the importance to efficiently and effectively utilize the time remaining.
The high-level summit coincides with the launch of the MDG Gap Task Force Report, which again, highlights the year’s gaps and trends in MDG progress and provides leaders with areas of focus. The report will be released on 17 September.
It is anticipated that this summit will bring about one of the most significant opportunities yet to ensure development success worldwide with the expectation that world leaders will recommit to promises and accelerate progress. As the Secretary-General urges, “Time is short. We must seize this historic moment to act responsibly and decisively for the common good.”
For more information: http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/
