Are we on track to meet the MDGs by 2015?

So far there are significant advances together with important set-backs. Every region faces particular challenges but has the opportunity to work together in order to achieve the MDGs. Although there is a long way to go, we know that the goals are achievable with global political support, strong partnerships and coordinated efforts. We also know that if some trends persist, some of the goals will be very difficult to reach.

Progress so far:
[Source: The Millennium Development Goals Report - 2008]

Goal 1: Eradicate extreme poverty & hunger
The goal of cutting in half the proportion of people in the developing world living on less than $1 a day by 2015 remains within reach. However, this achievement will be due largely to extraordinary economic success in most of Asia.

In contrast, previous estimates suggest that little progress was made in reducing extreme poverty in sub-Saharan Africa. In Western Asia, poverty rates were relatively low but increasing. And the transition economies of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and South-Eastern Europe were still recovering from the rise in poverty in the early 1990s.

Goal 2: Achieve universal primary education
In almost all regions, the net enrolment ratio in 2006 exceeded 90 per cent, and many countries were close to achieving universal primary enrolment. The number of children of primary school age who were out of school fell from 103 million in 1999 to 73 million in 2006, despite an overall increase in the number of children in this age group. These successes underscore that much can be accomplished with the political will of governments and with adequate support from development partners.

In sub-Saharan Africa, however, the net enrolment ratio has only recently reached 71 per cent, even after a significant jump in enrolment that began in 2000. Around 38 million children of primary school age in this region are still out of school. In Southern Asia, the enrolment ratio has climbed to 90 per cent, yet more than 18 million children of primary school age are not enrolled.

Goal 3: Promote gender equality & empower women
As part of its success in raising the total primary enrolment rate, Southern Asia has made the most progress in gender parity since 2000. Sub-Saharan Africa, Western Asia and Northern Africa have also made strides in reducing gender disparity. At the same time, Oceania has taken a step back with a slight deterioration in gender parity in primary school enrolment. Oceania, sub-Saharan Africa and Western Asia have the largest gender gaps in primary enrolment.

In Western and Central Africa, where high repetition and low retention rates are common, girls in particular fail to enrol in and stay in school. Drought, food shortages, armed conflict, poverty, lack of birth registration, child labour, and HIV and AIDS contribute to low school enrolment and high dropout rates for both boys and girls in those subregions, but prove to be especially devastating for girls.

Goal 4: Reduce child mortality
In 2006, for the first time since mortality data have been gathered, annual deaths among children under five dipped below 10 million. Nevertheless, the death of millions of children from preventable causes each year is unacceptable. A child born in a developing country is over 13 times more likely to die within the first five years of life than a child born in an industrialized country.

Sub-Saharan Africa accounts for about half the deaths of children under five in the developing world. Between 1990 and 2006, about 27 countries – the large majority in sub-Saharan Africa – made no progress in reducing childhood deaths. In Eastern Asia and Latin America and the Caribbean, child mortality rates are approximately four times higher than in developed regions. Disparities persist in all regions: mortality rates are higher for children from rural and poor families and whose mothers lack a basic education.

Goal 5: Improve maternal health
Maternal mortality remains unacceptably high across much of the developing world. In 2005, more than 500,000 women died during pregnancy, childbirth or in the six weeks after delivery. Ninety-nine per cent of these deaths occurred in the developing regions, with sub-Saharan Africa and Southern Asia accounting for 86 per cent of them. In sub-Saharan Africa, a woman’s risk of dying from treatable or preventable complications of pregnancy and childbirth over the course of her lifetime is 1 in 22, compared to 1 in 7,300 in the developed regions.

Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria & other diseases
Every day, nearly 7,500 people become infected with HIV and 5,500 die from AIDS, mostly due to a lack of HIV prevention and treatment services. Despite these staggering numbers, some encouraging developments have sparked small victories in the battle against AIDS. Thanks to improvements in prevention programmes, the number of people newly infected with HIV declined from 3 million in 2001 to 2.7 million in 2007. And with the expansion of antiretroviral treatment services, the number of people who die from AIDS has started to decline, from 2.2 million in 2005 to 2.0 million in 2007. However, largely because newly infected people survive longer, the number of people living with HIV rose from an estimated 29.5 million in 2001 to 33 million in 2007. The vast majority of those living with HIV are in sub-Saharan Africa.

Goal 7: Ensure environmental sustainability
Carbon dioxide emissions reached 28 billion metric tons in 2005 and continued upward, resulting in increased atmospheric concentrations of CO2. Globally, emissions increased by 30 per cent from 1990 to 2005, with annual growth from 2000 to 2005 greater than in the preceding decade. From 1990 to 2005, changes in emissions ranged from a 38 per cent decline in countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States to an 82 per cent increase in South-Eastern Asia. Per capita emissions remain the highest in the developed regions, about 12 metric tons of CO2 per person per year, compared with about 3 metric tons in developing regions and 0.8 metric tons in sub-Saharan Africa. Emissions per unit of economic output fell by more than 20 per cent in the developed regions, while they increased by 35 per cent in South-Eastern Asia and by 25 per cent in Northern Africa.

While no area can escape the adverse impact of climate change, the Arctic, small islands, mega deltas in Asia and Africa, and the African region overall seem to be especially vulnerable because of their high exposure to the effects of climate change, their populations' limited capacity to adapt to the consequences, or both.

Goal 8: Develop a global partnership for development
At current exchange rates, official development assistance (ODA) continued to drop from an all time high of $107.1 billion in 2005, to $104.4 billion in 2006 and $103.7 billion in 2007. This is mainly the result of a decline in debt relief grants. Adjusting for changes in prices and exchange rates, aid disbursements fell by 8.4 per cent in 2007 compared to 2006.

Excluding debt relief grants, net aid rose by 2.4 per cent in constant dollars. At the 2005 United Nations World Summit and related meetings, developed countries pledged to increase aid from $80 billion in 2004 to $130 billion in 2010 at 2004 prices. While the majority of these commitments remain in force, a few countries have announced new targets, some involving increased aid flows and others suggesting reductions. With debt relief grants unlikely to return to 2005 or 2006 levels, bilateral aid and contributions to multilateral development institutions will need to increase rapidly over the next three years if developed countries are to meet their commitments for 2010. Even a sudden escalation of aid flows will not compensate for the failure to provide the continuous and predictable build-up in official development assistance that was implicit in their 2005 commitments.

Non-governmental organizations, the private sector and a number of developing countries are becoming increasingly significant sources of development assistance. Special purpose funds - such as the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria - have become important channels for some of these resources.