MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS

International development and support activities are being carried out according to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) that were adopted at the UN Millennium Summit held in 2000 at the UN Headquarters in New York. The Millennium Development Goals consist of eight basic goals, a total of 18 concrete targets that are set within these goals and quantitative indicators that are incorporated into each target. While indices on population and related matters are included in the MDGs, the viewpoint of the population problem that exists at the basis of attaining these goals is not clearly reflected.

Goals and targets of MDGs are as follows.

Goal 1 Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger

1. Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people whose income is less than one dollar a day
2. Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people who suffer from hunger

Goal 2 Achieve universal primary education

3. Ensure that, by 2015, children everywhere, boys and girls alike, will be able to complete a full course of primary schooling

Goal 3 Promote gender equality and empower women

4. Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education, preferably by 2005, and in all levels of education no later than 2015

Goal 4 Reduce child mortality

5. Reduce by two thirds, between 1990 and 2015, the under-five mortality rate

Goal 5 Improve maternal health

6. Reduce by three quarters, between 1990 and 2015, the maternal mortality ratio

Goal 6 Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases

7. Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS Indicators
8. Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the incidence of malaria and other major diseases

Goal 7 Ensure environmental sustainability

9. Integrate the principles of sustainable development into country policies and programmes and reverse the loss of environmental resources
10. Halve, by 2015, the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation
11. By 2020, to have achieved a significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers

Goal 8 Develop a global partnership for development

12. Develop further an open, rule-based, predictable, non-discriminatory trading and financial system. Includes a commitment to good governance, development and poverty reduction - both nationally and internationally
13. Address the special needs of the least developed countries. Includes: tariff and quota-free access for the least developed countries' exports; enhanced programme of debt relief for heavily indebted poor countries (HIPC) and cancellation of official bilateral debt; and more generous ODA for countries committed to poverty reduction
14. Address the special needs of landlocked developing countries and small island developing States (through the Programme of Action for the Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing States and the outcome of the twenty-second special session of the General Assembly)
15. Deal comprehensively with the debt problems of developing countries through national and international measures in order to make debt sustainable in the long term
16. In cooperation with developing countries, develop and implement strategies for decent and productive work for youth
17. In cooperation with pharmaceutical companies, provide access to affordable essential drugs in developing countries
18. In cooperation with the private sector, make available the benefits of new technologies, especially information and communications

Reproductive Health Holds the Key

The Millennium Development Goals overlap with the ICPD Programme of Action for Goals 2 to 6. Realistically speaking, population will continue to increase if reproductive health including family planning is not fully utilized and will make the attainment of the targets set in MDGs an impossible task. This fact is gradually being recognized. Former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan stated, "The Millennium Development Goals, particularly the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger, cannot be achieved if questions of population and reproductive health are not squarely addressed. And that means stronger efforts to promote women's rights, and greater investment in education and health, including reproductive health and family planning".

ICPD

The International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) was held in Cairo, Egypt in 1994 as a UN-sponsored intergovernmental conference following the Bucharest Conference in 1974 and the Mexico City Conference in 1984. The conference emphasised improving the living conditions of individual women as a way to lower and stabilise the birth rate to solve the wider population problem.

As a result, improvement in areas such as reproductive health, reproductive rights and empowerment of women became the main focus of the population issue after ICPD.

A turnaround in tackling the population issue has been realized by relying on voluntary family planning through improvement of the environment for women instead of population control carried out by holding each country responsible to meet the population control target allotted to it. Such an approach has succeeded in avoiding various criticisms against the population issue and has realised a universal understanding of the need to address the population problem with consensus from 180 countries to the ICPD Programme of Action.

In this manner, ICPD was able to solve many problems including human rights by approaching the population problem from a very micro viewpoint of improving the environment of each and every woman on a grassroots level. Also epoch-making was its naming "International Conference on Population and Development," as it incorporated the word "development" alongside "population" in an effort to position it in the context of sustainable development.

Like the MDGs the ICPD PoA is designated to be attained by 2015. The greatest obstacle so far has been the allocation of agreed funding. Although the portion of the funds to be covered by the developing countries themselves are sufficient, attainment rate of the portion promised by the developed countries has unfortunately remained around 50%.

The Ninth MDG?

The International Parliamentarians Conference on the Implementation of ICPD PoA (ICPI) was held 18-19 October in Strasbourg, France. The conference assembled parliamentarians from around the world to promote the implementation of the Programme of Action that was adopted in Cairo, Egypt in 1994 and was a follow-up to the conference held in Ottawa, Canada in 2002. One of the outcomes of the conference was the need to include a ninth goal to the existing eight MDGs as stated "Based on the ICPD Programme of Action, make sexual and reproductive health accessible to all by 2015".

Participants at the International Parliamentarians Conference on the Implementation of ICPD PoA (ICPI), Thailand, 2006

For further information on the ICPD Programme of Action, ICPD+5, ICPD+10 and MDGs visit UNFPA & MDGs follow up