The Millennium Campaign: successes and challenges in mobilizing support for the MDGs.

• Author: Herfkens, Eveline

It was the best news for decades, when in 2000 world leaders acknowledged that the most urgent matter at the dawn of the new century was to put an end to poverty, and that the world has the resources and the know-how to do so. With the UN Millennium Declaration, the international community finally achieved the political consensus on what should be done by whom, after years of disagreements between non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and Governments, between international financial institutions and the United Nations system, and between the North and the South. Leaders repeatedly declared that they would "spare no effort" to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which range from halving extreme poverty to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing universal primary education, all by the target date of 2015.

The MDGs brought together for the first time a shared vision on development, representing a global partnership based on a shared responsibility by all countries. Developing countries have the primary responsibility for achieving these Goals. But rich countries acknowledged in MDG 8--develop a global partnership for development--that poor countries cannot achieve the goal unless rich countries increase and improve the effectiveness of their aid and change the rules of trade to foster development. The MDGs can only be achieved if Governments of both rich and poor countries live up to their promises.

The MDGs have their limitations. They do not capture other commitments made in the Millennium Declaration on governance, transparency, participation and human rights, which are not simple to measure, but are essential for the achievement of the Goals. Furthermore, while the first seven MDGs reflect international consensus derived from earlier UN conferences, the content of MDG 8, involving rich countries' commitments, was only discussed and agreed internationally in other fora following the Millennium Summit, such as the Doha Development Agenda (2001), the Monterrey Consensus (2002) and the Paris Declaration (2005). However, the essence of these commitments was reaffirmed in the Outcome Document of the World Summit in 2005.

Global goals, local solutions. While the MDGs were set at the global level, they can only become meaningful if they are adopted and adapted for local relevance. The Goals should not be a "one-size-fits-all" cookie-cutter solution, but should be localized and customized to country circumstances. Priorities and the degree of ambition should be locally determined and owned. Achieving the MDGs on social services, such as education and health, can be fairly straightforward and would involve investing in these sectors at the country level. However, country-specific MDGs also require that the poverty goal is not neglected. This, in turn, involves a complex set of domestic and international policies, supported by investment leading to income generation through "decent work" in the productive sectors, particularly agriculture and agro-processing, which for nearly all least developed countries are crucial sectors for generating labour-intensive growth for the poor.

The UN Millennium Campaign. The MDGs have proven to be of great value as a framework for...