Typical street scene in Santa Ana, El Salvador. (Photo: iStock)
IMF Survey: Focus on Steps to Speed Progress Toward MDGs
September 15, 2010
World leaders meet in New York next week to accelerate progress toward the Millennium Development Goals, which aim to cut poverty and improve education around the globe, and forge a global partnership for development by a 2015 deadline.
Economic expansion reduces poverty by creating employment opportunities, making anti-poverty programs fiscally feasible (photo: Andrew Holbrooke/Corbis)
MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS
The IMF’s Finance & Development magazine focuses on steps to reinvigorate progress toward the goals five years before the deadline.
Ahead of the United Nations summit in New York on September 20–21, Finance & Development focuses on what needs to be done to reinvigorate progress toward the goals.
Despite setbacks from the global economic crisis, progress is being made toward some of the eight international development targets that all 192 United Nations member states and many international organizations have agreed to achieve by 2015. The goals include cutting extreme poverty, reducing child mortality rates, fighting diseases such as HIV/AIDS, and developing a global partnership for development around the world.
September 2010 issue of Finance & Development: focus on what needs to be done to reinvigorate progress toward the Millennium Development Goals
The September issue of Finance & Development notes that although extreme poverty is falling sharply, universal primary education is within reach, and higher school enrollment is shrinking the gender gap in education, a lot more needs to be done to regain momentum. In developing countries, domestic policies can help build stronger local economies. And the rest of the world can help by reviving sustained global growth, increasing foreign direct investment and private sector–led growth, facilitating access to export markets, and improving the predictability and amount of aid flows.
Key articles on reinvigorating the Millennium Development Goals include
Regaining Momentum
Delfin S. Go, Richard Harmsen, and Hans Timmer
Progress on the Millennium Development Goals has been slowed by the crisis. The rest of the world has to help. A joint overview by the World Bank and the IMF.
Making a Breakthrough
Pedro Conceição and Selim Jahan
To accelerate progress toward the MDGs, growth must happen in sectors that directly benefit the poor, such as agriculture.
Saving Mothers’ Lives
Melinda Gates
Countries must make maternal health a policy priority as a way of building stronger families and empowering communities.
Time for a Rethink
Jagdish Bhagwati
It is hard to object to the Millennium Development Goals, but that doesn’t mean they lay out an effective blueprint for development, argues the Columbia University professor.
Half Empty or Half Full
Andrew Berg and Luis-Felipe Zanna
Does aid work? The net impact of aid surges depends on country-specific factors.
Growing out of Poverty
Arvind Panagariya
Economic expansion reduces poverty by creating employment opportunities and making anti-poverty programs fiscally feasible.
Inequality Is Untenable
Rodney Ramcharan
If policymakers neglect income distribution, the consequences for individuals and society can be grave.
■ Finance & Development is published four times a year in English.