The Millennium Development Goals

What are the millennium development goals

The Millennium Development Goals are a very significant and ambitious agenda for reducing the existing poverty and improving the lives and condition of the people of a country and the world leaders agreed on that agenda at the Millennium Summit in September 2000. For each and every goal, one or more than one targets have been set up for the Millennium Development for 2015 by using the planning taken in the world summit-1990 as a benchmark. The eight important goals represent a partnership and a close co-operation between the developed countries and the developing countries and as the Millennium Declaration states, they are determined to create an environment at the national level and global levels alike for the development and the elimination of poverty.

Millennium Development Goals (MDG) Issues

In September 2000, in the meeting at the United Nations Millennium Summit, the world's leaders agreed to sign a remarkable document, the Millennium Declaration. According to the United Nations Millennium Summit-2000, the Millennium Development Goals are- to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger in the poorer countries.

(i) to achieve universal primary education in all poor countries

(ii)  to promote gender equality in the family, society and the country and to ensure the empowerment of women in the levels of a country

(iii) to reduce the child mortality rate in all the developing countries to improve maternal health in the rural areas of the poorer countries.

(iv) to reduce HIV/AIDS, malaria and other contagious diseases and to be careful about the health of the people of the country.

(vi) to ensure environmental sustainability and to protect the environment.

(vii) to develop a global partnership for all sorts of development in a country

Also Read: The Sustainable Development Goals

Progress Towards Millennium Development Goals in Bangladesh

Firstly, Bangladesh has already achieved significant and impressive success in the field of population control. Statistics show that the total fertility rate (TFR) declined from 6.3 in 1975 to 3.3 in 1997-99. Accordingly, the population growth rate has come down from 2.9 per cent in the mid-seventies to 1.5 per cent in the late-nineties. It is, at present, 1.37% and it is a very positive sign for the development of our country.

Secondly, the mortality rate is often considered as the criterion for judging economic success and the failure of nations. Bangladesh has displayed very considerable success in this respect, especially in reducing the infant and child mortality rate. Now, the infant mortality rate, according to Bangladesh Economic Review-2017, is 29 per thousand and till the nineties, it was 243 per thousand.

Thirdly, Bangladesh witnessed significant success in disaster preparedness and in overcoming the phenomena of mass starvation and the threat of famine syndrome in the backdrop of endemic vulnerability to natural disasters. Although the issue of food security remains a next decade's challenge, the increased disaster preparedness, which was combined with expanded capacity to implement lean-season targeted wage-employment and transfer programs, has played an important role in ensuring minimum food entitlements for the poorest people during the times of crisis.

Fourthly, Bangladesh has made impressive achievement in reducing child malnutrition rates during the last 15 years. According to Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) data, the rate of controlling the growth for children in the age group of 6-71 months, which was 69 per cent in 1985/86, dropped to 49 per cent in 2000.

Fifthly, Bangladeshi women have played an important role in the success of micro-credit, ready-made garment exports, reducing population growth, increasing child nutrition and in the spread of primary education. While the significant gender gaps still persisting, the role of women in all walks of life has become increasingly visible and would be instrumental in bringing about wider social and economic changes in future.

Sixthly, the low-income countries are typically marked not only by the weak state but also by the weak civic and grass-root movements and activism. Bangladesh was an instructive outliner in this regard. The advances, made by the NGOs and CSOS as an alternative delivery mechanism as well as vocal civic institutions, have played a significant role in the reversal of fortunes. Social entrepreneurialism through catalyzing the developmental roles of the organizations of the poor such as Community Based Organizations (CBOS) and organizations for the poor (NGOs and CSOS) has been an important strategic element m the poverty reduction strategy. These social enterprises will continue to play an important role in developing a pro-poor development agenda in Bangladesh.

Seventhly, Bangladesh has achieved significant progress towards a viable democratic transition. Ensuring free and fair elections through a non-partisan Caretaker government has been a noteworthy political innovation in the backdrop of the weak democratic institutions in the country. There have also been Important gains in terms of increased political and electoral participation of women, enhanced press freedom, and increasingly active civic movements.

Progress in Cross-Country Perspectives

Bangladesh's progress also stands out in cross-country comparisons. This is ports the proposition that higher social/ human development outcomes can be achieved even at a lower level of per capita national income. Bangladesh growth performance was relatively modest with a per capita GDP growth of about 2 per cent per year. The growth performance started to improve only in the nineties. Similarly, the pace of income-poverty reduction was very slow During the period between the early eighties and early nineties, the incident of income-poverty declined by 0.8 per cent per year in Bangladesh compared with 1.9 per cent in India, 1.4 per cent in Pakistan and 3.6 per cent in Sri Lake Notwithstanding the relatively slow income growth and modest pace of income poverty reduction, Bangladesh's achievements in the broad area of human development were faster and in some respects, remarkable. Although the level of social deprivations in Bangladesh is still high, the pace of improvement has been encouraging.

Indeed, the pace of progress in reducing TFR. bringing down the level of under-five mortality, and lowering the prevalence of child malnutrition is not only higher than the average progress recorded in LDCS, but also stands out in the overall context of South Asia. "The population living below the poverty line declined by one percentage point a year in the 1990s and came down to 40 per cent in 2000, but it is not enough to achieve the millennium development" goal (MDG)" a UNDP study said. "The reduction of poverty that took place in the 1990s-at the rate of about one percentage point per year-was certainly modest by the standards of East and South-East Asia in the last few decades," the study said, urging policy-makers to support growth in the non-tradable sector. "The pace of poverty reduction accelerated in the 1990s compared to the 1980s," the United Nations Development Programme study said. The population living below the poverty line dropped from 52 per cent in 1983-84 to about 50 per cent in 1991-92, but then fell relatively sharply to about 40 per cent by 2000, it explained.

Country Strategy to Achieve MDGs in Bangladesh

Bangladesh has one of the most vulnerable economies, characterized by extremely high population density, low resource base, and high incidence of natural disasters. These have adverse implications for long-term savings investment and growth. Such defining features impart certain uniqueness to the formulation of the poverty reduction strategy. The present strategy addresses three key tasks facing the nation:

The first one focuses on the need for consolidating past economic and social successes (the task of sustaining the positive gains). The second one pertains to the compulsions of avoiding the pitfalls of past development experiences (the task of overcoming the negative tendencies). The third one draws attention to the new challenges that the nation has to confront in the context of globalization as well as new problems that arise from the present phase of domestic development (the task of addressing new challenges). The success of the strategy of poverty reduction and attainment of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) would depend on the extent to which the above three tasks are addressed in the coming decade.

The Millennium Development Goals Vision

With the constitutional obligation of developing and sustaining a society in which the basic needs of all people are met and every person can prosper in freedom and cherish the ideals and values of a free society, the vision of Bangladesh's poverty reduction strategy is to substantially reduce poverty within the next generation. For this, poverty reduction (with a special focus on the removal of hunger and chronic poverty) and social development (with particular emphasis on gender equality) has been made the overreaching independent strategic goals. Through adopting a comprehensive approach and by taking into account the country's past international commitments and evolving national realities, the strategy visualizes that, by the year 2015, Bangladesh would achieve the following goals/targets:

1. Remove the ugly faces of poverty by eradicating hunger, chronic food- insecurity and extreme destitution:

2. Reduce the number of people living below the poverty line by 50 per cent;

3. Attain universal primary education for all girls and boys of primary school age;

4. Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education;

5. Reduce infant and under-five mortality rates by 65 per cent, and eliminate gender disparity in child mortality;

6. Reduce the proportion of malnourished children under five by 50 per cent and eliminate gender disparity in child malnutrition;

7. Reduce the maternal mortality rate by 75 per cent;

8. Ensure access to reproductive health services to all;

9. Reduce substantially, if not eliminate totally, social violence against the poor and the disadvantaged groups, especially violence against women and children; and

10. Ensure comprehensive disaster risk management, environmental sustainability and mainstreaming of these concerns into the national development process.

ICT and Millennium Development Goals

Recent developments in the fields of communication and information technology are indeed revolutionary in nature. Information and knowledge are expanding in quantity and accessibility. In many fields, future decision-makers will be presented with unprecedented new tools for development. In such fields as agriculture, health, education, human resources and environmental management, or transport and business development, the consequences could be really quite revolutionary.

Communications and information technology have enormous potential, especially for developing countries, and in furthering sustainable development." Everywhere in the developing world, especially in Asia, governments are launching ambitious ICT infrastructure initiatives, radically changing their communications policy frameworks and situating ICT at the heart of their development programmes and strategies. ICT has become an indispensable tool in the fight against world poverty.

ICT provides developing nations with an unprecedented opportunity to meet vital development goals such as poverty reduction, basic healthcare and education, far more effectively than before. Those nations that succeed in harnessing the potential of ICT can look forward to greatly expanded economic growth, dramatically improved human welfare and stronger forms of democratic governance.

UN Lauds Dhaka's progress in attaining MDGs

The overall progress of Bangladesh towards attaining Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015 is satisfactory in most of the cases. The observations came from officials of the United Nations (UN) Resident Coordinator Office. "The progress including poverty reduction, primary school enrollment, gender parity and reduction of child mortality rate is satisfactory but the progress in reduction of mother mortality rate and environmental sustainability is not on the mark," Principal Officer at the local office of UN said.

In the case of primary school enrolment rate, the target for Bangladesh was set to increase net enrollment from 73 per cent in 1992 to 100 per cent by 2015. Current enrollment is nearly 90 per cent. In terms of gender disparity, the target was fixed to achieve equal attendance of female and male ratio in all levels of education while in primary and secondary level the gender parity has been already achieved. The principal Officer at the local office of UN said that the current rate of enrollment must be maintained, the school drop-out rates should be reduced and the quality of education must be bettered to achieve the MDGs by 2015.

In the sector of poverty and hunger elimination, the target was set to reduce the proportion of people in extreme poverty from 28 per cent in 1991 to 14 per cent by 2015 while the current status is 20 per cent. We can say Bangladesh is on the right track on alleviation of the extreme poverty level but the pace of reduction has to be increased against the population growth rate, she observed. Another MDG is to reduce under five-mortality rate from 151 deaths per thousand in 1990 to 50 by 2015 while the current status is 82. "The child mortality rate has shown a good pace but the reduction rate must be reduced by three per cent per year to achieve the MDGs", Principal Officer at the local office of the UN said. In the reduction of mother mortality rate and child malnutrition, Bangladesh results are not satisfactory.

The target was to reduce maternal mortality from 574 death per one lakh in 1990 to 143 by 2015 but the present achievement is 320-400. UN recommended that to get the mark on the sectors Bangladesh has to reduce the rate of early marriage, violence against women, increase the number of skilled health personnel and strengthen women empowerment to reduce maternal mortality as well as poverty reduction.

The 2005 World Summit was held from September 14 to 16 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York where more than 170 countries' heads of government including the then Prime Minister Begum Khaleda Zia attended. The major agenda of the summit was to review the developing countries' progress to meet the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) which were fixed by the United Nations (UN) Millennium Summit in 2000. But the progress report was not so satisfactory according to the hegemonic countries. However, in light of the above discussion, it can be said that to achieve MDGs. for the sake of the overall development of the country, we have to try heart and soul.