The Millennium Development Goals: Facing Down Challenges

Bread for the World Institute just released a new briefing paper on the Millennium Development Goals. Entitled, The Millennium Development Goals: Facing Down Challenges, the paper looks at four problems countries face in their efforts to achieve the MDGs. Of course, countries face huge and diverse challenges to development, and getting down the list to four areas was no easy task. Invariably, the paper leaves many important issues out, but it also explores some of the issues which we think are of the most significance (and consequence) to a countries development prospects. We invite others to read  the paper and let us know if we have missed the mark.

Included in the analysis are discussions of:

• Poor Starting Conditions: Countries whose human development indicators are at the lowest levels must make the greatest investments to achieve the MDGs. Not surprisingly, though, these are the countries with the fewest resources and the least capacity for rapid scale-up of programs in sectors such as health and education.

• Weak Governance and Institutions: Governments in developing countries have primary responsibility for promoting equitable, sustainable economic growth and human development. Governments that are unaccountable, inefficient, and/or do not respect human rights make growth and human development much more difficult.

• Conflict and Instability: Conflict not only stops development but reverses progress, exacerbating hunger, poverty, and disease and sharply increasing rates of premature death. Countries emerging from conflict have an opportunity to make rapid improvements in human development, but these are fragile opportunities that are easily passed up.

• Environmental Degradation: Many developing countries face heightened environmental risks. Deforestation, overfishing, droughts, and floods are longstanding problems in some regions. Global climate change has potentially devastating long-term consequences since higher temperatures harm many crops.

While the paper is largely descriptive of these problems, it does raise an important question about how (or whether) development assistance, particularly as delivered by the United States, can address these challenges. The point the paper makes is that addressing these problems requires a flexible approach that is highly tailored to meet local conditions (and address local challenges). Whether US foreign assistance meets this criteria is explored in more depth in a forthcoming briefing paper on foreign aid.