targets, the MDGs provide benchmarks to assess progress
and determine what adjustments are needed in national and
international strategies to achieve sustainable development.
The goals provide a framework for coordinating development
efforts. Most importantly, by combining goals across different areas, such as hunger, poverty, education, health, gender
equality, environmental sustainability and trade, the MDGs
demonstrate an interconnected vision of development.
Connecting Rights and Development
Many of the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights relate directly to human development. Article 23 of the Universal Declaration commits
countries to ensure the right to work. This right is reinforced by Goal 3 of the MDGs, which promotes gender equality and women’s empowerment and uses the
number of women employed in the formal (non-farm)
sector of a country’s economy as an indicator of success. Article 25 covers the right to a decent standard of
living, including the right to food. Article 26 establishes
the right to education. Holding leaders accountable depends on basic civil and political rights, such as freedom of expression (Article 19) and the right to take part
in the civic life of the state (Article 21).
Roadmap for Action
The MDGs are a grand vision, but they are also a roadmap for action, complete with measurable, time-bound objectives. For instance, Goal 1—to eradicate extreme poverty
and hunger—includes targets of reducing by half the proportion of people living on less than $1 a day or suffering from
hunger. Goal 3—to promote gender equality and empower
women—requires eliminating gender disparities in primary
and secondary education by 2005 and in all levels of education by 2015. Of the 18 specific targets included in the
MDGs, 10 contain explicit numerical indicators and the rest
call for changes that will make government action more effective, such as “integrating the principles of sustainable development into country policies and programs and reversing
the loss of environmental resources.”
The benchmarks created by the MDGs help countries
to measure progress, identify shortfalls, and realign development strategies and priorities. These benchmarks have
spawned an extensive effort to collect, analyze and disseminate MDG-related information. Over the last eight years, the
United Nations has produced a mountain of material, including six Millennium Progress Reports, and the World Bank has issued four Global Monitoring Reports to track progress toward
the goals. A myriad of data sets have been collected and the
information made available on the Internet, and many counwww.bread.org
tries have begun to collect and publish national-level data.
All of this information has added to our understanding of
the progress made and the work that remains to be done.
The publicity generated by the information has galvanized
support among citizens to hold governments accountable for
their commitments to development.
In his 2001 report on the MDGs, then-U.N. Secretary
General Kofi Annan wrote, “States need to demonstrate the
political will needed to carry out commitments already given
and to implement strategies already worked out.”6 Political
will does not occur in a vacuum. In fact, it most often d