Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)

In five years’ time, world leaders will meet to assess the progress that has been made in meeting the Millennium Summit commitment to “spare no effort to free our fellow men, women and children from the abject and dehumanizing conditions of extreme poverty”. That commitment, enunciated in the Millennium Declaration of 2000 and encapsulated in the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), has been the main impetus to advance international development over the last decade. The international community is currently evaluating progress made by countries toward the targets of the MDGs in order to chart a course forward for accelerated action on the MDGs between now and 2015.

At the regional level progress towards MDGs in Africa has been mixed across countries. But there is unequivocal progress on practically all MDGs. A number of targets will not be met, not because there is no progress but because the rate of progress is slower than required. Progress has been further slowed down by the recent triple crises: food; fuel price; and financial and economic, that engulfed the entire globe. African States and Governments remain committed and determined to achieve MDGs in spite of the crises and are making steady progress on almost all the MDGs. Key areas of progress include a reduction in the proportion of undernourished people on the continent;  universal primary education and gender equality and empowerment. On the health front, commendable progress has been made in reducing tuberculosis, while the proportion of children sleeping under insecticide-treated bed-nets is increasing in the drive to combat malaria. An important element of this relative success has been the introduction, by many African countries, of specific and institutional innovations that have maintained some of the gains achieved.  

The AfDB and the MDGs

The starting point and overriding goal should be to stimulate growth that is strong, sustained and shared. This might be achieved by building and harnessing the capacity of African economies, notably by promoting a vibrant sector, key to diversification and employment creation. The AfDB strategy is therefore tailored to help its regional member countries achieve strong, sustained and shared growth in order to reach the MDGs and in the process, generate higher domestic resources. By investing in infrastructure, the Bank helps the countries to unlock their production potential by alleviating supply constraints, lowering production costs and linking producers to markets.

In 2009 alone, the Bank disbursed around USD 6 billion to finance infrastructure projects in Africa. A lot more funds are needed – around USD 75.5 billion a year, according to a study by the Infrastructure Consortium for Africa – to fill the infrastructure gap.  The Bank’s private sector strategy is key to creating jobs and building a resilient economy, while the higher education and technology strategies will enable African economies to compete in this high-technology integrated world with strong human resources. Governance support has been strategic to unlocking the potential of the private sector and competitiveness. To enable market expansion, which broadens the revenue base, the AfDB has been investing in regional integration.       

The AfDB strongly believes that economic growth is crucial for progress on MDGs to be made. It is also critical that Africa develops its domestic resource base to reduce reliance on aid and external capital inflows.  The global economic and financial crisis contributed to the reduction in investment flows to the continent and, a decline in demand for exports, putting severe strains on the budget of several countries. Strengthening tax and non-tax revenues helps to create additional fiscal space, fund essential infrastructure investments and social services. It provides greater economic independence and reinforces accountable taxation and public expenditure systems.

The AfDB provides support to its regional member countries for them to reform their tax systems in order to mobilize domestic resources that can be invested in infrastructure and social development. There is still a long way to go, but the client countries are in the right direction.

Status of MDGs in Africa

Goal 1: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
Inadequate and incomplete data make assessment of progress on poverty reduction difficult. Nonetheless, notable progress has been made towards poverty reduction and extreme hunger. According to latest figures, the proportion of people in Africa living in poverty is decreasing. However, in absolute terms, the number of Africans living below poverty line is projected to increase by 2015.

Goal 2: Achieve universal primary education
African countries continue to perform well on most of the education targets. Net primary education enrollment has increased in all countries and the majority of African countries are likely to achieve this goal by the target date. However, the rate of progress made in primary enrollment has not been matched by a commensurate rate of improvement in the primary school completion rate. Ensuring a good quality of primary education across many African countries has become a major challenge.

Goal 3: Promote gender equality and empower women
African countries showed overall progress in gender equality and the empowerment of women. Gender parity in primary education is likely to be achieved by most countries. Unfortunately, parity decreases in secondary education, and the gap is widest in tertiary education. The year 2009 witnessed a continuing upward trend in the proportion of women in African national parliaments, as was also the case in the previous years. Rwanda, Angola, Mozambique, and South Africa lead the continent on this indicator.

Goal 4: Reduce child mortality
Africa continues to show progress, albeit slow, in reducing the under-five mortality ratio. The U5MR declined by 21 percent from 168 deaths per 1,000 live births in 1990 to 132 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2008. In most countries, percentage of immunized children against measles is above the 73 percent regional average in 2008. However, the rate of progress being made is insufficient to attain this target at the continental level.

Goal 5: Improve maternal health
Maternal mortality remains a major challenge for health systems worldwide. Nonetheless, the latest available data give some glimmer of hope for Africa as a region, which registered an overall decline for this indicator between 1980 and 2008. The high rate of HIV/AIDS prevalence seems to be a contributory factor to the elevated maternal mortality. The African countries are unlikely to attain this target given the rate of progress. Accelerating this slow rate of progress in reducing maternal mortality has been taken up at the continental level with the African Union Assembly of Heads of State and Government summit, held in July 2010 that focused on maternal and child health.

Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases
Nearly ten years after the Abuja Declaration on HIV/AIDS, TB and other related infectious diseases and the UNGASS on HIV/AIDS, it is noteworthy that the continent is recording success in combating the epidemic. Infection and prevalence rates have stabilized. Access to treatment has expanded. But new infections remain high. Malaria continues to be major cause of morbidity and mortality in Africa. However, there has been significant reduction in malaria deaths in few African countries. TB mortality is also decreasing and the number of households with an insecticide treated bed-net is rising. While their declared commitment to tackling these diseases remains very strong, most African countries have yet to meet the pledge that they made in Abuja to allocate at least 15 percent of their annual budgets to the health sector.

Goal 7: Ensure environmental sustainability
The slow progress toward Health MDGs is attributed partly to inadequate hygienic condition including inadequate access to safe water and sanitation.  In 2008, nine African countries reached over 90 percent coverage for access to safe drinking water, although largely driven by urban improvements. This is a tremendous achievement and provides a basis for learning for other African countries.The threat that climate change poses to Africa is resulting in a greater focus on environmental sustainability, with its natural resources being degraded at a worrying rate. A future challenge that presents itself to African countries remains short-term gains to be made through rapid economic expansion or whether to lend greater weight to protecting the environment for future generations.

Goal 8: Develop a global partnership for development
International cooperation and global partnership are crucial for achieving the MDGs. The partnership remains strong in the past years.Net official development assistance (ODA) to Africa rose in 2008 despite the global financial and economic crisis, even though  this fell far below the commitment of 0.7 percent of GNI of OECD countries. Nonetheless, Africa remains the largest recipient of ODA from OECD/DAC relative to other developing countries.

Conclusion

African countries are making progress, albeit slow, towards achieving the targets of the MDGs. The direction of human development indicators has significantly and positively shifted since the 1980s and 1990s. But challenges to progress remain.  These are an unstable global economic and political environment; inequality and inequity in access to social services; a global partnership that still falls significantly short of its promise; domestic resource mobilization and climate change. The evidence suggests that the MDGs are achievable if African countries, their governments and people, and their development partners rededicate and recommit themselves to the MDGs. To achieve this, they need to give due consideration to implementing an Agenda for Action. These actions include:

• Maintain sound and stable macroeconomic policies, improve national capacity to monitor and report on the MDGs
• Strengthen national statistical systems
• Strengthen MDG-based planning at all levels (tiers) of government, countries should cascade planning to lower tiers of government and build appropriate MDG-related capacity at those levels
• Scale up public sector  investments to achieve the MDGs
• Promote active private sector, CSO and NGO involvement in efforts to achieve the MDGs
• Promote a unified planning framework that provides a strong political, social and economic framework for achieving the MDGs
• Harness the potential of regional integration, including South–South cooperation.