Global Development Goals
What are Goals?
Goals can be described as desired outcome or aspiration of an
individual, group, organization or a country.
The benefits of goal-based planning
Why do we need Sustainable Development Goals? Do global
goals matter? The evidence from the MDGs is powerful and
encouraging. Global goals such as the MDGs and the SDGs
complement international conventions and other tools of
international law by providing a globally shared normative
framework that fosters collaboration across countries,
mobilizes all stakeholders, and inspires action.
Well-crafted goals are able to accomplish the following
1. Provide a shared narrative of sustainable
development and help guide the public’s
understanding of complex challenges.
The SDGs will raise awareness and educate
governments, businesses, civil society leaders,
academics, and ordinary citizens about the complex
issues that must be addressed. Children everywhere
should learn the SDGs as shorthand for sustainable
development.
2. Unite the global community and mobilize
stakeholders. Community leaders, politicians,
government ministries, academics, nongovernmental
organizations, religious groups, international
organizations, donor organizations, and foundations
will be motivated to come together for a common
purpose around each SDG. The shared focus on time-
bound quantitative goals will spur greater
mobilization, promote innovation, and strengthen
collaboration within epistemic communities or
networks of expertise and practice. The experience in
public health under the MDGs provides a powerful
illustration of how communities can mobilize around
time-bound goals.
3. Promote integrated thinking and put to rest the
futile debates that pit one dimension of
sustainable development against another. The
challenges addressed by the SDGs are integrated and
must be pursued in combination, rather than one at a
time. As a result, SDGs cannot be ordered by priority.
All are equally important and work in harmony with
the others. Each goal should be analyzed and pursued
with full regard to the three dimensions of sustainable
development (economic, social, and environmental).
4. Support long-term approaches towards
sustainable development
The goals, targets, and indicators will allow public and
private actors to identify what is needed and chart out
long-term pathways to achieve sustainable
development, including resources, timelines, and
allocation of responsibilities. This long-term
perspective can help to insulate the planning process
from short-term political and business imperatives.
5. Define responsibilities and foster accountability.
In particular, the goals can empower civil society to ask
governments and businesses how they are working
towards every one of the new goals. Timely, accurate
data on progress is crucial for effective accountability.
The SDGs must drive improvements in data and
monitoring systems, which look to capitalize on the
“data revolution,” i.e. significant improvements in local,
national, and global data collection, processing, and
dissemination, using both existing and new tools.
Lessons from the MDGs
The SDGs build on the success of the Millennium
Development Goals (MDGs) in mobilizing collective action
around a time-bound set of globally agreed goals. The eight
MDGs were adopted in 2002 as a framework to
operationalize the Millennium Declaration. The Declaration,
adopted by Member States of the UN General Assembly in
the year 2000, articulated the world’s “collective
responsibility to uphold the principles of human dignity,
equality and equity at the global level” and to eradicate the
world’s most extreme and deplorable conditions, including
poverty and destitution[1.ii]. The MDGs, which conclude at
the end of 2015, focus on the most vulnerable populations,
and address extreme poverty, hunger, disease, gender
equality, education, and environmental sustainability. They
mark a historic and effective global mobilization effort to
achieve a set of common societal priorities. By packaging
these priorities into an easy-to-understand set of eight goals,
and by establishing measurable, time-bound objectives, the
MDGs promote global awareness, political accountability,
improved monitoring, mobilization of epistemic communities,
civic participation, and public pressure.
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Many countries have made significant progress towards
achieving the MDGs. In 2015, the baseline year for
measuring MDG progress, almost half of the developing
world lived on less than US$1.25 a day measured in 2005
prices (the World Bank poverty line used during the MDG
period). According to new estimates from the World Bank,
today less than 10% of the world’s population live on less
than the equivalent $1.90 per day measured in 2010 US$.
Furthermore, according to the UN Millennium Development
Goals Report 2015, the likelihood of a child dying before age
five has ben nearly halved, and the global maternal mortality
ratio dropped by 45%. Since 1990, nearly 3.3 million deaths
from malaria have been averted, and new HIV infections
have decreased by 1.4 million cases.
Primary school net enrollment in the developing world has
reached 91%. Ninety-one percent of the world uses improved
drinking water. Additionally, ozone-depleting substances
have been almost eliminated, with the ozone layer predicted
to recover by mid-century. The MDGs have also provided a
galvanizing force and organizing framework for development
cooperation. Official development assistance (ODA) has
increased by 66% since 2000, providing an additional
US$135.2 billion o The MDGs played an important role in
focusing the world’s attention on reducing extreme poverty,
yet progress has been incomplete. As of 2011, the percent of
people in extreme poverty (living on less than $1.90 a day) in
sub-Saharan Africa was 44.3%, and in South Asia was 22.3%.
In particular, least developed countries, landlocked
developing countries, and small-island developing states
remain behind, as they face structural barriers to
development. In many societies the most vulnerable
populations have made little progress. Mass migration, often
caused by violence and conflict, has led to massive
displacement, instability, and large populations living in
dangerously overcrowded refugee camps and informal
settlements. Gender inequality remains widespread, as many
young girls are deprived of education and forced into early
marriages.
Under the MDGs the world has made tremendous progress in
reducing child mortality, but six million children still die each
year from preventable causes. Maternal mortality rates have
come down in most countries, but not sufficiently to meet the
MDG. Large numbers of people do not have access to
affordable primary health care [see Tracking universal
health coverage: First global monitoring report], and major
efforts are needed to ensure universal access to basic
infrastructure, including energy, water, sanitation, and
transport. While a lot of progress has been made in
increasing primary school enrollment in all countries,
completion rates remain low, and far too many children do
not complete a full cycle of education from early-childhood
development through to secondary school completion.
Approximately 800 million people remain chronically
undernourished and do not have access to sufficient, safe,
and nutritious food. Another billion or so face various kinds
of micronutrient deficiencies [see The State of Food
Insecurity in the World 2015]. For these reasons the SDGs
commit to ending extreme poverty in all its forms, including
hunger, and call on all people to enjoy universal access to
essential social services and basis infrastructure by 2030.
