Eastern Europe & the Commonwealth of Independent States make uneven progress towards fulfilling the Millennium Development Goals
VIENNA, 19 June 2006 – The new member states of the European Union are well on their way towards achieving their nationally adapted Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), but some countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) suffer from the same levels of poverty found in Africa and thus deserve the same level of attention the world community accords to African countries, says a new report released today by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
“In some countries of Central Asia, the challenges of meeting national MDG targets do not differ so dramatically from the development challenges facing low-income countries in Africa, South Asia or the Caribbean”, said Kalman Mizsei, UN Assistant Secretary General and Regional Director for UNDP’s Bureau for Europe and the CIS. “The international community should seek to engage in these countries with the same intensity that is apparent in its concern for development prospects in Africa”.
The new UNDP report, National Millennium Development Goals: A framework for action, breaks ground by charting countries’ progress towards achieving nationally adapted goals. While the global MDGs were designed to tackle the kind of underdevelopment that characterizes Africa and parts of Southeast Asia, the very different histories of underdevelopment in Eastern Europe and the CIS necessitated altering the goals to fit national circumstances.
The eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) – which range from halving extreme poverty to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing universal primary education, all by the target date of 2015 – form a blueprint agreed to by all UN member states at the Millennium Summit at UN headquarters in September 2000. They have galvanized unprecedented efforts to meet the needs of the world’s poorest.
The report is intended to serve as a platform for integrating the nationally adapted MDGs into country-level poverty alleviation frameworks. “The key question concerns how nationally adapted MDGs can be best used to promote sustainable development and eradicate inequalities in Eastern Europe and the CIS,” said Jacek Cukrowski, the report’s Lead Author.
The report emphasizes the need for partnerships between the public and private sectors to promote the region’s development agenda. Experience from the new EU member states in particular shows that the private sector can be an important participant in alleviating many development problems. Private companies increasingly see the opportunities associated with incorporating social concerns into business operations, in light of increased pressures from consumers and governments, but also in terms of securing access to new markets.
“Through a combination of philanthropic motives and self-interest, businesses are increasingly teaming up with governments and non-governmental organizations to form public-private partnerships that reach new markets and improve the quality of social services”, said Mr. Mizsei. In Kazakhstan, Chevron Texaco, Citibank and UNDP have formed a partnership to promote small- and medium-sized enterprise development. In Poland the oil refinery PKN has teamed up with Levi Strauss, the local government and UNDP in order to fund projects promoting sustainable development.
The report paints a mixed picture of development trends in the region. Among the success stories are the Czech Republic and Slovenia, which have eliminated absolute poverty altogether. For these and the other Central European states the challenge is to overcome economic inequality and to integrate vulnerable groups such as the Roma.
Other countries face much starker challenges. The per-capita GDP (in purchasing-power-parity terms) of Tajikistan is lower than the per-capita GDPs of Rwanda, Uganda and Cote d’Ivoire. Uzbekistan’s per-capita GDP is lower than Sudan’s and Cameroon’s. Approximately half the population of Moldova and Georgia remain under the absolute poverty line of $2.15 in PPP terms. By the end of the 1990s, an estimated 23 million people (over 40 per cent of Central Asia’s population) lived on less than PPP $4.30 a day; 10 million experienced extreme deprivation (living on less than PPP $2.15 a day).
Many countries of the region need to improve governance in order to deliver on the promise of the MDGs. The countries that have made the most progress in reducing poverty, ensuring gender equality, promoting better health and education, and combining economic growth with environmental sustainability–the new EU member states–have also had the most success in implementing economic, political and social reforms. On the other hand, the biggest social and economic problems are often observed in countries with underdeveloped democracies, suffering from high levels of corruption and poor state capacity.
For more information or interview requests, please contact Zoran Stevanovic, Regional Communications Specialist (zoran.stevanovic@undp.org + 421-2-59-337-428) or Denisa Papayova, Communications Associate (denisa.papayova@undp.org + 421-2-59-337-162).
www.undp.org/europeandcis
UNDP is the UN’s global development network, advocating for change and connecting countries to knowledge, experience and resources to help people build a better life. We are on the ground in 166 countries, working with them on their own solutions to global and national development challenges. As they develop local capacity, they draw on the people of UNDP and our wide range of partners. For more info on UNDP: http://www.undp.org
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