Inherit the Earth? Millennium Development Goals - so
near and yet so far
Barbara Butler
Churches Together in Britain and Ireland £18
(978-0-85169-381-1)
Church Times Bookshop £16.20 (Use code
CT127 )
IN 2000, 189 governments made visionary pledges at the United
Nations in the form of Millennium Development Goals. These aim to
halve extreme poverty and hunger by 2015, achieve universal primary
education, promote gender equality and empower women, reduce child
mortality and improve maternal health, combat HIV/AIDS, malaria,
and other diseases, ensure environmental stability, and develop
global partnership.
The goals have raised awareness of the issues, and there is some
progress. Child-mortality rates have fallen, more children attend
school, and more people have access to water and improved
sanitation services. But the goal of halving extreme poverty and
hunger by 2015 will not be reached.
The number of chronically hungry people remains obstinately high
at nearly one billion, slightly more than in 2000. The number of
the people living in extreme poverty is increasing in many
sub-Saharan Africa countries. So, contrary to the book's subtitle,
the world is far away rather than near the goals.
Barbara Butler of Christian Aware outlines the problems well,
and the book is packed with inspiring stories of people who are
striving to achieve the goals. Lacking, however, is critical
analysis of how governments of both Western and developing
countries have failed to devote sufficient resources and priority
to achieving the goals. Aid from Western countries stood at 0.29
per cent of their combined gross national income in 2012, a long
way short of the UN target of 0.7 per cent. They cannot blame it
all on economic recession.
In 2005, and again in 2010, governments reviewed progress
towards the goals, which was clearly not enough. But more resources
to back the vision were not offered.Poverty is a scandal that can
and must be overcome. It will happen only if people care
enough.
John Madeley writes about economic and social-development
issues.