Kofi Annan, UN -SG

The MDGs represent a global partnership that has grown from the commitments and targets established at the world summits of the 1990s. Responding to the world's main development challenges and to the calls of civil society, the MDGs promote poverty reduction, education, maternal health, gender equality, and aim at combating child mortality, AIDS and other diseases.

Set for the year 2015, the MDGs are an agreed set of goals that can be achieved if all actors work together and do their part. Poor countries have pledged to govern better, and invest in their people through health care and education. Rich countries have pledged to support them, through aid, debt relief, and fairer trade.

How is UNDP helping?

UNDP is working with a wide range of partners to help create coalitions for change to support the goals at global, regional and national levels, to benchmark progress towards them, and to help countries to build the institutional capacity, policies and programmes needed to achieve the MDGs.

Guided by the UN Core Strategy, UNDP's work on the MDGs focuses on coordinating global and local efforts that:

1.        Campaign and mobilise for the MDGs through advocacy;
2.        Share the best strategies for meeting the MDGs in terms of innovative practices, policy and institutional reforms, means of policy implementation, and evaluation of financing options;
3.        Monitor and report progress towards the MDGs; and
4.        Support governments in tailoring the MDGs to local circumstances and challenges.

What are the Millennium Development Goals?

 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 the world’s countries and all the world’s leading development institutions. They have galvanized unprecedented efforts to meet the needs of the world’s poorest.

"We will have time to reach the Millennium Development Goals – worldwide and in most, or even all, individual countries – but only if we break with business as usual. We cannot win overnight. Success will require sustained action across the entire decade between now and the deadline. It takes time to train the teachers, nurses and engineers; to build the roads, schools and hospitals; to grow the small and large businesses able to create the jobs and income needed. So we must start now. And we must more than double global development assistance over the next few years. Nothing less will help to achieve
the Goals."

United Nations Secretary-General
Kofi A. Annan

The Millennium Development Goal Indicators Database shows the latest available data as of April 2005.

Goals, targets and indicators

A framework of 8 goals, 18 targets and 48 indicators to measure progress towards the Millennium Development goals was adopted by a consensus of experts from the United Nations Secretariat and IMF, OECD and the World Bank. ( Road Map towards the Implementation of the United Nations Millennium Declaration, A/56/326 [PDF, 450KB])
Each indicator below is linked to millennium data series as well as to background series related to the target in question.
For a description of the monitoring process, see About the Millennium Development Goals.

Goal 1. Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger

Target 1.
Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people whose income is less than one dollar a day

Indicators
1. Proportion of population below $1 (1993 PPP) per day (World Bank)^a
2. Poverty gap ratio [incidence x depth of poverty] (World Bank)
3. Share of poorest quintile in national consumption (World Bank)

Target 2.
Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people who suffer from hunger

Indicators
4. Prevalence of underweight children under five years of age (UNICEF-WHO)
5. Proportion of population below minimum level of dietary energy consumption (FAO)

Goal 2. Achieve universal primary education

Target 3.
Ensure that, by 2015, children everywhere, boys and girls alike, will be able to complete a full course of primary schooling

Indicators
6. Net enrolment ratio in primary education (UNESCO)
7. Proportion of pupils starting grade 1 who reach grade 5 (UNESCO)^b
8. Literacy rate of 15-24 year-olds (UNESCO)

Goal 3. Promote gender equality and empower women

Target 4.
Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education, preferably by 2005, and in all levels of education no later than 2015

Indicators
9. Ratio of girls to boys in primary, secondary and tertiary education (UNESCO)
10. Ratio of literate women to men, 15-24 years old (UNESCO)
11. Share of women in wage employment in the non-agricultural sector (ILO)
12. Proportion of seats held by women in national parliament (IPU)

Goal 4. Reduce child mortality

Target 5.
Reduce by two thirds, between 1990 and 2015, the under-five mortality rate

Indicators
13. Under-five mortality rate (UNICEF-WHO)
14. Infant mortality rate (UNICEF-WHO)
15. Proportion of 1 year-old children immunized against measles (UNICEF-WHO)

Goal 5. Improve maternal health

Target 6. Reduce by three quarters, between 1990 and 2015, the maternal mortality ratio

Indicators
16. Maternal mortality ratio (UNICEF-WHO)
17. Proportion of births attended by skilled health personnel (UNICEF-WHO)

Goal 6. Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases

Target 7
Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS

Indicators
18. HIV prevalence among pregnant women aged 15-24 years (UNAIDS-WHO-UNICEF)
19. Condom use rate of the contraceptive prevalence rate (UN Population Division)^c
  19a. Condom use at last high-risk sex (UNICEF-WHO)
  19b. Percentage of population aged 15-24 years with comprehensive correct knowledge of HIV/AIDS (UNICEF-WHO)^d
  19c. Contraceptive prevalence rate (UN Population Division)
20. Ratio of school attendance of orphans to school attendance of non-orphans aged 10-14 years (UNICEF-UNAIDS-WHO)

Target 8.
Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the incidence of malaria and other major diseases

Indicators
21. Prevalence and death rates associated with malaria (WHO)
22. Proportion of population in malaria-risk areas using effective malaria prevention and treatment measures (UNICEF-WHO)^e
23. Prevalence and death rates associated with tuberculosis (WHO)
24. Proportion of tuberculosis cases detected and cured under DOTS (internationally recommended TB control strategy) (WHO)

Goal 7. Ensure environmental sustainability

Target 9.
Integrate the principles of sustainable development into country policies and programmes and reverse the loss of environmental resources

Indicators
25. Proportion of land area covered by forest (FAO)
26. Ratio of area protected to maintain biological diversity to surface area (UNEP-WCMC)
27. Energy use (kg oil equivalent) per $1,000 GDP (PPP) (IEA, World Bank)
28. Carbon dioxide emissions per capita (UNFCCC, UNSD) and consumption of ozone-depleting CFCs (ODP tons) (UNEP-Ozone Secretariat)
29. Proportion of population using solid fuels (WHO)

Target 10.
Halve, by 2015, the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and sanitation

Indicators
30. Proportion of population with sustainable access to an improved water source, urban and rural (UNICEF-WHO)
31. Proportion of population with access to improved sanitation, urban and rural (UNICEF-WHO)

Target 11.
By 2020, to have achieved a significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers

Indicators
32. Proportion of households with access to secure tenure (UN-HABITAT)

Goal 8. Develop a global partnership for development

Indicators for targets 12-15 are given below in a combined list.

Target 12.
Develop further an open, rule-based, predictable, non-discriminatory trading and financial system.
Includes a commitment to good governance, development and poverty reduction - both nationally and internationally

Target 13.
Address the special needs of the least developed countries.
Includes: tariff and quota-free access for least developed countries' exports; enhanced programme of debt relief for heavily indebted poor countries (HIPC) and cancellation of official bilateral debt; and more generous ODA for countries committed to poverty reduction

Target 14.
Address the special needs of landlocked developing countries and small island developing States (through the Programme of Action for the Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing States and the outcome of the twenty-second special session of the General Assembly)

Target 15.
Deal comprehensively with the debt problems of developing countries through national and international measures in order to make debt sustainable in the long term

Some of the indicators listed below are monitored separately for the least developed countries (LDCs), Africa, landlocked developing countries (LLDCs) and small island developing States (SIDS)

Indicators

Official development assistance (ODA)

33. Net ODA, total and to LDCs, as percentage of OECD/Development Assistance Committee (DAC) donors' gross national income (GNI)(OECD)
34. Proportion of total bilateral, sector-allocable ODA of OECD/DAC donors to basic social services (basic education, primary health care, nutrition, safe water and sanitation) (OECD)
35. Proportion of bilateral ODA of OECD/DAC donors that is untied (OECD)
36. ODA received in landlocked developing countries as a proportion of their GNIs (OECD)
37. ODA received in small island developing States as proportion of their GNIs (OECD)

Market access

38. Proportion of total developed country imports (by value and excluding arms) from developing countries and from LDCs, admitted free of duty (UNCTAD, WTO, WB)
39. Average tariffs imposed by developed countries on agricultural products and textiles and clothing from developing countries (UNCTAD, WTO, WB)
40. Agricultural support estimate for OECD countries as percentage of their GDP (OECD)
41. Proportion of ODA provided to help build trade capacity (OECD, WTO)

Debt sustainability

42. Total number of countries that have reached their Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative (HIPC) decision points and number that have reached their HIPC completion points (cumulative) (IMF - World Bank)
43. Debt relief committed under HIPC initiative (IMF-World Bank)
44. Debt service as a percentage of exports of goods and services (IMF-World Bank)

Target 16.
In cooperation with developing countries, develop and implement strategies for decent and productive work for youth

Indicators
45. Unemployment rate of young people aged 15-24 years, each sex and total (ILO)^f

Target 17.
In cooperation with pharmaceutical companies, provide access to affordable essential drugs in developing countries

Indicators
46. Proportion of population with access to affordable essential drugs on a sustainable basis (WHO)

Target 18.
In cooperation with the private sector, make available the benefits of new technologies, especially information and communications

Indicators
47. Telephone lines and cellular subscribers per 100 population (ITU)
48. Personal computers in use per 100 population and Internet users per 100 population (ITU)

Footnotes:
^a For monitoring country poverty trends, indicators based on national poverty lines should be used, where available.
^b An alternative indicator under development is "primary completion rate".
^c Among contraceptive methods, only condoms are effective in preventing HIV transmission. Since the condom use rate is only measured amongst women in union, it is supplemented by an indicator on condom use in high-risk situations (indicator 19a) and an indicator on HIV/AIDS knowledge (indicator 19b). Indicator 19c (contraceptive prevalence rate) is also useful in tracking progress in other health, gender and poverty goals.
^d This indicator is defined as the percentage of population aged 15-24 who correctly identify the two major ways of preventing the sexual transmission of HIV (using condoms and limiting sex to one faithful, uninfected partner), who reject the two most common local misconceptions about HIV transmission, and who know that a healthy-looking person can transmit HIV. However, since there are currently not a sufficient number of surveys to be able to calculate the indicator as defined above, UNICEF, in collaboration with UNAIDS and WHO, produced two proxy indicators that represent two components of the actual indicator. They are the following: (a) percentage of women and men 15-24 who know that a person can protect herself from HIV infection by "consistent use of condom"; (b) percentage of women and men 15-24 who know a healthy-looking person can transmit HIV.
^e Prevention to be measured by the percentage of children under 5 sleeping under insecticide-treated bednets; treatment to be measured by percentage of children under 5 who are appropriately treated.
^f An improved measure of the target for future years is under development by the International Labour Organization (ILO).