UN Millennium Project | Publications

Investing in Development

The Overview Report

Preface

Goals and targets

10 Key Recommendations

Why the Goals are important

Country processes

International actions

Costs and benefits

Appendixes

Maps, charts, and tables

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Why the Goals are important

	Introduction
	Why the Goals are important and why we're falling short
	The fulcrum of international development policy
	The means to a productive life
	A linchpin to global security
	Where we stand with only a decade to go
	Why progress is so mixed
	Four reasons for shortfalls in achieving the Goals

Why the Goals are important and why we're falling short

The Millennium Development Goals are the most broadly supported, comprehensive, and specific poverty reduction targets the world has ever established, so their importance is manifold. For the international political system, they are the fulcrum on which development policy is based. For the billion-plus people living in extreme poverty, they represent the means to a productive life.

Table 1: Major trends in the Goals, by region

For everyone on Earth, they are a linchpin to the quest for a more secure and peaceful world.

As of Jan 1, 2007, the advisory work formerly carried out by the Millennium Project secretariat team is being continued by an MDG Support team integrated under the United Nations Development Program.

Please visit MDG Support to get the latest information.

Investing in Development: A Practical Plan to Achieve the Millennium Development Goals
"Investing in Development brings together the core recommendations of the UN Millennium Project. By outlining practical investment strategies and approaches to financing them, the report presents an operational framework that will allow even the poorest countries to achieve the Millennium Development Goals by 2015."

For a full list of statements of support