This blog post is part of our special coverage on the U.N. Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) summit. Keep an eye out for more posts like these throughout the week.
The U.N. Summit on the MDGs is a week from today — but don’t panic if you can’t immediately remember the difference between MDG 4 or 6 or 3 or 8. We’ve got you covered!
Here’s YouTube playlist of just a few of our favorite MDG videos through the years. Organizations like UNICEF, GOOD magazine and the U.N. Foundation have done an incredible job of interpreting the eight poverty-fighting goals. And while a few of the stats are now out of date (since the videos span over several years), the overall message is still exactly the same: it’s time to come together and help achieve the MDGs.
Got a video to add to our MDG playlist? Share it with us in the comments below.
This Thursday, our CEO and President David Lane will be joining USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah in the U.S. State Department’s Conversations with America, a live video discussion series on foreign policy and global issues.
This week’s conversation will focus on achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). With the U.N. Summit on the MDGs just around the corner, this is the perfect time to chime in with any last-minute questions on MDG challenges, opportunities and next steps.
The discussion will take place online on Thursday at 10:15 AM (EDT). We’ll post up the video stream right here on the ONE Blog.
I hope you’re excited as we are — past Conversations with America participants include Ambassador Holbrooke, Ambassador Eric Goosby and Special Representative to Muslim Communities Farah Pandith. We’re honored to be participating in this event, so join us if you can.
We’re officially kicking off our special coverage of the U.N. Summit on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) today. Keep an eye out for more blog posts on the MDGs throughout the week — and be sure to tune into the blog during the Summit. We’ll be reporting live from New York City.
So what’s this new report about? Here’s a quick description: If the world is serious about tackling extreme poverty and disease, then it’s time to step up our investments in Africa’s women and girls — and the U.N. MDG Summit in New York City next week is the perfect place to begin.
Study after study has shown that, if women are given the tools they need, they can help lift communities out of poverty and transform millions of lives. For instance, when women and girls earn income, they reinvest 90 percent of it into their families, compared with only 30 to 40 percent for men.
And the good news is that the world is starting to sit up and take notice of the African women who have been leading some of the incredible advances on the continent over the past decade. The women profiled in this new ONE report –- from a Tanzanian sweet potato farmer to the director general of Nigeria’s Securities and Exchange Commission –- are all leaders in their own right.
But even with all these powerful stats and unbelievable female leaders, women worldwide still make up an estimated 70 percent of all people living in extreme poverty.
It’s time to make a change—and we hope this new report will help move us in the right direction. Filled with compelling stats, stories and recommendations for next steps, we hope you’ll take a read and let us know what you think!
Please welcome Brooke Riley to the ONE Blog. She is our policy team’s most recent addition and will be assisting with global health research.
Today is the final day of the groundbreaking Global Maternal Health Conference, the first international technical conference focused exclusively on maternal health. This exciting conference, organized by EngenderHealth’s Maternal Health Task Force, brings together more than 600 maternal health experts in New Delhi, India to discuss one of the most challenging fields in global health.
Although progress has been made, maternal mortality rates remain unacceptably high, especially in the developing world. Approximately 343,000 mothers die each year during childbirth and 80% of those deaths could be prevented if women had access to basic maternal health services.
This conference aims to build consensus and catalyze action around evidence, programs and policy to achieve Millennium Development Goal (MDG) Five and improve the lives of mothers around the world.
To bring attention to pressing maternal health needs globally, the first two days of the conference have featured numerous exciting events and presentations, including a film screening of ONE supporter Christy Turlington’s film “No Woman, No Cry.”
Cara Gold from the United Nations Millennium Campaign shares a unique opportunity to participate in Stand Up, Take Action!, a global grassroots effort to raise awareness for the Millennium Development Goals.
What will you be doing the weekend of September 17-19? Will you be joining the global movement to raise awareness of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) – eight goals to end extreme poverty and its root causes? I will!
Join me and millions of others as we take a stand for the rights of 1.4 billion global citizens who live on less than $1.25.
Since 2007, the United Nations Millennium Campaign has organized Stand Up, Take Action! -– a global grassroots mobilization effort to raise MDG awareness. Last year, a record-breaking 173 million people around the world took a “Stand” against poverty. I know we can beat that in 2010!
How can you get involved? This year, Stand Up, Take Action! “Make Noise for the MDGs” is happening around the world from September 17-19, with a global day of action on September 18. Register your event online at www.standagainstpoverty.org where you can also download Stand Up signs, brochures, logos, banners, t-shirt designs and more.
Be sure to also visit Meet Up to see what other events are happening in your community and “like” us on Facebook to talk about your event! Have fun with the theme –- ring bells, sing loudly, drum to your heart’s content and don’t forget to take pictures and video! You may be featured in next year’s promotional video!
Did you know that 2010 is a crucial year for the MDGs? Between September 20 and 22, approximately 10 years after 189 countries signed the Millennium Declaration, world leaders will attend the United Nations MDG Review Summit. At this meeting, progress will be assessed and plans will be made for the next five years.
This year’s Stand Up is not only a key opportunity for you to make your government aware that people care about the MDGs, but it also helps hold governments accountable for promises they have made. So please join us by taking a “Stand” against poverty in 2010!
- Cara Gold, U.N .Millennium Campaign, North America
Big news from the GAVI Alliance: In October, right after the Global Fund’s replenishment meeting, GAVI will host current and potential donors at an official resource mobilization meeting.
This meeting will be the first opportunity for donors to pledge the $1.1 billion needed for immunization programs between 2010 and 2012. Where possible, donors can also make commitments for the period between 2013 and 2015.
The funding that GAVI is requesting would help pay for the introduction of new vaccines and tackle major causes of pneumonia and diarrhea — two of the world’s biggest childhood killers.
It would also advance the introduction of new vaccines against HPV, Japanese encephalitis, meningitis, rubella and typhoid, and would and ensure the sustainability of current efforts to increase coverage of the pentavalent vaccine to children.
We’ve asked President Obama and other world leaders to come to the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) Summit in September with a plan to reduce poverty and disease by 2015. Conveniently, these back-to-back health financing meetings, only a few weeks after the MDG Summit, will create a great opportunity for leaders to take action on their plans by making significant contributions toward health MDGs 4, 5, and 6.
Stay tuned for more on ONE’s efforts around both of these meetings in the coming weeks and following the MDG Summit.
This month, we’ll be featuring blog posts that help illustrate how the Global Fund affects programs that fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria around the world. In this article, Dr. Joia Mukherjee of Partners in Health (PIH), who participated in our ONE Haiti conference call in January, highlights the partnership between the Fund and PIH.
It is hard to believe that it has been ten years since all 191 United Nations member states agreed to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
Yet the lack of progress on the final one — a global partnership for development — has hampered the achievement of all others. The one shining light in such a partnership for global development is the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria.
The Global Fund was partly established by activists in the developed and developing world, otherwise known as the “global North and South.” Many of these activists were living with HIV and wanted to start an organization that could help achieve universal HIV/AIDS treatment.
The Fund is a novel mechanism; it is a multilateral fund, independent of the United Nations and financed by donors from the government and private sector. Its structure has allowed even some of the poorest countries to expand treatment for HIV, tuberculosis and malaria as a basic right for free, largely through the public sector, with support from non-government organizations and the private sector.
The Fund has put more money into the public health sector than any previous initiative, and a consortium convened by the World Health Organization documented the positive synergies that this money has had not just on MDG 6 — combating AIDS, malaria and other diseases — but the health sector in general.
My organization, PIH, has been working to provide health care and improve the social determinants of health for the destitute for more than 20 years. As one of the recipients of first-round Global Fund monies in Haiti, we set out to build public sector health systems and tackle poverty as a critical component to our HIV response.
This work, supported by the Global Fund since its inception, has resulted in the rehabilitation and revitalization of 52 public facilities in ten countries around the globe. The public sector-NGO community partnership that has developed in the course of this work is poised to meet 4 and 5, the other health-related MDGs as well.
As the 2010 MDG summit approaches and the challenges to achieve the MDGs are addressed, it is critical to note the importance that dedicated funding for MDG 6 has had not only in achieving the right to HIV, TB and malaria treatment, but in improving the systems to deliver health care around the world.
ONE is campaigning to ensure that the Congressional budget does not cut foreign assistance programs like Feed the Future that help people break the cycle of poverty and hunger.
The Horn of Africa is experiencing its worst drought in 60 years. More than 11 million people, mostly nomadic pastoralists and farmers in south-central Somalia, north-eastern Kenya, and south-eastern Ethiopia, are severely lacking access to food.
2011 marks 30 years since the first cases of AIDS were documented. Take a closer look at the specific, achievable goals we must hit by 2015 to make this year the beginning of the end of AIDS.
As aid agencies warn more than 9 million people could be affected by a food crisis in East Africa, world leaders are failing to keep their 2009 promises to tackle the causes of chronic hunger and support farmers in the world's poorest countries.
