UNDP supports MDG-based national development strategies

The UN System is helping countries improve their capacity to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). To support this effort, UNDP and the Millennium Project have designed a comprehensive set of services to support MDG-based national development strategies. These services focus on three pillars:

• MDG-based diagnostics and investment planning (technical and financial assistance needed to achieve the MDGs over the long term);
• Widening policy options and choices (sectoral and cross-sectoral policy reforms and frameworks needed to accelerate growth with equity and promote long-term human development); and
• Strengthening national capacity (enable effective service delivery at the national and local levels).

Millennium Project

The Millennium Project was commissioned by the United Nations Secretary-General in 2002, aims at proposing the best strategies for meeting the MDGs and at developing a concrete action plan for the world to reverse the grinding poverty, hunger and disease affecting billions of people.

Headed by Professor Jeffrey Sachs, the Millennium Project is an independent advisory body and presented its final recommendations, Investing in Development: A Practical Plan to Achieve the Millennium Development Goals to the Secretary-General in January 2005.

The bulk of the Project’s work has been carried out by 10 thematic Task Forces comprising a total of more than 250 experts from around the world including: researchers and scientists; policymakers; representatives of NGOs, UN agencies, the World Bank, IMF and the private sector. Since their establishment, the Task Forces have conducted extensive research within their fields of expertise to produce recommendations for meeting the Millennium Development Goals. The ongoing work of the Project is led by a secretariat housed at UNDP headquarters in New York.

Partnerships

Partnerships are particularly important for UNDP's work and for achieving the MDGs. The eighth MDG, "To develop a global partnership for development," explicitly calls for partnerships, which are essential at all levels-local, national, global-for the attainment of the other seven goals and the values and actions set out in the Millennium Declaration.

UNDP's partners include governments, other UN agencies, international financial institutions, bilateral agencies, the private sector and civil society. Across countries and regions, UNDP as the UN's global development network, uses its global presence to bring together partners from many different backgrounds to share expertise, launch joint ventures and develop long-term solutions.