A Development Actor’s Perspectives On The Challenges Of Mdgs And The Prospects Of Sdgs: An Agenda Setting For A Better Global Development Paradigm By David Tola Winjobi (PHD) Convener, Campaign2015+ International

A Development Actor's Perspectives On The Challenges Of Mdgs And The Prospects Of Sdgs: An Agenda Setting For A Better Global Development Paradigm By David Tola Winjobi (PHD) Convener, Campaign2015+ International

Introduction
In the decades preceding the turn of the new millennium, there were hopes and expectations that year 2000 would provide a magic wand that would provide solutions to many if not all of the intractable challenges facing humanity. It was a period where commonplace were slogans such as “health for all by the year 2000”, “education for all by the year 2000”, “food sufficiency for all by the year 2000”, “shelter for all by the year 2000”, “prosperity for all by the year 2000” and several other slogans. Poverty, hunger, starvation and diseases seemed to be the major challenges facing the developing nations while the developed economies seemed to be enjoying the benefits of development including human rights, democracy, and good governance.

The United Nations indeed felt concerned about the plight of common people especially in the global south. In order to address the problem of poverty and promote sustainable developments, the eight millennium goals were adopted in September 2000 at the largest gathering of Heads of States committing both rich and poor countries to do all they could to eradicate poverty, promote human dignity and equality, and achieve peace, democracy and environmental stability. By this commitment the world has an unprecedented opportunity to improve the lives of billions of people by adopting practical approaches to meeting the Millennium Development Goals by 2015.

The MDGs and related targets and indicators serve as benchmarks of progress towards the shared vision of where the world wants to go and commitment to work together to get there. There are 18 targets and 48 indicators set to achieve the 8 goals by 2015. Three distinct characteristics of MDGs are that: it is people-centred; it is adaptable to SMART test; and it involves the development partners, among others. Even in these three distinct areas of MDGs' strength, many opportunities are being missed, and there lies the challenge. However, it must be stated to the credit of MDGs that it is about the first time that the issue of development, as a rallying point,has been brought to the limelight in a general sense keeping some speficic stakeholders busy more than ever before by supporting the efforts of the UN and governments. For example, there have been several initiatives, alliances, formations, coalitions, organizations including NGOs, CBOs, FBOs, trade unions, professional associations, student organizations, community groups, bilateral and multilaterals, and intergovernmentals working worldwide alongside the UN and governments in order to attain the vision and mission of the United Nations on the Millennium Declaration. Bye and large, MDG framework faces some challenges and has some inherent problems in its implementation across the globe.

Challenges Facing Implementation of MDGs
The challenges facing MDGs can be categorised into two: the challenges inherent in the Millennium Declaration leading to setting up of the eight goals of the MDGs and; the challenges facing the implementation of MDGs in various countries.

Though about 189 heads of government indeed signed the Millennium Declaration only a few of them were conversant with the content of MDGs they signed for. Some of the heads of government especially in developing countries hurriedly signed the document, quickly came back home, and easily abandoned the paper for some time before they perfunctorily set up a technical committee to look into the nitty gritty of the declaration. This caused some set backs for the take off of the implementation of the MDGs in those countries. For example, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo the then President of Nigeria participated in the UN MDGs campaign in September 2000, in New York, but did not kick start the implementation of MDGs until one year after Nigeria went into debt negotiation which led to the relief gain in 2005; an indication that Nigeria was five years behind the set date for achieving MDGs when it was already being implemented in some countries. In effect, Nigeria started implementing MDGs plans and programmes in 2006.

Similarly, the process leading to crafting of MDGs up to the signing stage was devoid of inclusion of critical stakeholders in many countries. In other words, most countries did not give opportunity for their citizens to make input into the MDG process, thus making it lack legitimacy.This seems a weakness affecting MDG implementation as people view MDGs with scenicism while some state or regional governments saw it as federal government business because it lacks the beauty of local democratic ownership. In addition, institutional stakeholders such as ministries, departments, agencies, including the parliament, CSOs and private sector were excluded. In most cases, it was only at the point of annual appropriation that the parliaments were involved while MDG line ministries were involved at the point of implementation. In some countries, the CSOs got invloved in MDG at almost the mid-term review in 2007 essentially to evaluate the progress so far while private sector came in at the behest of governments in order to assist in mobilising for funding related to some MDG lines that needed critical rescue.

There seemed to be a lack of institutional capacity to implement MDGs coupled with paucity of funds as many countries did not prepare for MDG at the time it came. This led to slow progress and low investment in critical areas of MDGs such as primary health care, universal basic education and agriculture and rural development. The resource mobilisation strategy was weak in many countries especially in Africa. Many countries were enacting institutional policies rather than people-centred policies. To the credit of many governments, many structures were built but to the detriment of human capital development which, if emphasis were to be placed on the latter, would have made a far reaching impact on the implementation of the MDG policies.

Though the MDGs are people-centred and development focused, lacking are the essential ingredients which are the bedrocks of development such as human rights, peace and justice. The issues of democracy, good governance, and human rights, are not expressly articulated in the Millennium Declaration let aone the MDGs though they can be linked in some way. However justice, peace, and security especially global terrorism are difficult to situate within the purview of all the eight goals.

MDG is fraught with myriads of lacuna as there are some emerging developmental challenges that were not captured. One of these is governance and accountability. Thus evidently absent in the MDG framework are issues bordering on youth involvement in governance, tackling corruption and inequality, insecurity and conflict management, uneven distribution of resources, support for local technologies, institutional strengthening, and inadequate social welfare policies.

Another challenge not captured is in the area ofpopulation dynamics which defers from country to country. Many developing countries have population policies which might not be known to the generality of the people while the policies do not address current dynamics, for example, of the upsurge in the youth population or inclement living conditions of people in the arid region. Management of population data in some countries is very poor while the data are inconsistent in some countries. Consequently, there is lack of adequate planningin an attempt to address the underlying issues dispassionately and appropriately.Even in education sector in most developing countries, MDG 3 faced the challenges of implementation in the area of recruitment of qualified teachers, lack of professionalism , inadequate incentive and motivation for teachers, low budgetary allocation, poor infrastructural and facilities, shortage of teachers in schools, lack of community participation, insecurity in schools and dearth of technical and vocational schools where students could be trained on skills acquisition.MDG 7 focuses on ensuring environmental sustainability. But then it emphasises more on water and sanitation and less on climate change issues. Environmental issues such asflooding, erosion, desertification do not attract much attention despite the fact that MDG 7 is connected to all the other goals.

Considering the progress so far on attaining MDGs in few weeks' time to 2015, there are uneven achievements between the developed and the developing countries. Of much concern to this discourse is the MDG progress in developing countries especially Africa. Ten countries in Africa are selected as examples to illustrate the progress so far made as the table below shows.

Example of Ten African Countries that have Achieved None of the MDGs by August 2014

S/No African Country MDG
Off Track MDG Achieved Key to MDGs
1. Cameroun 3,4,5 0 Goals 1-8
2. Chad 3,4,5,6,7 0 Goal 1:Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger

Goal 2: Achieve universal primary education
Goal 3: Promote gender equality and empower women
Goal 4: Reduce child mortality
Goal 5: Improve maternal health
Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases

Goal 7: Ensure environmental sustainability
Goal 8: Develop a global partnership for development

3. Gambia 1,3,4,6,8 0
4. Ghana 3,4,5,6 0
5. Lesotho 1,3,4,5,6 0
6. Malawi 1,5,7 0
7 Mozambique 2,3,6,7 0
8. Niger 1,2,3,5,7 0
9 Nigeria 1,4,5 0
10 Togo 3,4,5 0
Data source:http://www.mdgmonitor.org/country_progress, accessed online on Friday 29th Auguist 2014, 10:30 a.m.

From the data presented above, it is obvious that not less than 50 percent of the listed countries have missed Goal 1:eradicate extreme poverty and hunger while over 60 percent are off track to meet MDG 3 in promoting gender equality and empowering women. While seven out of ten African countries are off track in reducing child mortality, eight countries have failed to improve maternal health as they missed MDG5, according to the scores presented in the table above.

This goes to show that all efforts put in by most governments in Africa on infant mortality and maternal health are not drastic enough. Similarly, it is astounding that Chad, Gambia, Lesotho, and Niger have missed five out of the eight goals while big countries like Ghana, Mozambique and Cameroun have not faired well at all because they have each missed not less than three goals – even the largest of them all, Nigeria, has also missed three goals.

Bye and large, most African countries are not likely going to attain MDGs by 2015 which is few days away. The factors responsible for some of these lapses in derailment on MDG track could be attributable to issues bordering on democratic ownership and faulty implementation as discussed above. There seems to be that the loss in MDGs is the gain of SDGs as it would be seen shortly.

The Weakness of MDGs, the Strength of SDGs
The question that has been agitating the inquisitive minds has been “Can the world attain MDGs by 2015?”. Yes, or No! If “Yes” what happens, do we rest on our oars ? and if “No” what about it, do we become despondent? The need to monitor and evaluate performance on MDGs implementation is not only important but also highly necessary so as to know whether the programme is on course or derailing, or to know how far we have gone, and where we need to strengthen our efforts. Monitoring and evaluation efforts have shown some astounding results giving way to despondency on attaining MDGs by 2015.

Fourteen years on from the original adoption of the MDGs at the 2000 Millennium Summit, and less than four months left to 2015 it seems all the efforts by stakeholders towards achieving MDGs are not drastic enough. According to the UN Secretary-General, though there is some remarkable progress made in some countries, collectively countries are falling short in the achievement of MDGs globally. Even the developed countries are not left out as some have fallen short of attaining MDG 8 by failing in their commitment to approriate at least 0.7 percent of their GDP to the economy of poor countries.

The consequence of these shortfalls, the UN Secretary-General went on, further aggravated by the combined effects of the global food, climate, energy and economic crises, is that improvements in the lives of the poorest are happening at an unacceptably slow pace while in some countries, hard fought gains are being eroded. At the current pace, several of the eight MDGs and associated targets are likely to be missed in many countries (2010 Annual report of the Secretary-General (11 July 2011)). Though there seems to be some hope in developing countries, the challenges are most severe in the least developed countries (LDCs), land-locked developing countries (LLDCs) and some small island developing states (SIDS).

Therefore, if all MDGs cannot be achieved by 2015 (which is very certain), the need to look beyond the target year is imperative. CSOs and other stakeholders therefore have a crucial role to play in further engaging the governments to address those MDG lines they could not achieve at the set date and do more on those they achieved. If governments achieved MDGs by 2015 (which is very uncertain), imperative is the need for the stakeholders to further engage governments in monitoring and evaluation so as to consolidate on and not to derail from the gains hitherto achieved.

The need for all to look beyond 2015 MDGs is emphasised in the 2010 Annual report of the Secretary-General (11 July 2011) titled, “Accelerating progress towards the Millennium Development Goals: options for sustained and inclusive growth and issues for advancing the United Nations development agenda beyond 2015”. The Millennium Development Goal summit requested the Secretary-General tomake recommendations in his annual reports, as appropriate, for further steps toadvance the United Nations development agenda beyond 2015. Over the past months, structured discussions, in different United Nations fora, have enabled Member States and other relevant stakeholders especially the CSOs to make their own assessments on how the Millennium Development Goals should be reviewed and rethought. The post-2015 development framework is likely to have the best development impact as it emerges from an inclusive, open and transparent process with multi-stakeholder participation. Here lies the strength of SDGs as opposed to the weakness of MDGs whose ratification and implementation excluded the major stakeholders. Using established global, regional and national mechanisms and processes is one way to ensure that such deliberations benefit from the wide range of lessons learned and the experiences of different stakeholders. Several formal and informal meetings are on-going in the run-up to 2015 icluding the work of the Open Working Group.

The UN kick-started the programme to foster a broad based, open and inclusive dialogue with all stakeholders, including civil society actors, on the post-2015 agenda. A key part of this was theglobalconversation on post-2015 that captured the voices of citizens. As indicated in the UN Secretary General's report to the General Assembly in September 2011, the UN Millennium Campaign acted as one of the outreach mechanisms to civil society to gather inputs and feedback on the post-2015agenda and facilitate dialogue with the UN system. The UN Development Programme(UNDP) and the UN Department forEconomic and Social Affairs (DESA) were mandated by the Secretary-General to lead the work on the post-2015 framework. A Task Team of senior technical experts from UNDP and DESA,chaired by Olav Kjorven (UNDP) and Jomo Kwame Sundaram (DESA), and supported by the full UN system, was set up in January 2012 to define a system-wide vision for the post-2015 agenda.

The UN Secretary-General also set up a think tank group called High Level Panel (HLP) to whom the reports on various consultations were submitted. The HLP's role is purelyadvisory reporting to the UN Sec-Gen on various issues and outcomes of post-2015 framework. The Task Team is mandated to produce a study which will serve as a roadmap for the work of a High-LevelPanel that the UN Secretary General appointed third quarter of 2012. The study will critically appraise the current MDG framework, map on-going activities inside and outside of the UN on defining a post-2015 agenda, and assess challenges that have become more prominent in the last decade.

As part of this work, UNDP, working with other UN Development Group (UNDG) agencies, supportedconsultations at the national level in up to 50 countries and produced and distributed guidancenotes to the UN Country Teams tofacilitate these exercises. Theconsultations were set up in a waythat facilitated the inclusion of voicesof poor people and those that arevulnerable; although the modes ofdoing this depended on the countrycontext. UNDP also facilitated eight regional/global consultations todiscuss thematic and cross-cuttingissues in post- 2015 global agenda,such as inequality, sustainability,population and governance. As a general principle, civil society organisations were invited to participate in all levels of the consultations. This did not preclude various grassroots deliberations organized by civil society across the globe.

Outcomes of national deliberations
Since September 2012, many organizations including Campaign2015+ International, Beyond 2015 International, the Global Call to Action Against Poverty (GCAP), the International Forum of National NGO Platforms (IFP) etc have been convening national, regional, and community civil society deliberations in 40 countries in Europe, Latin America, Africa, and Asia. Representatives from thousands of CSOs took part.

Counting on the outcomes of the various reports, there is a collective understanding across national contexts that the world is in crisis. There have been fundamental changes since the Millennium Declaration in 2000. The MDGs played a useful role in bringing many stakeholders into a common conversation, but the deliberations agreed that it was time to develop a framework that would capture the transformational changes needed to realise human rights for everyone. At the end of May, the UN High Level Panel (HLP) issued a report titled A New Global Partnership: Eradicate Poverty and Transform Economies Through Sustainable Development. While this report made positive steps in insisting a post-2015 framework leave no one behind, it did not go far enough in articulating a transformative, alternative development path.

Some of the national deliberations raised an urgent need to work collectively to find new ways of organizing society, man's relationship to the planet, and the logic of the economy. Contributions were received from people around the world echoing the same demands. Civil society is concerned about rising inequality. People acknowledge that social protection is decreasing, leaving more people vulnerable to vagaries like climate change and fluctuating food prices. Those who already live in poverty are being further marginalized, systemically being thrown into further poverty. Even in places where economic growth is robust, many people are not included.

The CSOs during their deliberations believed that a post-2015 framework needs to meaningfully integrate the following emerging themes:

Equality – gender equality, social inclusion, and just global governance are essential for achieving transformation.

Environmental Sustainability – all development must happen within planetary boundaries, and corporations must be held responsible for the environmental destruction they cause.

Human Rights – rights must be at the core of a post-2015 framework, ensuring no one is left behind.

Eradication of Poverty and Hunger – there is no excuse for hunger. The time to end poverty is now. We need to redefine poverty to be a more holistic measure of inclusive development.

Many countries presented a vision of how they saw the realization of true development after 2015. People are calling for a framework that is transformative. It should not only look at incremental changes to alleviate poverty, but rather fundamental changes that help us collectively rethink our system of production and consumption, as well as how we define wealth. While the specificities of each national context influenced the vision, there were several common themes. Specifically, the deliberations envisaged:

- A post-2015 framework that looks at the wellbeing of people, not economies. Poverty has a financial element, but is not only about money. In recognition of this, seven deliberations called for holistic measures of wellbeing, such as Gross National Happiness, being pioneered in Bhutan. Human rights will only be realized when they are seen as an integral part of the way we live with each other and contribute to society.

- A developmental framework that sees human development and environmental development as inextricably interlinked. There is no doubt that our current patterns of production and consumption are putting the planet at risk. Every single deliberation called for respecting planetary boundaries in our development trajectory.

- An agenda that centers around equality, and respect for human rights. The post-2015 development framework needs to treat all people as equal. This means addressing gender injustice, as well as specifically considering marginalized communities in a new developmental framework.

- Active, engaged citizens who are empowered to hold governments to account for progress in the post-2015 framework.

Civil society envisions a world of peace, equality and sustainability, a future where society is free of poverty, inequality and powerlessness, and development takes place through the full exercise of economic, social, political, civil and cultural rights of all citizens, within the carrying capacity of our natural environment.

In all the civil socety deliberations that this writer was involved across the globe, the core issues reflected on the value of the MDGs, within the framework of thinking on the vision, purpose, values, and criteria of a post-2015 framework. While most did not explicitly reflect on this thinking, some outcomes of the deliberations are relevant to the discussion. Some coalitionsstressed the need and the value of having an agenda that led civil society, government, and international organisations to speak the same language about development. It was also an advantage for raising public awareness, and keeping poverty on the media agenda. Some coalitions found the precise, time bound nature of the MDGs to be an advantage in their advocacy, while others found it restrictive, making the MDGs unable to adapt to national contexts and realities. A post-2015 framework, they believed, should maintain its role as a common reference point, while employing common but differentiated responsibilities to allow for flexibility to acknowledge national realities in a universal framework. “The post-2015 framework must prioritise the realisation of people's rights and the key human rights- based principles must underpin it, including participation, non-discrimination and equality, empowerment and accountability”. – Beyond 2015 European Task Force.

There seemed to be a concensus of voices that to eradicate poverty and build a more just world, a framework must be based on four values:

- human rights,
- equality and justice,
- environmental sustainability
- good governance, participation, and accountability.

No womnder, the outcomes of the national deliberations put forward a strong consensus on the right of each person on the planet to live a life free from poverty. A post-2015 agenda must make explicit provisions for social protection and service provision, to provide an opportunity for all to live in dignity. It should be a framework that does not look to define poverty based on narrow measures of income. Rather, it should seek to measure human development in a way that is holistic, taking into account equality, the environment, and wellbeing, which should include social protection and access to services. Additionally, it should explicitly make human rights more important than business interests, ensuring that this is expressed through its language, structure, and accountability mechanism.

People coming together to participate in the deliberations, regardless of national origin, shared the opinion that inequality is one of the biggest challenges facing the world today, and all nations have an equal obligation to creating a more just world. Acknowledging this, a post-2015 framework needs to focus on equality, through promoting gender justice, progressive redistribution, structural transformation, corporate regulation and social protection.

Furthermore, the national deliberations pointed to the need for a new development framework to express universal values. All countries, rich and poor, in all regions of the world, are tied up in the same crisis. However, the way governments have responded has played a critical role in people's lives, with some countries making great strides in human development, while other countries, with more resources, are not moving forward. The crisis has different expressions in different contexts, ranging from unemployment to environmental degradation, domestic violence to hunger; but a fundamental, transformative shift will require all countries commit to upholding common values of equality and justice, respect for human rights, just governance and environmental sustainability.

Finally, some concern was raised in many national deliberations about the threat of poor governance to achieving current and future goals. Therefore, accountability, universality and good governance must underpin a new framework. Without clear delineations of responsibilities as well as rights, and without a mechanism for holding actors to their account for commitments, progress will not be made. Additionally, people affected by the outcomes of the framework need to be included and participate actively in building the more just world envisaged by the deliberations.

Conclusion: The Open Working Group (OWG)
The Open Working Group (OWG) is a group of representatives from 69 countries chosen by the United Nations to produce a set of universal Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for post 2015.One of the main outcomes of the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20), held in Rio de Janeiro in June 2012, was the agreement by Member States to launch a process to develop a set of sustainable development goals (SDGs).Rio+20 did not elaborate specific goals but stated that the SDGs should be limited in number, aspirational and easy to communicate. The goals should address in a balanced way all three dimensions of sustainable development and be coherent with and integrated into the UN development agenda beyond 2015. A 30-member Open Working Group (OWG) of the General Assembly is tasked with preparing a proposal on the SDGs.

The Open Working Group was established on 22nd of January 2013 by decision 67/555 (see A/67/L.48/rev.1) of the General Assembly. The Member States have decided to use an innovative, constituency-based system of representation that is new to limited membership bodies of the General Assembly.

The Rio+20 outcome document The Future We Want states that, at the outset, the OWG will decide on its methods of work, including developing modalities to ensure the full involvement of relevant stakeholders and expertise from civil society, the scientific community and the United Nations system in its work, in order to provide a diversity of perspectives and experience.The Rio+20 outcome document outlines, inter alia:

• the importance of remaining firmly committed to the full and timely achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and of respecting all Rio Principles, taking into account different national circumstances, capacities and priorities;

• the SDGs should be action-oriented, concise and easy to communicate, limited in number, aspirational, global in nature and universally applicable to all countries, and focused on priority areas for the achievement of sustainable development;

• the need to ensure coordination and coherence with the processes considering the post-2015 development agenda, and to receive initial input to the OWG's work from the UN Secretary-General in consultation with national governments;

• the need to assess progress towards the achievement of the goals, accompanied by targets and indicators, while taking into account different national circumstances, capacities and levels of development; and

• the importance of global, integrated and scientifically-based information on sustainable development and of supporting regional economic commissions in collecting and compiling national inputs to inform this global effort.

The OWG heldthirteen sessions in total to discuss different development themes for inclusion in the SDGs to be submitted to the UNGA for consideration and appropriate action during its 68th session. The inaugural meeting of the HLPF, under the auspices of the UNGA, was convened on 24 September 2013. Heads of State and Government, Ministers and other leaders articulated a number of proposals on the role of the HLPF: it should include stakeholders; it should emphasize accountability; it should review the post-2015 development agenda and the implementation of the SDGs; and it should examine issues from scientific and local perspectives. The High-Level Special Event took place on 25 September 2013 at UN Headquarters in New York. The Outcome Document of the event determined that the work of the OWG will feed into international negotiations on the post-2015 development agenda, beginning in September 2014, and that a Global Summit would be held in September 2015 to agree to a new UN development agenda.

REFERENCES
Beyond2015 International (2014) Values and targets of the post-2015 agenda. Unpublished document contributing towards deliberations on post-2015 development framework

MDG Monitor, Tracking the Millennium Development Goals,http://www.mdgmonitor.org/country_progress, accessed online on Friday 29th Auguist 2014, 10:30 a.m.

2010 Annual report of the Secretary-General (11 July 2011) titled, “Accelerating progress towards the Millennium Development Goals: options for sustained and inclusive growth and issues for advancing the United Nations development agenda beyond 2015”.

The Open Working Group (OWG) 13 Final Document published 19 July 2014

Tola Winjobi (2014). A Compendium of Deliberations on Post-2015 Development Agenda. End-time Publishers, Ibadan (in-press).

United Nations (2013) A New Global Partnership: Eradicate Poverty and Transform Economies through Sustainable Development. The Report of the High level Pnel of Eminent Persons on the Post-2015 development Agenda.

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