After focusing objectives on economic growth during the UN Development Decades of the 1960’s, ’70’s and ’80s, the Human Development Report issued in 2000, advocated in favour of goals placing human well-being and poverty reduction at the centre of global development objectives.
In September 2000, the world’s leaders gathered at the UN Millennium Summit, and 147 heads-of-state and governments and 189 nations in total adopted the United Nations Millennium Declaration of 2000. See the Declaration. (PDF, 64KB)
The 8 Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) set 18 clear numerical time-bound targets for making concrete progress before 2015, by tackling the most pressing issues faced by developing countries.
See goals and targets
Target 10, specifically dedicated to water and sanitation, is part of Goal 7, "Ensure environmental sustainability". The content is the following:
"Halve, by 2015, the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and sanitation."
Improving water resources development and management is a critical factor for meeting the MDG’s, not only specifically target 10, but also the broader goals of eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, achieving universal primary education, promoting gender equality and women’s empowerment, reducing child mortality, improving maternal health, combating major disease, and improving environmental sustainability. Therefore, efforts to achieve the MDG’s must involve planning and action in water resources development, management and use, both in order to meet the MDG’s Target 10 and to meet the MDG’s as a whole.
The UN Millenium Project Task Force on Water and Sanitation published a report identifying what it would take to achieve Target 10 and adressing the role of water management and development in meeting the MDGs as a whole.
Read this report
What about monitoring the MDGs?
The World Health Organization (WHO) began monitoring water supply and sanitation some 30 years before the advent of MDG’s. At the beginning of the 90’s, WHO established a partnership with UNICEF to initiate a Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP) for global assessment of water and sanitation. The JMP, the most comprehensive source of official data, has been delegated by the UN to monitor progress toward Target 10. JMP does not collect primary data directly, but relies on other existing data sources (household surveys, assessment questionnaires).
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On the basis of international statistics largely provided by JMP every 5 years, with intermediate updates every 2 years, a periodic assessment is made by the UN to see which countries are likely to reach the MDG’s.
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Moreover, a certain number of indicators have been set up to monitor the MDGs.
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