Dr. Noeleen Heyzer Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations

1. MDG Priorities in Asia and the Pacific Dr. Noeleen Heyzer Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations and Executive Secretary of ESCAP

2. Key ESCAP Resources on MDGs

3. Impressive progress • Impressive gains in many MDG indicators, especially in reducing poverty. • Between 1990 and 2005, the number of poor people declined from 1.5 billion to 947 million • The region is also on track for another key target namely universal access to primary school • Asia and the Pacific is an early achiever for some targets • Reducing gender disparities in primary and tertiary education • Halving the proportion of people without access to safe drinking water • Stopping the spread of HIV and AIDS and tuberculosis • Reducing consumption of ozone-depleting substances

4. But the region is lagging behind for some important targets • Slow progress on many others such as • In reducing hunger • In achieving higher standards of health • In ensuring that girls and boys complete the primary education • In reducing child mortality • In improving maternal health • In providing basic sanitation • Need to step up efforts

5. Country groups on and off track for the MDGs Status of achievement for 21 indicators based on latest internationally comparable data for sub-regions

6. Considerable variation between country groupings and sub-regions • The region’s 14 least developed countries have made slow or no progress on most indicators • Performing well only on gender equality in primary and secondary education and in reducing the prevalence of HIV and AIDS and TB. • The greatest progress has been made by South-East Asia which has already achieved nine out of the 21 assessed indicators and is on track for another four • The North and Central-Asian countries (including Russian Federation) are also early achievers for eight of the indicators

7. Considerable variation between country groupings and sub-regions • South Asia is an early achiever or on track for nine indicators but is progressing only slowly on many others • The Pacific Island countries have also been less successful, regressing or making no progress in 11 indicators and advancing only slowly in another three • Also moving forward slowly on expanding access to improved sanitation facilities and safe drinking water

8. The Proportion of undernourished has fallen only slightly • The total number of hungry people barely changed. Source: FAO

9. Strategies to Reduce Hunger and Improve Food Security • Creating jobs and increasing incomes • Boosting agricultural production • Maintaining stable and reasonable food prices • Providing safety nets for the poor • Implementing feeding programmes

10. Improving Basic Services such as Health and Education is a Key for Achievement of Many MDGs • Investing more in basic services • Ensuring social inclusion and equal access to social services • Giving priority to maternal and child health

11. Strengthening basic infrastructure • Achieving the MDGs in the region will require stronger basic infrastructure, particularly road transport, water supply, sanitation, electricity, information technology, telecommunications and urban low-income housing • The linkage between poverty reduction and infrastructure has been established through several regional studies. • Better rural roads, for example, expand markets for marginal and small farmers and thus reduce rural poverty • They also allow households better access to schools and health centres.

12. Infrastructure gaps in the Asia-Pacific • Infrastructure gaps in Asia-Pacific are wide between countries and within countries • e.g. • About 23% of households still without access to electricity • About 24% of rural population do not have access to all-season roads • Closing infrastructure gaps • For 2010-2020, the needs are nearly $800 billion per annum • Also an opportunity to generate additional aggregate demand for sustaining the region’s dynamism in post-crisis world • Scope for regional cooperation in infrastructure development • Regional financial architecture could assist in efficiently mobilizing regional savings for closing these gaps

13. Seven key drivers for accelerating progress towards MDGs • Rebalancing Asia-Pacific economies in favour of greater domestic consumption • Making economic growth more inclusive and sustainable • Strengthening social protection • Reducing persistent gender gaps • Ensuring financial inclusion • Boosting international economic assistance and • Exploiting the potential of South-South cooperation and regional cooperation

14. Towards 2015 • The list of drivers is by no means exhaustive • Each country has to address its own specific needs and opportunities • They can help accelerate progress towards many of the goals where the progress has been slow in order to sectoral priorities

15. Copy of presentation can be downloaded at: www.un.org/regionalcommissions