A new e-brochure from the European Commission showcasing its efforts to speed up the progress towards the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) illustrates how millions of the world’s neediest people are already benefitting from EU help.
The publication provides figures on real and measurable achievements of EU-funded initiatives linked to MDGS: from Mexico to Malawi, Palestine to Pakistan and beyond.
The e-brochure can be found here: https://ec.europa.eu/europeaid/sites/devco/files/brochure-mdg-2015_en.pdf
According to Mr. Koos Richelle, General Director of Europeaid, the exercise of compiling data for the brochure ‘EU Contribution to the MDGs’ "has proven to be a valuable exercise in terms of making us aware of our strengths and the impressive contributions our cooperation makes worldwide; as well as of our weaknesses in terms of being able to determine all our outputs". EuropeAid plans to use the lessons learned from this exercise in order to improve their ways of registering and compiling data in the future.
The eight Millennium Development Goals were established in 2000, setting tangible targets for cutting extreme poverty, reducing child mortality and achieving universal primary education, among others.
According to the figures published in the e-brochure, European Commission external aid has risen from under €10 billion to €12.3 billion in 2009 since the MDGs were established. The publications highlights some impressive results in the past five years:
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24 million people assisted through food security related social transfers (MDG1)
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9 million children enrolled in primary education (MDG2)
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31 million households connected to better drinking water (MDG7)
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36,000 km of road constructed or maintained (MDG8)
Additionally the e-brochure offers filmed testimonials from around the world for many of the eight MDGs, as well as individual data for each. For example, viewers can learn more about an EU Food Facility in Bangladesh, job-creation efforts in Malawi, school support in Pakistan, and female empowerment in Palestine and Mexico.
European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and EU Commissioner for Development Andris Piebalgs offer some introductory video comments.
With €12.3 billion in 2009, the European Commission provides around 13% of development cooperation funding worldwide. Its programmes are targeted at all sectors which are crucial for development in partner countries, such as education, health, infrastructure or peace and democracy.
In 2009 the European Union and its 27 Member States jointly gave a total of €49 billion in development aid, which globally makes the EU by far the largest donor, representing 56% of global aid.
To watch a related video, produced by EuropeAid, click on the icon below:
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