Ghana on track to achieve MDGs

15-09-2010

GHANA is said to be on track to achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) 1 and II, which deal with the reduction in poverty and hunger by 2015.
According to the 2008 Ghana Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) report, which was launched by the National Development Planning Commission (NDPC) in Accra yesterday, available data collected in 2006 shows that Ghana was largely on track in achieving the MDG 1 target by reducing by half the proportion of the population living in extreme poverty.
The report, which was presented by Dr Peter Quartey of the University of Ghana, said that although current data on poverty was not available, trends in economic growth suggested that there was a further decline in poverty between 2006 and 2008.
Dr Quartey said some of the interventions, which had helped in the area of poverty reduction were the Growth and Poverty Reduction Strategy, Livelihood and Empowerment Programme (LEAP), the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), and Micro-Financing Initiative among others.
He, however, indicated that the country was not likely to achieve goals IV and V, which involved reduction in child and maternal mortality, and called for concerted efforts in that direction.
Other targets that the country was having serious challenges with were: Combating HIV and AIDS, malaria and other diseases; and also ensuring environmental sustainability, which are goals VI and VII respectively.
In a critical review of the report, Professor Clara Fayorsey, Head of the Sociology Department of the University of Ghana, urged stakeholders to take cognisance of the micro-economic climate in assessing the progress so far made in the country.
She pointed out that there were times that statistics presented at the national level differed from the actual situation on the ground, adding that “Macro indicators are fine, but do not reflect adequately the micro situation”.
The UN Resident Co-ordinator and the UNDP Resident Representative in Ghana, Ms Ruby Sandhu-Rojon, said the MDGs had become a single development compact providing a remarkable framework for both developed and developing countries to work towards a common goal.
She said the UN system had, since the adoption of the MDGs in 2000, provided financial, technical, advisory, training, logistic and infrastructural support to the private sector and civil society organisations to deliver on the goals.
Ms Sandhu-Rojon commended Ghana for its efforts, saying that the country had been chosen from a few countries to gather evidence for international analysis on the MDG progress, good practices and experiences, as well as challenges and opportunities for acceleration.
In her welcoming address, the Director General of the NDPC, Dr Regina Adutwum, indicated that the 2008 MDG report was the fourth of such reports to be issued by Ghana and explained that there were others in 2002, 2004 and 2006.
She urged the country’s ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs), as well as institutions, civic society groups and individuals, to play their respective roles to ensure that the country moved ahead in terms of target achievement before 2015.
The Chairman of the NDPC, Mr Paul Victor Obeng, said people sometimes assumed that the MDGs were meant for others and rather advised them to consider the goals as their own and do well to ensure that they were achieved.