MDGs and education
Global cause and effect: how the aid system is undermining the Millennium Development Goals
Is a focus on global causes undermining real progress on the MDGs?
Authors:
Publisher:
Wateraid, 2007
This report argues that there is a genuine risk that the human development related Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) will not be met if international donors continue to pursue single issue ‘global causes’ instead of building an aid system that will respond to the complex needs of poor communities,
Specifically, the report criticises the failure of donors and developing country governments to recognise the interrelationship between health, education, water and sanitation. Progress in health and education is dependent on access to affordable sanitation and safe water, yet global aid spending on health and education has nearly doubled since 1990, while the share allocated to water and sanitation has contracted.
The authors also criticise the international aid system’s lack of responsiveness to the demands of the poor, who often put affordable access to safe water and sanitation at the top of their priorities.
In light of these failings, the report recommends that:
- new ‘integrated approaches’ to development are required, which recognise the linkages between essential services and shape development policy accordingly
- donors must start by working with the evidence from developing countries and ensure that poor people play an influential role in the design, implementation and monitoring of aid
Without this more integrated and accountable approach, the report warns that the international aid system risks being led by donor priorities, and pushed by the loudest Northern campaigns, resulting in unbalanced financial inputs and perverse developmental outcomes.
