T

he UN’s Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) can still be achieved despite the global financial crisis, agreed participants Wednesday at a recent two-day ministerial meeting.

The MDGs were launched in September 2000 at a UN summit to focus development efforts across the world to achieve specific targets by 2015.

The goals call for the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger, universal primary education, the promotion of gender equality, a reduction in child mortality, improvements in maternal health, stopping HIV/AIDS and other diseases, promoting environmental sustainability and developing a global development partnership.

In the 2009/2010 report issued jointly by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and two UN bodies, Indonesia was named an early achiever in meeting the gender equality and education MDGs, but was reported to be lagging in fighting HIV/AIDS, protecting its forests and reducing carbon emissions.

Thailand and Vietnam are on track or have already achieved more MDG targets than Indonesia, but the country’s progress towards meeting the MDGs is in line with other Asia Pacific countries, officials agreed.

The meeting, which was held at the Four Seasons Hotel in South Jakarta, brought together delegates from all over the world to discuss the progress and future efforts needed to achieve the MDGs in the Asia Pacific region.

One of the meeting’s main discussions was on the adverse effect of the financial crisis, particularly on official development aid.

UN Under Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs Shu Zukang said that there was a need for the developed world’s leaders to keep their promises to fulfill the MDGs.

“The financial crisis should not be an excuse to fail achieve any of these goals”, Zukang said. “You make a commitment, you honor a commitment,” he added.

Participants agreed that the MDGs were most likely to be realized through a focus on inclusive and sustainable development.

Christopher Delgado, a strategy and policy advisor at the World Bank, said it was important to encourage efficient agricultural production and infrastructure investment for both capacity and job creation.

Job creation is particularly important to reduce the gap between rural and urban areas in countries where new jobs are not appearing at the same rate at which capacity is growing, he added.

Delgado also said that there was a lack of awareness that hunger was still a large problem, adding that this is surprising since poverty had been decreasing.

Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa agreed with the meeting’s closing declaration that said the MDGs were not a far-off dream. The goals are potential reality as long as there is “sincere cooperation and partnership among all stakeholders,” he added.