Five years have passed since world leaders launched the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to be achieved by 2015 and the Asia-Pacific region, home to a majority of the world's poor, is now facing a daunting task to get rid of extreme poverty.

There are 14 least developed countries (LDCs) in the region, including some of the poorest nations in the world, with an average per capita income of just 513 US dollars.

Nearly half of their combined population of 260 million live below poverty lines. And these countries are facing many difficulties in achieving MDGs in the coming 10 years.

By contrast, Asia and the Pacific is the most dynamic region in the world in terms of trade, development and investment with countries like China and India now posting the world's fastest growths.

The MDGs can never be achieved in the LDCs without support from their wealthier neighbors, said Erna Witoelar, the UN special ambassador on MDGs for Asia and the Pacific.

"MDGs are about solidarity," she said in an interview with Xinhua Friday.

Witoelar said she was very optimistic about attainment of the MDGs within the 2015 deadline given that countries in the region have been making tremendous efforts to strengthen cooperation and solidarity among themselves.

How can developed countries help the LDCs?

"They must ensure that growth in the LDCs accelerates," said Hafiz Pasha, assistant administrator and director of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) Asia-Pacific regional bureau.

The LDCs need to boost growth to at least 7 percent from the current average of 5 percent to achieve the MDGs, he told a press conference here.

On the sidelines of a regional meeting on MDGs in Jakarta which concluded Friday, the UNDP and the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific issued several recommendations to help the LDCs: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, Kiribati, Laos, Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Timor Leste, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.

The UN agencies urged the facilitation of duty and quota-free market access, especially by introducing preferential schemes for the LDCs; simplified WTO accession processes; and support for trade-related infrastructure and human resources development.

They also recommended that developed countries expand the coverage of debt relief to more severely-indebted countries and nearly triple official development assistance from less than 4 billion US dollars to more than 12 billion dollars by 2006.

Pasha noted that per-capita aid to Asia-Pacific LDCs stands at only 19 dollars compared to 43 dollars in other LDCs.

"While the G-8 has in recent weeks announced debt cancellation for 18 countries, no Asia-Pacific country was included there either," he said.

The United Nations has called on rich countries to share 0.7 percent of their gross national product (GNP) for aid but only a few have announced a clear timetable to do so.

UN Millennium Project Director Jeffrey D. Sachs during his visit to Jakarta criticized the United States for spending too little on foreign assistance.

The US government is spending 0.16 percent of GNP, or about 19 billion dollars, on foreign assistance while military spending accounts for 5 percent of GNP or 500 billion dollars and the war in Iraq costs the country 80 billion dollars a year.

"It's a big mistake. Even from the narrow consideration of US foreign policy, the United States will be a lot safer if it works more in the leadership in development...," Sachs said in an interview with The Jakarta Post newspaper published Friday.

Initiated during the UN Millennium Summit in 2000, the MDGs include reducing by a half the proportion of people suffering from poverty and hunger; achieving universal primary education; eliminating gender disparity; reducing child mortality by two thirds and maternal mortality by three fourths; halting and reversing the incidence of major diseases; and reducing by a half the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water.

According to a UNDP report, the Asia-Pacific region has made good progress on targets of school enrollment, reduced infant mortality and increased access to safe water.

But progress is lagging in poverty reduction, malnutrition, literacy and maternal mortality.

In the closing session of the three-day MDGs conference in Jakarta Friday, ministers and high-level representatives from countries in the region stated that "much remains to be done for the next 10 years."

Source: Xinhua