In 2000 the leaders of 189 countries agreed 8 Goals in order to fight poverty which should be achieved by 2015. These are called the Millennium Goals which have been defined in 21 sub-objectives.

Goal 1: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger

– Halve the proportion of people living on less than $1 a day
– Achieve Employment for Women, Men, and Young People
– Halve the proportion of people who suffer from hunger

Goal 2: Achieve universal primary education

– By 2015, all children can complete a full course of primary schooling, girls and boys

Goal 3: Promote gender equality and empower women
– Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education preferably by 2005, and at all levels by 2015

Goal 4: Reduce child mortality

– Reduce by two-thirds, between 1990 and 2015, the under-five mortality rate

Goal 5: Improve maternal health

– Reduce by three quarters, between 1990 and 2015, the maternal mortality ratio – Achieve, by 2015, universal access to reproductive health

Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria,and other diseases

– Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS
– Achieve, by 2010, universal access to treatment for HIV/AIDS for all those who need it
– Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the incidence of malaria and other major diseases

Goal 7: Ensure environmental sustainability

– Integrate the principles of sustainable development into country policies and programmes; reverse loss of environmental resources
– Reduce biodiversity loss, achieving, by 2010, a significant reduction in the rate of loss
– Halve, by 2015, the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation (for more information see the entry on water supply)
– By 2020, to have achieved a significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum-dwellers

Goal 8: Develop a global partnership for development

– Develop further an open, rule-based, predictable, non-discriminatory trading and financial system
– Address the Special Needs of the Least Developed Countries (LDC)
– Address the special needs of landlocked developing countries and small island developing States
– Deal comprehensively with the debt problems of developing countries through national and international measures in order to make debt sustainable in the long term
– In co-operation with pharmaceutical companies, provide access to affordable, essential drugs in developing countries
– In co-operation with the private sector, make available the benefits of new technologies, especially information and communications