STATEMENT
BY
H.E ZACHARY D. MUBURI-MUITA PERMANENT
REPRESENTATIVE OF THE REPUBLIC OF KENYA TO THE
UNITED NATIONS DURING THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY THEMATIC
DEBATE ON MILLENIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS : RECOGNIZING THE
ACHIEVEMENTS, ADDRESSING THE CHALLENGES AND GETTING BACK
ON TRACK TO ACHIEVE THE MDGs BY 2015:
HELD ON 1-2 APRIL, 2008,
UNITED NATIONS HEADQUARTERS,NEW YORK.
Mr. President,
I take this opportunity to express appreciation to the President of the General Assembly for organizing this thematic debate on “Millennium Development Goals: Recognizing the Achievements, Addressing the Challenges and Getting Back on Track to Achieve the MDGs by 2015”. In the same vain, I wish to thank the President of the General Assembly for the Background Papers on the three MDGs under focus during this discussion - poverty and hunger, education, and health.
Kenya associates itself with the statements delivered by the representatives of Antigua and Barbuda and Cape Verde on behalf of the Group of 77 and China and the African Group respectively.
Mr. President,
Kenya like many other developing countries recognizes that the MDGs offer a great opportunity to address human welfare in the world. The adoption of the Millennium Declaration and the Millennium Development Goals in 2000 was a laudable initiative by the international community to fight poverty, accelerate human development and facilitate the gradual but more effective integration of the developing world, especially Africa, into the global economy. The reaffirmation of MDGs in subsequent international conferences was an additional indication of commitment of the international community to address poverty and inequality, and to end the marginalization and exclusion of the poor and disadvantaged.
In Africa, the challenges of eradicating poverty, achieving rapid and sustainable socio-economic development and integrating the continent into the mainstream of the world economy have increasingly been taken seriously by the African leadership as evidenced by some of the recent important development initiatives and measures. These include the transformation of the Organization of the African Union (OAU) to the African Union (AU), the adoption of the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD) as the strategic programme to pollster Africa’s efforts towards meeting the MDGs, among others.
Mr. President,
Further, in recognition of the special needs of Africa, the Millennium Declaration called upon the international community to support the consolidation of peace, poverty eradication and sustainable development. The development Partners were specifically to, among others, take special measures to address the challenges of poverty eradication and sustainable development in Africa including debt cancellation, improved market access, enhanced Official Development Assistance (ODA), increased flow of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), and the transfer of technology. Africa was also to be assisted to build capacity to tackle the spread of HIV /AIDS and other infectious diseases. Indeed, this recognition and commitment of the international community to the special developmental needs of Africa, coupled with Africa’s own initiatives in this direction, raised hopes of achieving the MDGs on the continent by 2015.
In spite of the initial high expectations the latest reports generally indicate that Africa has not made sufficient progress towards meeting the MDGs by the target date of 2015. That most countries in Africa are far off track to achieve most or all of the goals is now a forgone conclusion.
Mr. President,
To reflect on the Kenyan MDGs situation, may I start by pointing out that some uneven progress has been made. During the final two decades of the last century, the Kenyan economy experienced declining economic growth rates reaching its worst in 2002 at 0.5 percent Real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth. This depressed economic situation had spill over effects on other sectors, hence the bad performance of many MDGs indicators. For instance, the beginning of this decade marked declines in access to safe drinking water and sanitation, child nutrition and health services, increased pressure on environmental goods and services and, a large number of people living below minimum level of dietary energy consumption.
The situation began improving from 2003 due to efforts by the government to resuscitate the economy, through the Economic Recovery Strategy for Wealth and Employment Creation (ERS 2003-2007). The implementation of the ERS has enabled the economy to grow from a GDP of 0.5 percent in 2002 to 6.1 in 2006 and estimated 7.1 percent in 2007. These gains have impacted positively on MDGs indicators across the economy. For instance, the percentage of Kenyans living in absolute poverty reduced by 10 percent between 2002 and 2006. As a result of the introduction of Free the Primary Education in 2003, the national gross enrolment rate in primary schools rose from 93 percent to 107.7 percent in 2006 while the net enrolment for 2006 was 86.5 percent.
Mr. President,
Since independence, Kenya has implemented development programmes that focused on the MDGs. As a result, the adoption of the MDGs-based planning in response to the Millennium Declaration served to sharpen the focus and also rally all stakeholders behind the MDGs. Since the launch of the MDGs based planning in 2004, several milestones have been realized. They include:
- A cabinet directive in March 2005 requiring all Ministries/sectors to mainstream MDGs in their specific policies, plans and budgets. This led to increased budgetary allocations for MDGs - related programmes, and further, MDGs have become key criterion for allocating resources to development programmes. Education, health and agriculture have been the greatest beneficiaries of this directive.
- The national MDGs Needs Assessment Study was undertaken in 2005 and it indicated that a total of US$ 5.9 billion would be needed annually to implement the MDGs. This report has continued to inform the planning and budgeting process in Kenya since then.
- Millennium villages concept has been introduced leading to designation of Bar Sauri in Siaya and Dertu in Ladgera districts as millennium villages, while 9 other districts have been declared Millennium areas. The two villages and 9 districts are being set up as models for best practices that can help achieve MDGs in the country.
- There have been district MDG capacity building exercises to entrench MDGs-based planning at district level and identify quick win projects for implementation.
Mr. President,
The government’s efforts to address the MDGs have been faced with a number of challenges that have included inadequate resources, poor infrastructure, inadequate capacity and policy frameworks. It is in this respect that the international community is called upon to review and meet their commitments, particularly in the area of provision of resources, technology transfer and capacity building to fast track the implementation and achievement of MDGs by the target time of 2015.
On its part, the Government has prepared Vision 2030 to replace the Economic Recovery Strategy as the blue print for economic development. The Vision 2030 has been prepared to embrace the MDGs and will be implemented through five-year medium-term strategies that the Government has started developing.
Mr. President,
Finally, let me point out that the achievement of MDGs requires that the assumptions behind the MDGs agenda must hold at all times. Thus, achieving MDGs requires implementation of commitments by all stakeholders. All parties must live to up to the challenge bestowed upon them in the Millennium Declaration. If this is done, regardless of how far off track countries are, there is still hope. With adequate donor support and MDGs-friendly policies, we can deliver on these goals.
I thank you, Mr. President
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