The
United
Nations Millennium Summit was organised at the turn of the century
in order to use this remarkable point in time to focus worldwide
development efforts and to improve the living conditions of the worlds
poorest as soon as possible in the new millennium. The Millennium
Development Goals (
MDG) were adopted by the international community,
with specific objectives to be achieved by 2015, including halving the
proportion of the worldwide amount of people living on less than $1 a
day.
The
Monterrey
Consensus which was reached during the International Conference on
Financing for Development in March 2002 was an important step towards
the achievement of the MDGs. Among other national and multilateral
commitments, it includes the pledge of the industrialised countries to
increase official development aid (ODA) to the level of 0.7% of their
respective GDP as well as continued efforts towards debt relief.
In September 2005, a High Level Plenary Meeting of the 60th session of
the General Assembly brought together more than 100 Heads of State and
Government, and was coined the
2005
World Summit. At this summit, the Millenium Declaration and the MDGs
were reaffirmed, including the commitment to the global partnership for
development. The Monterey Consensus and the need for financial means
were also reconfirmed, as was the implementation of Rio's Agenda 21 and
the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation from WSSD in 2002.
At the occasion of the World Summit 2005, REN21 launched its
issue
paper Energy for Development, which explores the potential role of
renewable energy in meeting the Millennium Development Goals. Although
energy is not explicitly mentioned in any of the MDGs, there is a
growing recognition that energy services play a crucial role as a
cross-cutting prerequisite for development and improved living
conditions around the world.
