On July 30 at a UN Foundation-sponsored event, officials from the Obama administration unveiled Celebrate, Innovate and Sustain: Toward 2015 and Beyond, the official U.S. strategy for achieving the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Celebrate, Innovate, and Sustain will very likely serve as the template for President Obama’s highly-anticipated speech at the MDG Review Summit, which will be held September 20-22, 2010, at the UN General Assembly.
USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah, NSC Senior Director Gayle Smith, Ambassador Rick Barton, and officials from the U.S. Treasury Department and the Millennium Challenge Corporation briefed high-level representatives from UN organizations and the NGO community on the strategy, which focuses on the four following imperatives:
1) Leveraging innovation;
2) Investing in sustainability;
3) Tracking development outcomes, not just dollars; and
4) Enhancing the principle and the practice of mutual accountability.
“The U.S. strategy seems to validate the premise that effective partnerships and NGO participation are vital components for meeting the MDGs,” Lindsay Coates, Executive Vice President of InterAction, said of the document. “InterAction and its member organizations look forward to working closely with the administration to meet the MDGs by their 2015 deadline.”
InterAction member organizations figured prominently in the reaction and discussion session that followed the briefing. David Lane, CEO of ONE, moderated the candid dialogue, while Millennium Promise CEO John McArthur and Oxfam’s Director of Aid Effectiveness Greg Adams provided the first comments and responses to the plan. Other member organizations present at the event included Africare, Bread for the World, and Save the Children.
Notably, Celebrate, Innovate and Sustain contains a reference to the eagerly-awaited Presidential Study Directive (PSD) on global development policy, saying that the PSD “will guide the U.S. approach to the Millennium Development Goals.”
Between now and the MDG Review Summit in late September, InterAction will draft an official response to Celebrate, Innovate and Sustain, using its Achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs): The Road Forward for the U.S. as a basis of comparison.
Read Celebrate, Innovate and Sustain: Toward 2015 and Beyond.
