GLOBALPROGRESS

Connecting people, ideas and resources to help the UN solve global problems.

FALL 2010

Millennium Development GoalsReach a Turning PointThis year’s Millennium Development Goals(MDGs) Summit at the UN headquarters in New York helped to focus the world’s attention on the efforts underway to combatglobal poverty. While problems like hungerand disease are daunting, the renewed commitments are inspiring.

The Summit took place from Septem-ber 20-22 and was organized to assess andaccelerate progress on the eight goals set by150 world leaders in 2000. These goalstackle the biggest problems facing the world today — including global poverty,women’s and children’s health, hunger, andeducation.

The MDGs are the “to-do” list for solving the world’s toughest challenges.They are our goals, your goals, and the

shared goals of everyone who believes in ourindividual and collective power to shape abetter world.

The UN Foundation has been helpingadvance the MDGs for the past decade.Campaigns like Nothing But Nets, theMeasles Initiative, and Girl Up are aimed directly at individual goals, as well as involving everyone in their accomplishment.

If you have sent a malaria net to Africa,sponsored a childhood vaccination, or low-ered your energy use, you have taken actionto achieve the MDGs. What we must donow is redouble our personal commitments,and reach out to our family, friends, and networks to inspire them to join us.

Significant progress toward achieving

The 600 million adolescent girls living in the developing world today are a generationthat could change the world — but they need our help. Making up half of the largestyouth generation in history, these girls represent a sure-fire way to change the future ofthe world’s health, economy, and stability for the better. If healthy, skilled, empowered,and educated, adolescent girls cancreate a new future for themselvesand their families. A healthy andeducated girl is one of the bestways to ensure the prosperity andwell-being of an entire commu-nity in a developing country.

Inspiring American girls to help girls in developing countries is the goal of the UNFoundation’s Girl Up campaign. Formally launched in September,the campaign has been active allsummer with a dynamic and interactive web site, city tours,corporate partnership outreach,and online organizing campaignsthat have led to several thousand

UN Foundation ProgramsHelping Advance the MDGs:• Nothing But Nets, has raised more than $32million to distribute more than 3.5 million anti-malaria nets in 25 countries across Africa.

• The Measles Initiative, a UN Foundation-ledpartnership, has reduced measles and child mortality through immunization. So far, the reduction in global measles deaths by 78% is the single greatest contribution to achievingMDG 4.

• Girl Up, a UN Foundation campaign, mobi-lizes support for UN programs that providecomprehensive health care, life skills educationto keep girls safe from violence, and funding to allow girls to enter and stay in school.

•mHealth Alliance coordinates efforts to deployinformation and communications technologyto advance mobile health.

• Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves, a UN Foundation-led public-private initiative,promotes clean and efficient household cooking,planning to enable 100 million households to acquire cleaner, lower emission, and higher performance cookstoves and fuels by 2020.

1 Eradicate Extreme Hunger andPoverty

2 Achieve Universal Primary Education

3 Promote Gender Equality and Empower Women

4 Reduce Child Mortality

5 Improve Maternal Health

6 Combat HIV/AIDS, Malaria, and Other Diseases

7 Ensure Environmental Sustainability

8 Develop a Global Partnership for Development

The Millennium Development Goals:

Girl Up Connects the Energy of U.S.Teens and Empowers Their Peers inthe Developing World

(continued on p.5)

(continued on p.2) www.unfoundation.orgGirl Up appears on Good Morning America.

Photo: David Evans

This September at the UN Millennium Development Goals(MGD) Summit, leaders from around the world came together to accelerate progress on some of the biggest problems facing our planet.While the challenges are significant, the renewed commitments that emerged from the three-day summit are inspiring. Realizing the MDGs will take more than promises from world leaders — it’sgoing to take action from all of us.

You’re already making a difference through your support of the UN Foundation. Your contributions provide the leverage that is needed to help the UN make a difference in millions of people’slives every day.

Thanks to you, partnerships with the UN are moving our worldmuch closer to achieving the MDGs. Your contributions are helpingthe UN identify and remedy unmet needs around the world. For example, the need for malaria-preventing bed nets has declined from300 million to just 30 million. The number of people living in extreme poverty is down by 130 million. We’ve seen a 78 percent decrease in measles deaths, and 5 million people are walking todaywho would otherwise have been paralyzed by polio.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon launched a historic GlobalStrategy for Women’s and Children’s Health earlier this year. Withyour support, that vision is well on its way to becoming a reality. We will continue to work with the UN — and its new agency, UNWomen — to keep the needs and concerns of women and girls on the forefront of the global agenda. Reproductive health and familyplanning issues are at the top of this priority list and you can counton us to make sure these important topics receive the attention andresources they deserve.

Right now we have a unique opportunity to move even closer to eliminating preventable diseases and giving the world’s poorestpeople the opportunity they need to lift themselves out of extremepoverty. It starts with increasing awareness, because making peopleaware of solutions is the first step in creating change.

President Barack Obama’s speech at the MDG Summit emphasized the importance ofinnovations and partnershipsin moving us closer to solvingglobal problems. Partnershipswith the UN are reachingpopulations previously considered unreachable. And still more innovationsand partnerships on the horizon will bring us closerthan ever before to eliminat-ing preventable diseases andextreme poverty.

With your support forming the backbone of our efforts, we are making real, tangible, measurable progress. I hope you’ll help us close the gap by sharingthe UN Foundation’s work with the important people in your life.Please don’t underestimate your power to influence and create change — we can’t do this without you.

Thank you again for all you’ve done on behalf of the UN’s work.I look forward to working with you and your family, friends, and net-works — in the months and years ahead.

Sincerely yours,

Timothy E. Wirth

From the Presidentnew supporters since June.

One of Girl Up’s earliestsupporters, Shannon McNa-mara of Basking Ridge, NewJersey, embodies the personalaction and leadership thatGirl Up is working to ignite.At age 17, Shannon has traveled twice to Tanzania tomeet with her peers and hasspearheaded the donation ofmore than 23,000 books toTanzanian girls.

“On my first trip toAfrica at age 15, I noticed that,while boys were encouraged to study or play, girls were expected to perform householdtasks like collecting water, planting beans, washing clothes, andcaring for their siblings — all at the expense of going to school,”recalls Shannon. “I knew immediately that I wanted to step upmy own efforts to help girls empower themselves, their families,and their communities through education.”

Shannon loves the message of Girl Up because she knowshow important it is to invest in girls from developing countries.She has already begun giving “High Fives” (the 5 actions the campaign invites its supporters to take to help change girls’ lives)to her family and Facebook friends, and hosted an August gathering of 40 fellow students to talk about the issues facing girlsworldwide and write letters to them.

Research shows that American girls think girls everywhereshould have the ability to learn, be healthy, and succeed. The“for girls, by girls” approach of Girl Up mobilizes girls in theUnited States to raise awareness and funds for UN programs thatprovide girls in developing countries life-changing opportunitieslike the ability to go to school, see a doctor, access clean water,and stay safe from violence.

The campaign’s early supporters include the MTV Networks, WNBA, Girls Inc., the National Coalition of GirlsSchools, and Ivanka Trump Fine Jewelry. Trump has even designed a special bracelet, the sale of which will benefit Girl Up.The bracelet ($30 retail), which has been featured on InStyle.comand People.com’s “Style Watch” and is available at the Girl Uponline store (www.GirlUp.org), was unveiled on September 21,2010 as part of New York City’s annual Fashion’s Night Out event.

The actions of another Girl Up supporter, Jenna Bailey of Cleveland, Ohio, illustrate the personal energy and digitalcommunity building that will bring more girls into the campaignin the coming years.

“I became a fan of the Girl Up page on Facebook and sentthe link to all my friends, who then became friends themselves,”says the 16-year-old who also donated half of the money she earned from teaching swimming lessons this summer to thecampaign. “In addition, I tagged all my Facebook friends in apicture of the ‘Girlfesto.’ If getting the word out about Girl Upis this easy, raising awareness and funds in my community shouldbe too.”

The admirable humanitarian instinct of girls like Jenna andShannon will be an important force for good as Girl Up works inthe months and years ahead to unite girls in the common causeof a better world. n

(Girl Up continued from p.1)

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UN Foundation Chairman, Ted Turner, and President, Senator Timothy Wirth

Photo: Dav

id Eva

ns

Girl Up is working to improve the livesof girls in countries such as Ethiopia(seen here), Liberia, Malawi andGuatemala.

Cooking shouldn’t kill you — but in develop-ing countries it does.

For more than 3 billion people, exposureto smoke is an inescapablebyproduct of preparing a mealover an open fire or with a traditional cookstove. WorldHealth Organization researchhas found that exposure to cook-stove smoke is responsible for1.9 million deaths annuallyworldwide. It’s one of the topfive health risks in developingcountries, predominantly affect-ing women and children, andcontributes to a range of chronicillnesses, including lung cancer,heart disease, pneumonia, andlow birth weight. Think aboutit: cooking a meal is one of themost dangerous activities for awoman in the developing world.

Five hundred millionhouseholds rely on firewood,coal, dung, and biomass for fuel.Apart from the grave health effects, inefficient combustionmeans much of that fuel iswasted — and its collection

degrades natural resources, acceleratesdeforestation, and contributes to climatechange. What’s more, the time-consuming task of gathering fuel falls almost exclusively upon women and girls — time thatcould be spent getting an education or startinga small business. Women and girls also face riskof attack while they forage for fuel, particularlyaround refugee camps and conflict zones.

Recent advances in cookstove design, testing, and monitoring suggest that the moment has arrived to take clean cookstoves toscale. Cookstove programs underway in India,Mexico, and Peru also signal new and vital support from country governments that canhelp make sure stoves and fuel sources are appropriate for their countries’ cultures.

That’s why the UN Foundation led theformation of the Global Alliance for CleanCookstoves, a bold, new partnership to savelives, improve livelihoods, empower women,and combat climate change by creating a thriving global market for clean and efficienthousehold cooking solutions. The Alliance’s“100 by 20” goal calls for 100 million homesto adopt clean and efficient stoves and fuels by2020, a move toward a long-term vision of universal adoption. Learn more about the Alliance at www.unfoundation.org. n

The Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI)has been working since 1988 to make polio thefirst viral disease since smallpox to be conqueredworldwide. The UN Foundation has beenworking closely with its core partners since1999.

The GPEI has reached an impressive 99 percent of its goal, thanks to a global immunization effort that provided lifetime protection from polio infection to hundreds ofmillions of children. The world now has a narrow window of opportunity to reach the remaining one percent of the goal, although significant challenges remain.

Four remaining endemic countries —Afghanistan, India, Nigeria, and Pakistan —continue to export the wild polio virus, causingoutbreaks in neighboring countries that had recently been polio-free. The problem hasbrought new urgency to interrupting transmis-sion within those four borders.

“Polio will not go quietly into history,” says

Steve Strickland, Senior UN Foundation Liaison Officer for the GPEI. “Even though wehave eliminated it in more than 140 countries,the final four are proving to be especially difficult. But it most certainly can be done.”

Recent successes reported by the GPEI include a record-low eight polio cases in Nigeria this year, compared to hundreds lastyear, and the lowest number of polio cases reported in India in ten years.

Yet polio has the capacity to reappear inany part of the world, especially poor countriesand regions with weak health infrastructuresand sub-standard sanitation systems. “We sawmultiple outbreaks of the virus this spring andsummer,” says Strickland. “A virus migrationfrom India caused an outbreak in Tajikistan,which hasn’t had a case of polio for more thana dozen years. And an outbreak in Angola,caused by a wild polio virus from Nigeria, hasnow spread to the DR Congo. These are

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Cooking Up SolutionsThe Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves

Polio Eradication Faces New Challenges

“Together, we can make sure no child ever suffers from this tragic, cripplingdisease again.”

Steve StricklandSenior UN FoundationLiaison Officer for the GPEI

(continued on p.4)

Photo: GTZ

Women in Malawi using a cleancookstove.

Nothing But Nets spent the summer months continuing to providelife-saving, anti-malaria bed nets to families throughout Africa. Ahighlight was distributing 20,000 nets in Senegal with the campaign’sfounding partner, NBA Cares, as part of their Basketball WithoutBorders activities. NBA players, legends, and coaches helped theNothing But Nets team and local partners deliver nets to families in thevillage of Rufisque, speaking with families and helping them hangtheir nets. This distribution was a key step toward achieving full coverage for Senegalese families in need of bed nets.

In addition, the Nothing But Nets “Buzz Tour” continued totravel around the country to spread the “buzz” about ending malariadeaths by 2015. Thousands came out to the tour’s many “buzz stops”in Denver, Houston, Los Angeles, and Seattle, just to name a few.

Furthermore, Nothing But Nets has stepped forward to fill an urgent need identified by the United Nations: more bed nets for the

Central African Republic. Nothing But Nets took action by teamingup with singer and actress Mandy Moore and Population Services International (PSI) to get a net to every family in the Central AfricanRepublic by the end of this year. Reaching this goal will require thedelivery of 837,000 bed nets.

“Insecticide-treated bed nets are one of the easiest ways to protect families from malaria-carrying mosquitoes,” says Moore, whohas been active in the fight against malaria since she saw its impactfirsthand during a trip to South Sudan last year. “I’m proud to bepart of this initiative to send nets and save lives, and am hopeful wecan reach our goal in the Central African Republic.”

Malaria, a disease that has existed for centuries and killed millions, is preventable. Mandy Moore’s voice, and the global reachof social media, is helping spread the buzz about the urgency of ending deaths from this disease within the next five years. n

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Korean Nuns Pledge to Raise $1Million for UN Girls’ Education and Empowerment Programs

NOTHING BUT NETSFills Urgent Need in the Central African Republic

(Polio Eradication Initiative continued from p.3)

dramatic reminders that we now stand at a critical turning point inthe fight against polio.”

Strickland says that the multi-million dollar shortfall in theGPEI’s budget has caused postponement of planned immunizationsin five African countries. “We can’t keep the virus contained indef-initely,” he says, “which is why vaccination leading to eradication issuch a smart economic investment. And it costs far less than treatment and control.”

“Curtailing immunizations carries considerable risks, particu-

larly with infectious diseases like polio,” he notes. “It is all too easyfor the virus to jump borders and regain a foothold in countries whereit had once disappeared.”

GPEI is intensifying efforts to find new or renewed financialcommitments from around the world to get the polio eradicationcampaign back ahead of the disease. “Together, we can make sure nochild ever suffers from this tragic, crippling disease again,” Stricklandsays. “We have the tools and know-how, and we will never have a better chance than we do today.” n

A group of nuns are proof that support to tackle global problemstranscends boundaries, religions, and generations. An interfaith association of Korean nuns from the Buddhist, Roman Catholic, Anglican, and Won-Buddhist religions has pledged to raise $1 millionfor the UN Foundation to help fund UN programs to educate andempower girls in Ethiopia.

The nuns’ group, known as Samsohoe, visited the UN Founda-tion in June to deliver a $200,000 check and to learn more about theprograms their pledge will support. They were also eager to discusstheir motivation: several of the group’s members were orphaned during the Korean War and felt a debt of gratitude toward UN Peacekeepers from Ethiopia who protected and cared for them.

According to Rev. Jijung, one of the four Samsohoe memberswho participated in the visit, “this is our way of saying thank you,sixty years later.”

In the Korean language, “samsohoe” means “a group of threesmiles.” It derives from an ancient Korean legend, and in moderntimes, the term “samso” describes friends with different religiousbackgrounds. Founded in 1988, Samsohoe is the first Korean organization of its kind led by female spiritual leaders. The UNFoundation looks forward to partnering with them as our work continues to unfold. n

From left to right — Rev. Jijung; Sr. Beata; Rev. Jinmyung; Kathy Calvin,Chief Executive Officer, UN Foundation; Sr. Catherine

www.unfoundation.org

The first thing one notices when arriving inHaiti these days is the intensity of the people,native as well as volunteers from abroad, working to bring this battered nation back tolife. Hard work is a badge of honor and dedication; in some ways, it is the noble publicface that hides a range of more complex internalfeelings about the state of things as we approachthe one-year anniversary of the January 12earthquake.

For me, and many others who spend timein Haiti, I expect, the daily and even hourlyswings from hope to despair create a kind ofemotional whiplash. Walking with a police patrol through the isolated Camp Corail, which is about a 25 minute drive — if traffic cooperates — from Port-au-Prince, I was both encouraged and worried about the future.

The camp is well organized with tents inneatly arranged and well spaced rows. Food andwater supplies seemed adequate. Children approached us to talk, laugh, and kick soccerballs with the multi-national group of Haitianand UN police and Peruvian peacekeepers thatguard and patrol the camp, keeping the roughly6,000 inhabitants safe. The smiles of everyonein the camp provided a sense that, while life isdifficult, there is a way forward.

Still, the questions nag. What would ahurricane, or even a strong storm, do to theseneatly ordered tents? Where can these peopleget work out here, so far from any community

or marketplace? Will the new transitional woodframe structures being built, at a hoped for paceof 5 per day, become permanent? I posed thesequestions to the committed individuals in theHaitian government, the UN, and NGO communities, and after hearing their realisticbut creative and positive ideas, the pendulumswung back to hope.

Haitians know that the world’s attentionon their small country will not last, particularlyif things don’t seem to be going right. However, if the Interim Haiti Recovery Commission (IHRC) can convince the peopleof Haiti, international governments, and NGOs that it is a serious and well organized decision-making body, then resources will continue to flow into the country. And further,if the committed team I met with at Haiti’sInter-Ministerial Committee for TerritorialManagement can find a way to integrate theirplans with those of the IHRC, the idea of themuch discussed decentralization of Haiti mightbecome a reality.

The world is rooting and working forHaiti, but we all have to stay in the game together and for the long haul if its people are tohave a chance at a better future. As always, theUnited Nations will be at the forefront of thateffort, with the UN Foundation behind themevery step of the way. n

the MDGs was widely reported at the Summit, including a decline in the number of people living in extreme poverty (130 million fewerpeople than in the year 2000). Additionally, thenumber of women dying due to complicationsin childbirth or pregnancy has decreased by34%. But progress has been far from uniformand has actually slowed as some governmentssharply curtailed funding due to the global economic recession.

This creates an important opportunity forpeople who support organizations like the UNFoundation to step up to the challenge and leadby example. Going forward, the UN Founda-tion will expand programs like Nothing ButNets, the recently launched Girl Up campaign,and the newly announced Global Alliance forClean Cookstoves to help partners support theUN’s work.

As part of thisglobal effort to summonuniversal action in sup-port of the MDGs, TedTurner was named to a new 21-memberMDG Advocacy Group created to galvanizeworldwide involvement.In a video message tothe world, Turner said,“Do something todayto advance one of the eight MillenniumDevelopment Goals atunfoundation.org. It’s easy and it’s within ourreach. We can all make the world a betterplace.” n

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Haiti’s Resilience Put to the TestRobert Skinner, Associate Director of the UN Foundation’s New York Office

(Millennium Development Goals continued from p.1)

“Hard work is a badge of honor and dedication ... it is the noble public facethat hides a range ofmore complex internalfeelings about the state of things as we approach the one-year anniversary of the January 12 earthquake.”

Robert SkinnerUN Foundation

Jeffrey Sachs, Ted Turner, and Her Majesty Queen Rania Al Abdullah during an event at the MDG Summit in New York.

Senator Timothy Wirth andUSAID Administrator Rajiv Shahdiscuss the U.S. Government'sapproach to the MDGs at the UNWeek Digital Media Lounge.

The United Nations Foundation and the United Nations Association of the USA (UNA-USA) have agreed to form a newstrategic alliance that will build on the strengths of both organizations in helping support the work of the United Nations.

For more than six decades, UNA-USA has been at the forefront of advocacy on behalf of the UN. Over the last twelveyears, the UN Foundation has worked to connect people, ideas,and resources to the UN. This new alliance will bring togetherthe power of UNA’s strong chapter-based network with the UNFoundation’s dynamic online presence and campaign expertise,and the innovative Washington-based advocacy of the BetterWorld Campaign.

Both organizations, including over 125 chapters and 12,000members of the UNA and the hundreds of thousands of supporters of the work of the UN Foundation, will increase public awareness and strategic advocacy work that helps the UNmake the world a better place. For more information, pleasevisit www.unfoundation.org. n

This September at the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDG)Summit in New York, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon launchedthe Global Strategy for Women’s and Children’s Health. This strat-egy is a call to action to improve the health of women and childrenworldwide to advance progress on all of the MDGs. Focusing onwomen’s and children’s health is one of the best ways to accelerateprogress on the full range of global issues facing the planet today.

And progress is indeed being made. Childhood deaths have beenreduced from 12.5 million in 1990 to 8.8 million in 2008. And a newreport sees a 34% decrease in the number of women dying due to complications during pregnancy and childbirth — from an estimated546,000 in 1990 to 358,000 in 2008. Though the decline is impres-sive, the same report confirms that 1,000 women continue to die frompregnancy-related causes every day.

As stated by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, “Noperson of conscience should stand by as such needless deaths continue.It is said that a society can be judged by how it treats women and children. Just as no woman should die needlessly in childbirth, no person of conscience should stand by as such senseless deaths continue.Each of us can make a difference. Together, we can improve the healthand well-being of women and children. When they thrive, so will our world.”

As part of a growing global consensus that improving women’s andchildren’s health is the best way to help achieve all of the MDGs, the UN Foundation and partner organizations are committing $400 million to make motherhood safer, educate and empower more adolescent girls, and protect children from preventable diseases. n

Strategic AllianceStrengthensU.S.-UN Relationship

Eye on the UN

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INSIDE: • Polio Eradication Faces New Challenges• Korean Nuns Pledge to Raise $1 Million• Haiti’s Resilience Put to the Test• Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves• UN Foundation and UN Association of the USA Join Forces

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