Today is the day to blog about the Millennium Development Goals. For those unfamiliar with the Goals, they are the United Nations’ commitment to end poverty, begun in the year 2000. Their eight goals are
- Goal 1: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
- Goal 2: Achieve universal primary education
- Goal 3: Promote gender equality and empower women
- Goal 4: Reduce child mortality
- Goal 5: Improve maternal health
- Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases
- Goal 7: Ensure environmental sustainability
- Goal 8: Develop a Global Partnership for Development
Each of these goals is broken down into quantifiable steps with descriptive indicators. The entire program is very concrete, but depends on local actions.
As a priest of the Episcopal Diocese of New Hampshire, I’m happy that we have committed to supporting the MDGs at several levels. As a diocese, we have committed funding to KWIHEED and Masiphumelele Corporation. At Grace Episcopal Church, we support the Rest for the Nations Church, a congregation of Rwandan refugees in Concord, NH. Further, we support their families back in Rwanda and sell traditional baskets to develop employment opportunites in Africa.
Personally, I have gotten involved with Hackers for Charity, which I have written about before. They have recently opened a new computer lab for AOET. Through their school, children are offered primary education (goal 2) and given opportunity for employment after school (one computer-related job in Uganda can feed five families, goal 1). By keeping the children in full-time school, mothers can gain job skills and even form their own companies (goal 3).
If I stretch, Hackers for Charity can cover almost all of the MDGs. It’s an easy and fun way to be involved in transforming the world!
