The main focus of this blog these days has been on attempting to organize a "local" effort, for the truly global effort of the 2010 UN Millennium Campaign whose byline is "This is our year. Let's make it happen."
There seem to be two legs to this effort. One to raise support through the Stand Up Take Action Campaign and the other to address issues through the UN Millennium Campaign. This blog is interested in both efforts
Their main focus is now on the upcoming 'MDG Summit on 20-22 September 2010 in New York' (High-level Plenary Meeting).
The UN General Assembly has decided to convene a 'MDG summit' this September, with the objective to accelerate progress towards all the MDGs by 2015. The summit will review successes, lessons learned, obstacles and gaps, challenges and opportunities, “leading to concrete strategies for action”. [more]
The primary means of doing this is keeping interested civil society stakeholders informed on the latest developments related to the MDG summit process.These are the professionals, people who have made this their life work. You can visit the dedicated website.
Links to U.N. Hearings are provided at this blog's related wiki as information on the themes and participants and respondents taking part in the hearings.As part of the preparatory process for the ‘MDG summit’, the UN General Assembly requested and the President H.E. Dr. Ali Abdussalam Treki convened informal interactive hearings with NGOs, Civil Society and the Private Sector. To assist him in preparing the meeting, the GA President formed a ‘Task Force’ of representatives of civil society and the private sector to advise him on the format and participation at the Hearings. The President of the General Assembly, in close consultation with the Task Force, as well as UN Member States, and using the recent report of the Secretary-General as guidance, established specific themes and selected speakers for these four sessions.
Earlier this month the professionals or civil society organisations were given an opportunity to have their say at the Hearings of the General Assembly – a part of the official process - that convened from 14-15 June 2010 in New York. Links to U.N. Hearings are provided at this blog's related wiki, as is information on the four themes with links on either the participants and respondents taking part in the hearings or the organizations with which they work. The four themes are an attempt to highlight key aspects of the Millennium Declaration and the MDGs, while also emphasizing the interrelated nature of the MDGs and the international development agenda more broadly.
A tremendous amount of effort by the UN Millennium Campaign is being made through numerous organizations and it is an effort to get one's head around the scope of this truly world-wide effort.
It still does not seem though that the Stand Up advocacy efforts are as well focused or are as near to reaching a tipping point needed to go beyond last year's impact even. Though understandably it is still all coming together and a great deal is going on at the various related websites and on Facebook. They have now have modified the landing page for the newsletter for 2010. I am still waiting for them to have sign-ups for online 2010 events and not just the 2009 widget.
