Nigeria records major progress in MDGs, says FG

THE Federal Government yesterday affirmed that it has made significant progress in the achievement of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) since its inception.

According to the Director of Programme in the Office of the Senior Special Assistant to the President on MDGs, Mr. Ochapa Oganyi who spoke in Abuja yesterday at the inaugural meeting of the expanded working group for the production of the 2015 MDGs report said Nigeria is committed to the achievement of MDGs.

He noted that the country was honoured by United Nations for reducing half population of those who suffer hunger in the country. “You will agree with me that, Nigeria has recorded significant progress in the achievement of the MDGs. Evidence from the Performance Tracking Surveys conducted by the National Bureau of Statistics states that Nigeria has made progress on most of the goals.”

He said “Permit me to give you an update on the progress made on the MDGs in Nigeria. With particular reference to Goal 1, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization honoured Nigeria for reducing by half the population of those who suffer hunger way ahead of the 2015 deadline.

“As regards Goal 2, Primary Six Completion Rate improved to 88% in 2012 from the baseline of 82% in 2004 but declined to 74% in 2014.

“Nigeria has achieved the gender parity targets at primary and secondary education levels with the national average Gender Parity Index (GPI) being 1. There is significant improvement in Goal 4 with a reduction from the 2008 National Demographic Health Survey figure of 157 under-five deaths per 1,000 live births, to 89 per 1,000 deaths in 2014. This trend is similar for infant mortality rate. The 2012 infant mortality rate of 61 per 1,000 live births declined slightly in 2014 to 58.

“With respect to MDG 5, Nigeria has continued to reduce the Maternal Mortality Ratio (MMR). In 1990, the MMR was estimated as 1,000 per 100,000 live births; in 2008, this figure dropped to 545 and in 2012, the figure was 350. The 2014 MMR figure stands at 243 per 100,000 live births, which means this target has been achieved.

“Goal 6 has also recorded remarkable improvement with the fall of HIV prevalence from a baseline figure of 5.8 to 3.4 in 2014. We can also tell the same success stories for Goals 7 & 8.” He said.

Commenting on the 2015 MDGs report, Oganyi said “The report will document key achievements, challenges faced and key lessons learnt at both the national and sub-national levels in the implementation of the MDGs in Nigeria.”

“Let me underscore this fact that as we wind down it is very imperative that we document our achievements, our challenges and lessons learnt. For every MDAs, every sector we want to know over last fifteen years that the MDGs has been on what we have been able to achieve, the successes recorded, the challenges so that as we transit to a new agenda we can be able to use those lessons learnt, those practices that evolves to implement the new MDGs,” he added.

Also, the Economic Adviser, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Ojijio Odhiambo said the production of 2015 MDGs report would aid the formulation of the Post-2015 development agenda.

He called on the stakeholders to be proactive in ensuring that the report captures the interest of the rural people.

“The report we have embarked upon is going to inform the next development agenda. Stakeholder participation is very important. We have noted in the past fifteen years that we need to do things differently. Unless we engage in the business and mission way of doing things we will leave a lot of people behind. We need to put report of progress at the national level without and the data of what is happening at the community level. We need to need to move to doing things differently. We need to move towards ensuring that we don’t leave anybody behind if we are prepare to produce this document.”

ational Coordinator, United Nations Millennium Campaign (UNMC), Hilary Ogbonna expressed the need to take the issue of data serious in the production of the report.

“I hope that Nigeria will take serious the issue of data to ensure that there is accuracy in the report.”

“If we don’t report well about the MDGs we would have lost to tell our story about the impact of MDGs in the country,” he added.