Nearly 100 Chinese and foreign participants gathered in Beijing
on Thursday to discuss new methods of education and training in a
bid to attain the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
The conference, with the theme of promoting the role of
education and training in attaining MDGs, drew representatives from
the UN, academia and non-government organizations (NGOs) from
Asian, African and Latin American countries.
Addressing the conference, Wang Zhongyu, president of the China
Economic and Social Council (CESC), said the MDGs embodied the
aspirations of people towards an improved life and the common wish
to promote world peace, stability and realizing mutual benefits for
all.
Only by uniting with each other could countries throughout the
world build a harmonious society with sustained development and
common prosperity, he said.
Wang, also vice chairman of the Chinese People's Political
Consultative Conference, proposed that countries take effective
measures to strengthen the UN's role in promoting international
cooperation on development and making full use of the leading role
played by the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC).
He also suggested the establishment of a "fair, reasonable and
efficient" framework to evaluate the progress of attaining MDGs
recognition. Wang called for NGOs and others involved in education
throughout the world to improve levels of cooperation.
Wang said it was crucial to carry out joint training programs
with higher institutions and NGOs. "Under the new circumstances we
need to find ways and mechanisms to promote how MDGs status can be
attained," he said..
Many participants hold that the development of appropriate
educational courses is a strategic way of achieving MDGs status.
It's been suggested that countries should adjust their educational
systems and modernize training methods.
Initiated during the UN Millennium Summit in 2000, the MDGs
include reducing by half the proportion of people suffering from
poverty and hunger, achieving universal primary education,
eliminating gender disparity, reducing child mortality by two
thirds and maternal mortality by three quarters, halting and
reversing the incidence of major diseases and reducing by half the
proportion of people without access to safe drinking water.
(Xinhua News Agency March 17, 2006)