Press Conference on Millennium Villages Project

 

The “path-breaking” 2006 Millennium Villages initiative was now the largest scale project to achieve the Millennium Development Goals through an integrated rural development approach in sub-Saharan Africa, Jeffrey Sachs said today at the launch of the project’s second phase, for which George Soros had pledged an extra $47 million.

At the outset of a Headquarters press conference, Mr. Sachs, Director of Columbia University’s Earth Institute, said that phase I had made tremendous breakthroughs in achieving the Millennium Development Goals in places that had been written off as “absolutely hopeless”.  The essence of the project was to work with local communities in clusters of villages with a total of 30,000‑50,000 inhabitants, using cutting-edge, low-cost technologies in a highly effective way.  The projects ensured that communities would benefit from the synergies by simultaneously investing in agriculture, health, education, infrastructure and business development.

He said that, five years into the project, the enthusiasm and support of host Governments in all 10 African countries remained strong.  There was an almost continent-wide request to scale up the initiative, as people realized that the project was “practical, effective, community-based, sustainable and practical”.  Nigeria and Rwanda had recently joined, and there were subregional initiatives as well.  United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon was a patron of Millennium Villages.  The partnership included academia, business, United Nations agencies and local and national Governments, working together to find effective ways to harness talents and technologies in order to achieve each of the Millennium Development Goals.

Mr. Soros, Founder and Chair, Open Society Foundation, announced his support for phase II — some $27 million over five years, following the $50 million he had provided in 2006.  In addition, the Soros Economic Development Fund would consider providing up to $20 million in loans to support investment-worthy business projects.

He said that in the beginning, the project had seemed like a bold idea that could easily fail, but that it “deserved a shot”.  The Foundation’s Board had been opposed to his contributions, but “since it was my money, they decided to go along with it”.  Phase II aimed to link small agriculture with business structures that could provide sustainable income for entire regions, not just the model villages.

He said that, three years ago, an independent evaluation had concluded that the project had achieved remarkable results and had recommended that it should be scaled up.  He said that phase I of the Millennium Villages Project had consisted of 80 model villages in 10 countries, with a total population of half a million people.  The main achievement was to make African leaders understand that the Project’s approach was working.

National Governments were now funding the projects largely by themselves.  Nigeria had adopted the model and had decided to scale it up, using its $1 billion debt relief package for that purpose, Mr. Soros continued.  Different countries followed different tracks, he said, with, for instance, Malawi supporting its most food-insecure communities and Rwanda accelerating economic growth and social services.

Answering questions about criticism of the independent evaluation, Mr. Sachs said the scientific findings of that survey had been published in peer-review publications.  Governments in Africa, having seen the success of the project, were scaling up.  The evaluation was carefully measuring what was happening on the ground, where enormous progress was being made on achieving the Millennium Development Goals.  He said the “armchair critics” also did not understand that new tools were being developed, using cutting-edge technology.  A whole system for community-based malaria control had been developed with tremendous success.  Those new tools were now open-source, online material.

By 2015, those new tools would be baseline.  There was a growing network of participation, including by subregional organizations, in supporting and scaling up the projects.  He said that from benefiting a half million people, the Project was now helping tens of millions.  Integrated programmes, for instance in malaria control, had been pioneered, which now had become standard packages.  Haiti would be a good area to apply the new tools, and there was now one project under way in the south of Haiti.

Asked about the impact on the Project of unrest in places such as Malawi, as well as the social movements that had sparked the “Arab Spring”, Mr. Sachs said that although unrest was felt in the Millennium Villages, those communities were resilient and wanted to protect their achievements.  The unrest in Malawi was worrisome, he added, as the Government had reacted in an erratic way, threatening achievements it had made.

Mr. Soros said that most of the problems in Africa were problems of governance.  It was important to assure the people in the model villages of the commitment to stay and to keep going despite unrest.  Leaving now would be betrayal.  There were no projects in the North of Africa, although students from Tunisia and Egypt had asked for support.

Addressing a question about the impact of the global crises on the project, Mr. Sachs said that growth in the developing world, led by such countries as China, Brazil and India, remained strong, even though rich countries had hit stagnation.  The global aid budget was being squeezed, however.  Growth in Africa was continuing because of increased use of information and communications technology, as well as agricultural renovation and rising mineral prices.

To other questions, Mr. Soros said that, sadly, his Foundation was not willing to support too many new phase I projects.  The Foundation would continue to be active in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, albeit at a reduced scale.

Asked for his opinion on the “ Occupy Wall Street” protests, Mr. Soros expressed understanding for the sentiments driving that movement.  After all, many people, including small-business owners, had seen their credit card charges raised from 8 to 20 per cent.  Because of that, many had been put out of business.  At the same time, the decision not to inject capital into the banks, but to relive them of their bad assets had given banks bumper profits, allowing for “bumper bonuses”.

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For information media • not an official record