INTRODUCTION
The media are very powerful. They shape our perception of today’s world. They shape public opinion. They shape our focus, what is urgent, what can be ignored, which facts we are confronted with and of which facts we will remain ignorant. Such power can be used for good or for bad. As for bad, we know the role radio stations and other media played in Rwanda and former Yugoslavia in fuelling hate and contributing to the explosion of ethnic violence. But mostly the power of media is used for the good. In fact, years before Mugabe started to bother opposition politicians, he sent his men to beat up and literally destroy the press machine of the one and only independent newspaper.

Armatya Sen famously said “famines do not occur in democracies”. Indeed: free media provide timely information which ensures citizens pressure governments, which take action: they would not want to loose the next election…

As achieving the Millennium Goals is primarily a question of governments acting upon their promises, the Millennium Development Goals will not be achieved without an active role and involvement of the media.

THE MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS

It was the best news for decades when in the year 2000 world leaders acknowledged that the most urgent matter at the dawn of the new century was to put an end to poverty and that they acknowledged that the world has the resources and the know how to do so. With the Millennium Declaration the world finally also achieved the political consensus on what should be done by whom, after years of disagreements between NGOs and governments, between international financial institutions and the UN and between the North and South. World leaders declared six times that they would “spare no effort” to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, which range from halving extreme poverty to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing universal primary education, all by the target date of 2015 .

The Millennium Goals are a compact of shared responsibilities and mutual accountability between rich and poor countries. The developing countries have primary responsibility for achieving the first seven goals: to reduce poverty, to increase literacy, to improve health services etc. But rich countries acknowledged in Goal 8 that poor countries can not achieve the goals unless rich countries increase and improve the effectiveness of aid and change the rules of trade to foster development.

But as the United Nations Secretaries-General (both Kofi Annan and Ban Ki-Moon) have repeatedly stated, when talking about the Millennium Goals “The lacking ingredient is political will.” The Millennium Goals will not be achieved at the United Nations. We, at the UN can create a platform for governments to make commitments but we cannot force compliance by our Member States. Only their citizens and Parliaments can hold governments to account.

But in order to do so they must be aware of promises made. UN targets have been set in the past but the degree to which they were achieved depended very much on the degree that mobilization around these Goals took place way beyond the traditional development community and the UN bureaucracy, galvanizing government action, In order to mobilize, media are crucial to spread the “news”.

AWARENESS AND ACCOUNTABILITY

In the North, issues of world poverty have long been absent from the public discourse. Today we see the beginning of a recognition that poverty is not just a problem of the poor. What happens in a poor village in Afghanistan can hit us too. Poverty snatches away the hope and opportunities from people and thus breed resentment, instability, insecurity and failed states. In the ‘70s Willy Brandt already talked about “interdependence”. Open economies like ours depend on international stability and on a rule-based system of global governance. In the ‘90s we witnessed the process of “globalization”. We are all linked by trade, finance, migration. Diseases, like AIDS and avian flu, have no passport; they travel, and so do financial crises. And the degree poor countries can afford and choose clean energy for their development will define our success in combating climate change. So the Millennium Development Goals are a roadmap to sustainable development for all, a roadmap to ensure globalization benefits all of us, as the Millennium Declaration promises, a roadmap to an inclusive global community, to a better, safer world for all.

Polls across rich countries also show that most citizens do not even need to be reminded of their own self-interest to end poverty. The moral imperative is enough.. Human suffering elsewhere is not “too remote to the concerns of your readers or viewers” as some media seem to believe. We have seen with the tsunami the media playing a crucial role confronting us in rich countries with human suffering elsewhere and we pored out our hearts including in Germany, a country with an image of inward-lookingness, focusing on its own economic problems. Private giving raised 600 million euros here and the media were crucial in creating this awareness.

But what about the silent tsunamis that kill daily many more infants? Deaths that could be easily prevented by vaccination of a few cents each, by safe water, by malaria bednets? To imagine the number of babies dying unnecessarily, imagine several of these new airbuses filled totally with infants and crashing daily. You can choose to ignore this fact or as a journalist take responsibility. Some time ago in Cannes at the broadcasters’ fair, I gave a press conference with broadcasters like MTV, TV España, TV 5 and BBC World in which they underlined that as far as ignorance stood in the way of achieving the Millennium Development Goals, it was their corporate social responsibility to pay attention.

Talking about media responsibility leads me to a remark on the way developing countries, particularly in Africa are often portrayed. The average consumer of news in rich countries gets a one dimensional caricature: the truth is, there are more democratically elected governments than ever; democracy has become more inclusive and civil society is thriving all over the globe; economic management has been better than ever; most developing countries grew faster than Europe over the last few years; despite Iraq and Darfur, there are fewer civil wars and conflicts than ever. More kids go to school than ever in human history…
And people in these countries can take credit for this: it is not us, donors who
develop developing countries: they develop themselves…
Also an image I wish Northern media would avoid in portraying the relationship between “donors” and “recipients”: we lecture – you listen; we give – you receive; we know – you learn; we take care of things – because you can’t. This fits in perfectly with the myth of Western superiority – and even reinforces it…
Moreover, this also reproduces this discriminating stereotype: as a friend of mine once stated: “When you move to my country you are automatically an “expatriate expert”; when I move to Europe I am just an immigrant…”.
Some media prefer “man bites dog” stories to“good news” stories. Given the image that exists about developing countries some of the good news stories may well have a “man bites dog” character. For instance:
On current trends, the MDG POVERTY target will be met at the global level by 2015. This would be a striking success,even if this good progress at the global level largely reflects progress in the populous countries of India and China.
Asia is one of the world’s most dynamic regions, so it should come as no surprise this region has made rapid progress towards many of the MDGs. But not all the developing countries in Asia are making sufficient progress; indeed none are currently on track to meet all the goals by 2015.
The most dramatic progress has been made across the continent on the first, the poverty goal, and progress on the 2d (education) has also been good. On the Child mortality Goal (4), however, the picture is mixed: only in India more than 2 million children die every year… The Goal where progress is the slowest is the 5th (maternal mortality): in fact, some countries (India, Pakistan) are even regressing…
There is no excuse for this dismal situation, as even in SubSahara Africa some of the poorest countries are making dramatic progress. In Asia, Vietnam decided it could afford to be more ambitious in the number of poor people it would raise above the poverty level by 2015 and is on target for achieving this more ambitious goal. I know the secret of these success stories. This is, that the Goals are achievable if the “Global Deal” is in place. These countries had fairly good policies in the sectors concerned and mobilized their own domestic resources, and for these countries we the rich countries have been relatively generous with high-quality aid and debt relief for them.
“If you can make it there you can make it anywhere”. If both parties live up to their promises the Goals are achievable…
The most important role that media can play is in highlighting the responsibilties and progres of their own country as part of the “global deal” on the MDGs.

MEDIA IN RICH COUNTRIES
The promises of rich countries are contained in Goal 8 : more and better aid, but also more fair rules for trade.

• TRADE is more important than aid: our trade policies deprive poor countries the chance to earn their way out of poverty by selling their products on our rich consumer markets. Worse even, our European Common Agricultural Policies even destroy their local markets: 70% of the world’s poor live in rural areas, depend on agriculture, but can not compete against our subsidized exports. In the meantime in Europe, these policies hurt ourselves: they cost the average European family 100 euros a month, without helping our own small farmers, or our environment. This calls for good old investigative journalisme…. As long as these facts do not hit the front page, it continues to be extremely hard for politicians here to challenge the sanity of these agriculture subsidies.

• AID. While Official Development Assistance (ODA) trends have improved, the reality remains that ODA-levels will still fall short of those promised. E.g. Germany promised 35 years ago to spend 0.7% of its National Income on aid. And, while the percentage today is higher than it has ever been, Germany is lagging: With 0.36% of Germany’s National Income spent on Aid in 2006, Germany is well below the donor country average, including below France (0.47%) and the U.K. (0.52%), and still far below the long promised 0.7%, which has been surpassed for many years by some of its neighbors.Would the German check still be in the mail, in 2015, when the Goals have to be achieved?

AID EFFECTIVENESS, would require yet another half hour speech, so let me summarize that too much aid is still driven by donor’s own geopolitical agenda’s and domestic economic interests; aid should be focused on achieving developing country objectives and delivered in ways that do not undermine their governments’ accountability to their citizens.

In Germany there is the highest disbelief that the Millennium Development Goals actually are achievable while it is a fact that the world is not only broadly on track for the m ost important first Goal, but it certainly has the knowledge and resources to do so. This lack of press coverage and attention leads to a situation where politicians do not get many incentives to show leadership on these issues.

MEDIA IN THE SOUTH

The role of the media in the South is even more important, as the role of developing countries is critical to the achievement of the Goals. They have to improve policies, to ensure pro-poor and transparent public expenditures, to deliver pro-poor labour-intensive growth, and to fight corruption. The media can help ensure transparency, and discover and expose cases of bad governance. In the South the media can help, not only by raising awareness of the promises their governments made, but particularly by playing its role as the guardian of public interest.

The emphasis should be on the situation and the government policies towards those for whom the MDGs seem most out of reach: the poor, the vulnerable, the excluded. I recall the results of the largest survey ever of opinions of 60.000 poor people across the globe, aptly titled “Voices of the Poor” done by the World Bank in 2000. As the interviewed articulated their aspirations, it was not income, or lack of access to health or education, but the powerlesness, lack of VOICE to be heard, to influence decisions, that bothered them most. It is up to you to give them a voice, to show the reality from THEIR perspective…

Critical reporting on the Millennium Goals progress in your country is a very powerful tool to increase accountability: progress is measurable and monitorable: how far is your country falling short in critical area’s like healthcare, education and environmental sustainability; how does it compare with neighboring countries? When people know where their government is failing they are often galvanized into action – which in turn spurs governments to become more responsive…
CONCLUSION
The Millennium Goals can only be achieved, when governments are held to account for their promises: only an informed citizenry can do so. Awareness building of the Goals is pivotal. And don’t you tell me this might be very important but boring: isn’t it your job to make these issues sexy? In fact we have fantastic examples where this is happening – not just the growing number of broadcasters across the globe that broadcast our clips as public service announcements, but creative ways to reach out: in Germany two years ago MTV sponsored a rapcontest dedicated to the MDGs; and, shortly in India, a celebrity studded reality show titled Ustaad, will involve artists, musicians and singers coming together to promote the Millennium Goals.

Last year on World Poverty Day, we were able to mobilize more than 23 million people across the globe to Stand Up against poverty – for the Millennium Goals, making the Guinness Book of Records. This year on October 16th/17th we hope this number will be doubled. So I invite you to join us and many of your colleagues, including Deutsche Welle, to reach out and mobilize as many people as possible to –again- set a Guinness World Record. But the record we really want to break is the record of broken promises…

As vital is the role of the media in monitoring and scrutinizing governments, and putting their policies and actions, or lack thereof, in the public arena.
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Let me conclude with quoting Ghandi: “the difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to solve most of the world’s problems.”:
Holding your government to account for just implementing what they promised at international conferences – over and over again – is something the media should be perfectly capable to do. Put it on your agenda, and continue to do what journalists do best: critical, hard hitting and honest reporting.

You are one of the most powerful instruments for educating, raising awareness and motivating. You are also a powerful instrument of tracking progress and calling your governments to account when they are failing to fulfill their commitments.
This year we are at the halfway mark to the year 2015, when the Goals need to be achieved. This year we also saw the G 8, under Germany’s Presidency failing to do so.
We need to get serious. We need to get the message out that WE are the first generation in human history, who has the resources, the know-how and the political promises to put an end to poverty. And, in order not to loose that opportunity, action is needed now –
So in 2015 – when Germany has the G 8 Presidency again – the Goals will be achieved.