“With just over 800 days left to achieve the most ambitious anti-poverty program the world has ever seen, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon gathered [on Monday] at U.N. headquarters heads of state and representatives of business, civil society and philanthropic organizations to fuel a final push to propel the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) across the finishing line,” the U.N. News Centre reports. “The day-long meeting — formally called ‘MDG Success: Accelerating Action and Partnering for Impact and convened by the Secretary-General’ — has so far generated some $2.5 billion in pledged funds towards boosting MDG achievement,” the news service notes. Ban “called on the participants … to learn from both success and failure, to accelerate efforts in ‘the precious two years that remain,’ and to focus, strategize, and mobilize,” according to the news service (9/23).

“There’s growing momentum for world leaders gathered in New York to sign an ‘outcome document’ on Wednesday that is seen as an important milestone toward setting a post-2015 global development framework,” Devex reports. “The document, which is currently being negotiated on the fringes of the 68th session of the United Nations General Assembly, won’t suggest specific goals, targets or metrics, according to European Commissioner for Development Andris Piebalgs,” who spoke with Devex on Monday, the news service notes. “U.N. leaders want to ratify a post-2015 global development agenda at the General Assembly in two years,” the news service notes (Rosenkrantz, 9/24). “With less than two years until the MDGs expire, policymakers, civil society groups, and academics worldwide are taking stock of what progress has been made and debating what should happen after 2015,” The Guardian notes. The newspaper provides an interactive infographic that “charts each country and the progress made — or not — on dozens of MDG indicators” (Harris/Provost, 9/24).