Thailand has achieved almost all of the Millennium Development Goals, fifteen years ahead of schedule. Thailand has also set itself secondary goals, called MDG Plus which aim to further the MDGs they have already achieved. Although there has been much progress, Thailand still needs to use policies which will help to fight poverty and health care in the North of Thailand.

Target 1: Reduce by half the proportion of people living on less than a dollar a day. Thailand has already achieved this target, reducing poverty to 9.8% in 2002 from 27.2% in 1990.

Target 2: Reduce by half the proportion of people who suffer from hunger. Between 1990 and 2002 the amount of people not receiving enough food dropped from 6.9% to 2.2%. Underweight children have dropped from 18.6% to 8.5% in the same time. However in the north of Thailand, 27% of the population is still considered underweight.

Target 3: Ensure that all boys and girls complete a full course of primary schooling. In 1995, 77% of children were enrolled at school. It is highly likely that Thailand will achieve universal (100%) primary education.

Target 4:Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education preferably by 2005, and at all levels by 2015. Girls and Boys in Thailand already have equal opportunity to attend school, with more girls going on to secondary education than boys! In 2000, 97.8% of women and 98% of men were able to read. In the same year it was found that 1 in 3 females over 60 cannot read, compared to 1 in 5 males.

Target 6: Reduce by three quarters the maternal mortality ratio.
The maternal mortality rate was already so low in 1990, that this target is not applied to Thailand.

Target 6: Reduce by three quarters the maternal mortality ratio.
The maternal mortality rate was already so low in 1990, that this target is not applied to Thailand.

Target 7: Halt and begin to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS. Since 1991 there has been an 80% drop in the amount of new cases each year. HIV/AIDS continues to spread among some groups, especially young people.

Target 8: Halt and begin to reverse the incidence of malaria and other major diseases. This goal has already been achieved for malaria, but tuberculosis is beginning to become a problem again as sufferers of HIV/AIDS have caught the disease and are dying from it because of their weakened immune system.

Target 9: Integrate the principles of sustainable development into country policies and programmes; reverse loss of environmental resources. There have been new policies put in place by the government to reduce carbon dioxide emissions and encourage sustainable development. Although from 1989 and 1998 deforestation has dropped from 28% to 25.3% this is still one of Thailand's biggest problems and they are working hard towards solving it.

Target 10: Reduce by half the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water. This goal has already been achieved as 93% of Thai people in 2000 had access to safe drinking water compared to 80% in 1990. The improvement has been made in both city and country areas with safe drinking water access rising from 76% to 91% in rural areas.

Target 11: Achieve significant improvement in lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers, by 2020. This goal is close to being achieved as 90% of Thai people either rent or own their own home and only 7% of Thai people live in houses made of non-permanent materials.

Conclusion:
The Thai government has worked very hard to achieve as many goals as possible and are now sharing their ideas and policies with neighboring countries. Although there is almost complete equal opportunity in Thailand more attention needs to be paid to the poorer Northern region.