The Arab countries have taken some great steps towards the MDGs. People are expected to live longer, there are not so many children dying, and the maternal mortality rate has fallen. More and more people are able to read. There are more people, who have enough water and better sanitation system.

The progress became a little slower in the 1990s. In order to meet the goals by 2015, Arab states must fasten their progress again. There are big differences between the countries. Some are moving very fast towards the goals, but then there are countries, whose steps towards them have been slow, or there haven't been any.

One country has already reached the goal of halving the number of people suffering from hunger. About four countries are making progress, but then there are seven countries, whose improvements have been too slow. The situation is like that in other goals as well. Some countries are well on their way, some are making too little progress, and some are not improving at all. We don't have enough information about some countries to tell how they are progressing.

However, it seems all Arab countries could reach all the goals by 2015. It's not impossible in any of those countries, though there should be some great acts.

There has been some progress as well as setbacks in this goal. The study of the World Bank, tells us that about 10 percent of the population in Tunisia and Jordan are suffering from poverty. The number is 20 percent in Algeria, Egypt and Morocco. Highest numbers are in Yemen (40 percent) and in Mauritania (46 percent).

It seems that the situation could become better. During the 1990s the number of people struggling in poverty grew a little in Algeria and Morocco. In Djibouti it almost doubled. In Mauritania the number stayed high, but in Egypt and Jordan the poverty rates fell a little.

The answer is to focus on the rural areas, where most of the poor live. If those people get jobs, the situation would become way better.

There has been less progress in the problem of people suffering from hunger. It is possible that the Arab region is not able to reach the target (Halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people who suffer from hunger). In six countries the situation has become worse, or the progress has been very slow. Four countries are experiencing setbacks. Then there are some countries, who have taken some great steps towards this goal. Some of then are Egypt, Kuwait, Saudi-Arabia, Sudan and Syria.

During the 1990s it seemed that the region would not meet the goal. Six countries, out of 14 with available information, are making some great progress. In five countries the number of children going to school became smaller.

Most of the children who start their school remain there until at least their 5th grade. There were some great progress in that during the 1990s and so over 95 percent of the children reach their 5th grade. But things are not that happy in every country. In Mauritania and Sudan for example, less than eight out of ten children are able to do this.

Slowly most of the young adults (aged 15-24) are able to read. About 12 countries of 20 seem to be able to achieve universal literacy by 2015. Other eight countries are making some slow progress. The number of people, who don't know how to read, is usually bigger when we go out of the cities. There should be some faster progress in order to achieve this goal.

At schools this goal is very likely to be achieved by 2015. But that is only when we talk about primary education. In universities, there are still a lot more boys than girls. Libya and Mauritania are well on their way reaching this goal. Some other countries must fasten their progress so that the goal will be achieved by 2015.

When we talk about Universities, there are quite big differences between the countries. In the Comoros, Iraq, Yemen and Morocco, there are about eight girls for every ten boys. In Djibouti, Sudan and Lebanon there are actually more girls at the Universities than boys. In Mauritania and Yemen, there are only three females for every ten males.

Two thirds of the adults who cannot read are women. Most of them live in the rural areas. Some great steps have been taken towards gender parity in literacy. Especially among younger generations. Five countries have already reached it. Another ten are making good progress. But then some countries (for example Iraq, Mauritania and Yemen) are not progressing that well.

The number of women employed (in non-agricultural sector) is not too big. Less than 20 percent of those people are female. In Algeria, Bahrain, Saudi-Arabia and the United Arab Emirates it is less than 15 percent. There is no country, where it would be more than 30 percent.

The number of employed women has been growing, but very slowly. In some countries there has not been progress at all. For example Saudi-Arabia and Morocco are in that category. Only about 5 percent of the seats of the parliaments of the area are held by women.

The progress in this goal has not been fast enough to achieve it. In Iraq the situation became worse. In Djibouti, Mauritania, Sudan and Somalia it hasn't became better either. More than one tenth of children die before their 5th birthday. In Jordan and Yemen the progress has been simply too slow to achieve the goal.

But still, there are some countries that could reach this goal. About 13 seem to be moving pretty fast towards it. The Comoros and Egypt have been able to reduce their child mortality. The United
Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Oman, Bahrain, Qatar, Libya, the Occupied Palestinian Territories and Tunisia have the lowest mortality rates in the region.

The progress in immunizations has been quite good in the region. Immunizing against measles improved pretty much between 1990 and 2001. Especially in Lebanon, Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, Oman, Saudi-Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates the progress has been fast. In Djibouti, Somalia and the Sudan, the improvements have been way slower.

There is not so much available information about this goal. It seems that there are big differences between the countries. The situation is much worse in Sudan, Mauritania and Somalia than it is in Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi-Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

If there were skilled health professionals attending every birth, the number of women and children dying could be way smaller. Even though there have been some great improvements, still every third women has to give birth without professional support in Egypt, Comoros, Mauritania, Morocco, Somalia and Yemen. On the other hand, there are countries like The United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Kuwait and Jordan, where about 95 per cent of births are attended by health professionals.

As mentioned before, the information about this is very little. In order to achieve this goal, these countries should improve their data collection a lot. With that data we would know more and it would be possible to know what kind of acts there should be to move towards this goal.

It seems that more than half a million AIDS cases have been reported in the Arab states since 1980.
There is not enough data about this goal either. There is a wall of silence when we talk about this disease. Still people say that public awareness would be the best way to long-lasting results.

Malaria is not the biggest problem in most Arab countries. But there are some. In the Comoros, Somalia, Mauritania, Djibouti and Sudan, there are many children dying of this illness. Tuberculosis is also a problem in those countries.

But tuberculosis is better informed and people are more aware of it. In Somalia, about eight out of ten cases are cured. In Djibouti, six out of ten are cured.

Even though the environment in the Arab countries is not very strong, but fragile, not many countries have decided to focus on this goal. Actually only five states have made a protection plan.

There is not much forest in the Arab states. Actually less than one percent of the land area of Qatar, Algeria, Saudi-Arabia and Yemen is forest. The situation is different in Sudan, where one quarter of the land is covered by forests. Even though Saudi-Arabia and Tunisia have gotten some more forests by letting them grow there, things are not that well in the Comoros, Sudan and Somalia. In those countries the coverage is actually under threat.

The air quality has gotten worse. The countries have become richer and the standard of living has risen, which is not a bad thing, but it causes more carbon dioxide in the air, because of all the new cars etc that are bought. There was an increase of carbon dioxide in the air in three countries, especially in Libya.

With the little available information that we've got, it seems that the region is able to offer safe water to its citizens by 2015. In the cities of Lebanon and Djibouti, this has already been achieved. Comoros, Egypt and Sudan seem to be on their way to this by 2015. In Libya, Mauritania, Oman and Tunisia there haven't been steps towards this goal, but there haven't been big setbacks either. Morocco and Jordan are having some setbacks.

Across all the countries, now eight out of ten people are able to use safe water. Still the situation is not that good in every place of the region. There should be some great improvements in some parts of the countries.

In twelve countries, more than 90 percent of the people living in cities are able to use safe water. In Mauritania and Oman more than half of the urban population does not have that chance. The progress in those countries was very little.

It is not so easy to keep on making progress on this goal for this region. At least 15 countries are using more water than they should. When there is no water, the whole society is in troubles. The poor is suffering the most. Especially those, who live in the cities and depend on farming and the food that comes from the farms.

This is not an easy problem to solve. The fast population growth makes it even more difficult. People are moving to cities and changing their lifestyles. These changes are not always good for the environment. If countries work together, there could be some fast results.

In urban areas about 90 percent of people have a working sanitation system in the region. But the situation is very different in each country. In Egypt for example, most of the population have a sanitation system. But in Mauritania the situation is the worst. In 2000 about half of the population had not a working sanitation system.

With Global Partnership some big and important steps could be taken. Together making the lives of the people in Arab states better would be faster. One of the biggest problems that they think global partnership could help with is debt burdens for example. In Lebanon, 40 percent of the money that they get from export goes for debt services. In Algeria and Morocco the number is about 30 percent and 15 percent in Tunisia and Jordan.

If we talk about connectivity, it has gotten better in recent years. People are able to use more phones. But that happened only in the richest countries of the region. In the poorest countries, it was vice versa. Less and less people are using telephones.

The number of personal computers is growing fast too in those countries that produce oil. It happens in middle-income countries too. In twelve countries, only about 2 per cent of the population is able to use internet. In Bahrain and United Arab Emirates the number is the highest, but even there about two thirds of the people cannot use internet.