UNESCO contributes to the achievement of each of the MDGs through its fields of competence - education, the sciences, culture, communication and information - with a special focus on the urgent needs of disadvantaged and excluded groups or geographic regions or countries. UNESCO will work in all areas of its competence to the attainment of the MDGs.

None of the MDGS will be achievable without substantive progress in EFA. According to its mandate as UNESCO's Centre for Literacy, Non-Formal Education, Adult and Lifelong learning, UIL's activities contribute to the EFA Goals 3 (Ensuring that the learning needs of all young people and adults are met through equitable access to appropriate learning and life-skills programmes) and 4 (Achieving a 50 per cent improvement in levels of adult literacy by 2015, especially for women, and equitable access to basic and continuing education for all adults). Moreover, UIL's activities support the MDGs with a special focus on eradication of extreme poverty and hunger (MDG 1) and promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of women (MDG3).

Millennium Development Goals
UNESCO and the MDGs