Roundup: Laos to highlight progress in MDGs in UN forums in New York

Despite its being a tiny landlocked nation, Laos has made some inroads in its Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), particularly in providing primary healthcare to Laotian mothers and children in the country's hinterlands.

This will be the message that Laos President Choummaly Sayasone will bring to New York when he joins the leaders of more than 150 member-countries of the United Nations during the 70th session of the UN General Assembly.

Sayasone, who departed Wednesday, will also join other world leaders, dignitaries and delegates in discussing the progress of the MDGs especially among the less-developed countries like Laos.

The world leaders are expected to sign in New York a global development agenda for the next 15 years or up to 2030 called Sustainable Development Goals.

Considered one of the success stories in Southeast Asia over the past decade and a half of rapid economic growth, Laos has made achievement in a significant proportion of the MDGs first set in 2000.

Although the country's diverse communities continue to experience challenges to health and livelihood opportunities, Laotian authorities have steadily improved the living standard of the rural people.

In Laos, the further the communities are from the roads the more challenging is the task of the government in alleviating poverty and providing access of essential health and other services, particularly in times of need.

The further away they are from the roads, the more difficult it is for state workers and the greater the logistical barriers for them to bring basic services to the communities, not to mention a better quality of life for them.

But it is these areas that have the most to gain from the decade-and-a-half-long efforts to achieve the MDGs, a set of country-adaptable targets adopted at the turn of the century for achievement at the end of 2015.

Aimed at improving quality of life for all worldwide, the eight global MDGs encompass poverty reduction, universal primary education, gender equality, reduction of child mortality, improvements in maternal health, addressing HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases, environmental sustainability and fostering a global partnership for development.

An additional 9th MDG was adopted in the case of Laos, which is focused on reducing the impact of unexploded ordnance that remains from the U.S. military bombing campaign on the sidelines of the Vietnam War some four decades past.

Laos has achieved some progress in most of the MDGs, including in the reduction of poverty, child health and maternal mortality.

However, improving maternal and child health, considered essential to any healthy and prosperous population, remains an ongoing challenge to Laotian authorities.

For children, a healthy start can make a big difference in their future, in their capacity to study, work and play, and to become healthy individuals capable of contributing to the welfare of their communities.

With this in mind, Laotian policy makers aid donors and international organizations joined efforts five years ago in providing related services.

One example is the United Nation's Joint Program on Maternal, Newborn and Child Health in Phongsaly Province, which started operating in 2011. The program has provided essential health services and interventions to members of the rural communities in the province.

The program has brought together four UN agencies - the United Nations Children's Fund, United Nations Population Fund, the World Health Organization and World Food Program - in a concerted effort to boost local efforts to achieve poverty reduction through better health for Lao women and children.

With support and coordination of health authorities and concerned communities, steps are being taken to engage both women, men and their kids in a holistic and evidence-based, culturally adaptive and appropriate approaches, particularly in eradicating child malnutrition, stunting, disease and maternal deaths, the more common afflictions in less developed countries.

The program also encourages women and their partners to consider family planning options that allow them to freely control their fertility and space pregnancies. Abortion, which remains prohibited in Laos except in the case of danger to the life of the mother, is not included in the program. Endi