The New Face of Development

As the Sustainable Development Goals replace the Millennium Development Goals in January, Mike Wooldridge asks what are the realistic prospects for eradicating poverty by 2030? Can such strategies really "leave no one behind"?

Looking at what might lie ahead over the next 15 years, as well as drawing on his own extensive experiences of reporting development issues over the last 50 years, Mike asks what difference, if any, the new SDGs will make in day-to-day development strategies? Is traditional “aid” still relevant today? How far can new development partnerships go in achieving the ambition of ending poverty once and for all, or is "development" becoming something of a toxic term, with neo-liberalism and globalisation making some people much better off but leaving many more people (and the environment) worse off? And what do the poor themselves think about all of this - do grandiose global goals have any impact at all on the way they live?

(Photo: Mekaru and his family still migrated over 1,000km each year to work in the brick kilns of Andra Pradesh. Credit: Ruth Evans)