Impact on developing markets continued
Millennium Development Goals
The international agreement on the Millennium Development Goals (MDG), which aim to solve some of the biggest problems in developing countries, is a tremendous achievement from the United Nations.
The Millennium Development Goals are:
- Eradicate extreme hunger and poverty
- Achieve universal primary education
- Promote gender equality and empower women
- Reduce child mortality
- Improve maternal health
- Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases
- Ensure environmental sustainability
- Develop a global partnership for development.
Each of the goals has concrete targets to be reached by the year 2015.
Although the MDGs are agreed between states, it is widely accepted that they can only be achieved if all participants in society (governments, civil society, private sector) work together and perform their respective roles.
For each MDG, a large number of factors were determined and consequently measured (the full report is published on our corporate website). This methodology produced the following scores for Heineken:
Scores of the MDGs
In our previous Sustainability Report we stated that we would work together with other multinational companies to develop a uniform way for businesses to report on their contribution to the realisation of the goals. Consequently, together with five other companies, we have joined a project initiated by the Dutch National Committee for International Cooperation and Sustainable Development (NCDO) aimed at measuring private sector contributions. In the course of 2006, Dutch Sustainability Research (DSR) conducted research and the results were presented to the public in Arnhem, the Netherlands, on 16 November 2006.
Although we believe that the work done by DSR provides a good basis, we have identified a number of points that need improvement in a new version. First and foremost, it is unclear what any specific score means; because the size of an impact is not taken into account, it is virtually impossible to compare the contribution of different companies using this framework. Secondly, some results are not in line with expectations based on other research. For example, our score on MDG 1 is not consistent with the outcome of the Economic Impact Assessment in Sierra Leone. Participants in the study also articulated several other points of criticism and concern that will receive due attention in 2007.
As a result, all parties involved have agreed that during 2007 a new study will be carried out, taking into account all the points raised during and after the public presentation. The objective is to have a good working model finalised and presented to interested parties by the end of the year.
