© The World Bank
The World Bank's mission is to work for a world free of poverty. This year, as world leaders and development partners have taken stock of progress toward achieving their vision for development, they have seen that without bold actions, the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) they adopted at the turn of the century will not be reached. To focus global attention on the world's poor people, they have proclaimed 2005 the year of development. There is a growing realization that lack of sufficient progress toward these goals has immediate and tragic consequences. Every week 10,000 women in the developing world die giving birth, and 200,000 children under age five die of disease. More than 8,000 people die every day from AIDS-related conditions, and 2 million people will die of AIDS this year in Africa alone. As many as 115 million children in developing countries are not in school. For hundreds of millions of people, a future without poverty, disease, and illiteracy depends on development. For the world, long-term security and peace depend upon it. Stepped-up action toward meeting the MDGs is thus necessary. The urgency of this need is highlighted in the second Global Monitoring Report , which assesses progress and proposes ways to build momentum toward achieving the goals (see “The Global Monitoring Report” ). The Bank is a central partner in the effort—through its knowledge, its lending, and its support for country-owned poverty reduction strategies. The Bank has sharpened its support for the development agenda through a two-pillar strategy for reducing poverty that is based on building the climate for investment, jobs, and sustainable growth and on investing in poor people and empowering them to participate in development. The strategy recognizes the vital relationship between long-term growth and human development: without human development, economic growth cannot be sustained; and a healthy economic climate provides a setting in which people can thrive. | 
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