Reaching the millennium development goals : Mauritania should care

Mauritania is a resource-rich developing country. As many other African nations, it will not reach most of the Millennium Development Goals, unless the authorities commit to accelerating progress. To succeed by 2015, the government needs to: mobilize additional financial resources, introduce policy changes at the sector level, and strengthen the links between strategic objectives and the budget. Adopting the Millennium Development Goals as the overarching development framework will keep policy-makers focused on concrete results and help them avoid the so-called"natural resource curse."This paper calculates the total cost of the Millennium Development Goals and financing gap (on aggregate and for each goal); recommends changes in domestic sector policies; and proposes ways to integrate the Millennium Development Goals into the budget process. Over 2008-2015, the total cost of reaching the goals in Mauritania and the resulting financing gap stand at, respectively, around 9 and 3 percent of non-oil gross domestic product on average per year. Education is the most expensive goal in absolute terms, but the individual financing gaps are widest for poverty reduction and improving maternal health. On the policy side, sector strategies need to be aligned with the goals and resources allocated more than proportionally to the disadvantaged groups, mainly at the local level.