ISLAMABAD, Feb 18: Pakistan has achieved targets in three indicators of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) ahead of the target year of 2015, says a report published by the United Nations and Asian Development Bank.

These indicators are: reducing the proportion of people living on less than $1.25 per day; reducing the prevalence of TB and reducing consumption of ozone-depleting substances.

According to the 2011-12 report titled ‘Accelerating Equitable Achievement of the MDGs: Closing the Gaps in Health and Nutrition in Asia and the Pacific’ published by the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, UN Development Programme and the ADB, Pakistan is also on track on meeting targets in the indicators of gender primary education, TB incidence and terrestrial and marine areas protected to total territorial areas.

However, the report pointed out, there was no progress on reaching primary enrolment to the last grade, prevalence of HIV, forest cover and carbon dioxide emissions.

It warns that the country is slow to making progress in the MDG indicators of underweight children, primary enrolment, primary completion, gender tertiary, under-five mortality, infant mortality, maternal mortality, antenatal care, safe drinking water and basic sanitation.

Overall, the Asia-Pacific region has made great strides in reducing poverty and is moving fast towards other development goals, but levels of hunger and child and maternal mortality are still high.

The report warns that at the present rate of progress, the region is unlikely to meet millennium development goals related to eradicating hunger, reducing child mortality and improving maternal health, etc.The Asia-Pacific region has already achieved the target of halving the incidence of poverty, and reducing the proportion of people living on less than $1.25 per day from 50 to 22 per cent between 1990 and 2009.

It has also achieved ahead of the target year some other MDG indicators, including promoting gender equality in education, reducing HIV prevalence, stopping the spread of tuberculosis, increasing forest cover, reducing consumption of ozone-depleting substances and halving the proportion of people without access to safe drinking water.The report says while strong economic dynamism has driven regional success in poverty reduction, even fast growing countries continue to lose shocking numbers of children before their fifth birthday and thousands of mothers die unnecessarily while giving birth.

If governments are to raise standards of health they will have to focus much more sharply on the needs of the poor and the vulnerable.

The report shows striking disparities between and within sub-regions, countries and even social groups in their progress towards achieving the MDGs. For instance, while South Asia is on track for nine MDG indicators, Sri Lanka is on its way to achieving targets in 15 indicators.

The report notes that many countries can speed up progress with just a little effort. Fourteen off-track Asia-Pacific countries need to accelerate progress by less than two percentage points annually to reach the target of halving the proportion of underweight children by 2015.

The report outlines an eight-point agenda to fast-track progress towards the health MDGs, which requires addressing social determinants of health inequities and vulnerabilities; establishing an equitable, accessible, responsive and integrated primary healthcare system and improving preventive, primitive and curative mother-and-child health services.