Achieving the Millennium Development Goals is to a large extent about bringing effective technologies to bear to meet the challenges of hunger, disease and income poverty. As the leading repository of modern technology, business is indispensable in providing the technologies needed for economic development and success.

Partnerships must have “win-win-win” outcomes – improved health and social benefits for the people who need them most, successful results for the public sector organization, and tangible business benefits for the private sector company. The logic is simple enough, however working with an organization with different objectives from your own is not always easy. If the public and private sectors can learn to value their differences and work together to build on them, the prize will be worth it.

There are strategic and operational obstacles associated with building new types of partnership between non-traditional allies. However, when they are made to work, such partnerships can be a vital tool for delivering more effective development solutions. They merit increased support and investment from leaders in all sectors, as well as increased attention and rigour in terms of analysis, impact assessment and capacity building.

At the 2007 Global Compact Leaders Summit, the message was clear: it is time to move from policy to action. It is time to act strategically and scale up if we are to collectively achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Save the Children is ready to do just that. Our priority is to promote children’s rights and better the lives of children around the world. We welcome the growing engagement of the business world with organizations such as ours to achieve change for the better. 

The boundaries between private and public sectors are being eroded as professionals move between corporate and non-profit worlds. This flow of skills between sectors is good news for the future of public-private partnerships. And for the young generation now entering the workforce, the new landscape is an appealing one. Today’s highly motivated set of employees are often driven in their career choices as much by the opportunity to make a difference as by the prospect of a high salary. Photo © Paul Morgan

The MTN Nigeria Foundation has launched over 100 partnership projects across Nigeria focused on education, health and economic empowerment. At the last count, MTNF’s projects were estimated to have touched and helped uplift the lives of over 1,000,000 people. Our experience demonstrates that partnerships which are dynamic, homegrown, transparently implemented and responsive to local conditions can be exceptionally powerful tools for transforming the lives of ordinary people in developing countries.

To provide improved guidance on designing effective and high-impact partnerships for all parties involved, the Global Compact brought together a number of UN organizations, businesses and other stakeholders to develop a “Partnership Assessment Tool” (PAT). PAT takes the partners through a systematic examination of the internal and external aspects of the governance of the partnership and desired sustainable development outcomes.

Businesses of every size and from every industry rely on water. For some, like my company, water is a main ingredient. For others, water is a key part of the production process or the supply chain. But water is not just important to our businesses, it is critical to the communities we serve. We cannot have a sustainable business unless the communities we serve are sustainable themselves. The private sector has an important role to play in water stewardship and the CEO Water Mandate offers a roadmap for sustainability.

The World Savings Banks Institute is the global voice of savings and retail banking, representing institutions in 92 countries. WSBI members are progressively introducing CSR concerns into their banking activities. Many member banks are signatories of the Global Compact on an individual basis, including BancoEstado (Chile), Caixa Economica Federal (Brazil), Swedbank (Sweden), Groupe Caisse d’Epargne (France), and a number of the Spanish Confederación Española de Cajas de Ahorros (CECA) members. WSBI’s overall ambition is to improve the uptake, implementation and strategic integration of the GC principles into all of their members' business activities.

The Communication on Progress (COP) programme remains a priority for the Global Compact Office; it is the backbone of our accountability and quality efforts. On the Global Compact website, top-quality COPs are recognized through the Notable COP programme. Showcasing outstanding COPs – with respect to the quality and comprehensiveness of the information they provide – is proving to be a strong incentive for companies to improve their COPs, particularly as efforts increase to link COPs with mainstream financial market analysis. The Notable COP programme also aims to advance organizational learning by sharing good reporting practices.

Our offering of strategic resources grew significantly in 2007. At least a dozen new publications and online tools were developed this year – often in coordination with key partners and experts – to aid GC participants in implementing the ten principles, engaging in partnerships and communicating progress.

On 17 December 2007, the UN Global Compact and the Barcelona Center for the Support of the Global Compact launched the first comprehensive survey of Global Compact Local Networks. The report presents a detailed analysis of 90 emerging and existing networks and showcases numerous examples of network activities from all regions of the world.

Read about Local Network events, launches and dialogues being held around the world, including in Bulgaria, Côte d’Ivoire, India, Korea, Peru, Ukraine, the United States and Viet Nam.

Over 100 participants representing 40 Global Compact Local Networks in Africa, Europe, Asia, the Arab region and the Americas attended this year's V Annual Local Network Forum, held in Monterrey, Mexico on 17-18 October 2007.  The agenda of this year's Forum was based on input gathered during the regional network meetings held in the first half of 2007, in addition to bilateral contact between the Global Compact Office and Local Networks.