Contributions of the private sector

Any national strategy to achieve the Millennium Development Goals needs to include a clear framework for private sector growth. Many of the public investment strategies outlined in the previous chapters are essential for an efficient and dynamic private sector. For their own part, private enterprises can contribute directly to the Goals through core pursuits such as increasing productivity and job creation or seeking opportunities for service delivery through public-private partnerships. In all these activities, companies need to adhere to high standards of responsible corporate governance and citizenship. However, companies and their leaders can also take action to support the Goals more broadly, by contributing to MDG-based policy design, by advocating publicly for the Goals, and by pursuing various models of corporate philanthropy. In these ways, businesses can “engage as reliable and consistent partners in the development process,” as called for in the Monterrey Consensus (box 9.1). In this chapter we briefly describe each of the channels through which the private sector can critically support achievement of the Goals.