The Millennium Villages seek to end extreme poverty by working with the poorest of the poor, village by village throughout Africa, in partnership with governments and other committed stakeholders, providing affordable and science-based solutions to help people lift themselves out of extreme poverty.

The purpose of this toolkit is to develop capacities of local governments and their communities to ensure a strong MDGs focus in their local development strategies and effective and efficient conversion of public funds into public benefits. The toolkit draws on the ample evidence of creative local strategies for achieving the MDGs across the globe.

The eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)

The Millennium Villages initiative (and other developments) could achieve more integrated sustainable settlements if sustainability aims such as those set out in the proposed evaluation framework (minimising resource consumption; maximising environmental capital; urban design quality; quality of life, social inclusion, community participation; commercial viability) were adopted as central objectives.