Sometimes when we start a long journey, it can be hard to see how far we've gone.
Towns begin to look the same, and the destination seems as far away as it did when you started. Without charting your progress, finding the motivation to continue is difficult.
Our journey towards achieving the global Sustainable Development Goals is the same. Our destination is far, and many of us are unsure of the progress we've made.
Recently Bill and Melinda Gates co-authored the Goalkeepers report, which maps out how far we've come and how far we have to go. The report aims to encourage the world to stay the course and accelerate our progress on this long journey.
The report, which will be released every year until 2030, will track 18 SDG indicators including child and maternal deaths, stunting of growth, access to contraceptives, HIV, malaria, extreme poverty, financial inclusion and water sanitation.Encouragingly, the report finds that we have made progress. Since 1990, the proportion of people living on less than $1.90 (about R25) a day has decreased from 35% to 9%.
Reduced child mortality rates meant that 100million children were able to survive, dream and thrive.
This progress has been largely driven by strong leadership and commitment from governments, organisations, institutions and communities.
Less than 20 years ago, my country, Ethiopia, had some of the worst rates of child and maternal mortality in the world. But in 2003, the Ethiopian government launched the Health Extension Programme to give people access to health information and services.
Through the programme, 4,000 health extension workers were trained to provide basic preventative health services in rural communities. Within eight years, child mortality was halved.
Simple innovations have also sparked progress on the SDGs.
While Ethiopia had success in reducing child mortality, maternal health was not improving at the same rate. This was largely due to women choosing to give birth at home, where they did not have access to skilled midwives.
The government had learnt, through its Health Extension Programme, that women were more likely to seek care at a health facility if they had received health information from people in their own community...