Indoor air pollution and the Millennium Development Goals

• WHO's Millennium Development Goals web site
• United Nations Millennium Declaration
• United Nations Millennium Development Goals web site
• United Nations Millennium Development Goal Indicators database

The importance of interventions to reduce exposure to indoor air pollution is reflected in the Millennium Development Goals in many ways:

• As most of the disease burden due to indoor air pollution falls on children under five years of age, interventions will help achieve a significant reduction in child mortality (Goal 4).
  
  
• The collection of fuel imposes a serious time burden on women and children and alleviating this drudgery will contribute to promoting gender equality and empowering women (Goal 3).
  
  
• With less time spent on fuel collection, people will have more time available for education and income generation activities that are likely to contribute to eradicating extreme poverty (Goal 1).
  
  
• The proportion of the population relying on solid fuels constitutes one of the indicators to monitor progress towards ensuring environmental sustainability (Goal 7).
  More information on this indicator

Indoor air thematic briefing 1 gives an overview of the links between indoor air pollution, household energy and the Millennium Development Goals.

See also:

• WHO Household energy database
  Information on household energy covering 143 countries, and for years 1974-2008.
• Clean household energy for all
  Brochure on WHO activities
• Multiple links between household energy and the Millennium Development Goals
  Health and the Millenium Development Goals Flyer
• Assessing Household Solid Fuel Use: Multiple Implications for the Millennium Development Goals Article in Environmental Health Perspectives, 2006
• Modelling household solid fuel use towards reporting of the Millennium Development Goals article in Energy for Sustainable Development, 2006
  pdf, 230kb