Nigeria has reiterated its commitment to the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015.

Chief Emeka Wogu, the Minister of Labour and Productivity, gave the assurance on Wednesday in New York at the ministerial session of the ongoing Global Compact Leaders Summit 2010.

The Tide’s  source reports that the summit is a UN initiative that seeks to foster socially responsible business practices.

Wogu’s comments came a day after the UN released the 2010 MDGs Progress Report showing irregular and uneven progress in reducing poverty around the globe.

The minister said since the Millennium Declaration in 2000, Nigeria had continued to demonstrate an unfettered commitment to the realisation of the eight goals.

He said all the policies and programmes of the government on economic reform and development had been conceived in line with the principles of the declaration.

“The Nigeria Medium-Term Expenditure Framework and the Medium-Term Sector Strategy were developed with a target of 57 per cent of total spending earmarked for MDGs- related sectors.

“Debt relief proceeds allocated to the MDGs since 2006 in the budget amount to 1.5 billion dollars annually. 

“Conditional grant schemes to state governments, a generic macro-economic framework policy, as well as evidence-based MDGs development planning are all part of the strategy for achieving the MDGs in Nigeria,” he said.

Wogu told the international gathering, made up of government ministers and corporate chief executives, that Nigeria had the “political will” under President Goodluck Jonathan to attain the MDGs.

He said what was needed more in the international community was robust partnership between the government and the private sector to spur development.

The minister said Nigeria fully supported a broad call for corporate responsibility through the alignment of business operations and strategies with the Global Compact 10 principles on human rights, labour, environment and anti-corruption.

The summit is debating how governments can promote corporate responsibility and engage the private sector in development cooperation, particularly on the MDGs.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will chair the two-day summit, which gets under way on Thursday, to discuss how to build a new era of sustainability in national governments.

In his remarks at a reception to welcome the delegates, Ban observed that the number of companies participating in the Global Compact had risen from 40 to more than 8,000.

He said it was an indication that more business leaders had accepted the idea that principles and profits were complementary.

However, the vast majority of companies around the world had not committed themselves to the tenets of corporate responsibility, the UN chief said.

More than 1,000 corporate chief executives, government ministers, heads of civil society organisations and UN officials are attending the gathering.