TEDxChange: Millennium Development Goals Progress Cheat Sheet - Tonic. Melinda Gates takes message of change to TEDx in 30 countries. Starting Monday, Melinda Gates is taking her message for urgent action on the UN Millennium Development Goals to a series of events in 30 countries, from New York and Seattle to the Kibera slum in Nairobi.
This week in New York, the United Nations will hold a summit to review progress on the global targets, marking the 10th anniversary of the agreement by 192 countries to achieve the eight goals by 2015. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and Melinda Gates discuss maternal and child health at a conference in Washington DC in June. The goals are a kind of road map to end poverty and its root causes, and they include improving health of women and children, expanding education and combating diseases. Gates, the co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, said she aims to call attention to successes to bolster public support for continued funding, which has become more challenging as governments tighten their belts and countries turn inward. MDGs under discussion at TEDx events. Thousands of people engaged in global development will today be attending TEDx events all over the world themed around the millennium development goals (MDG) to coincide with the UN MDG summit in New York this week.
More than 60 public TEDxChange satellite events are planned around the world, organised as viewing parties and discussions around a live webcast from New York, convened by Melinda Gates. Around two thirds of the events are being held in Europe and North America, with the remaining third spread across Africa, Asia, South America, Oceania, and the Middle East. TEDX is a spin-off from TED, which describes itself as a small, non-profit "devoted to ideas worth spreading". TED hosts annual conferences, bringing together innovators from the worlds of technology, entertainment and design, producing talks that are made available on their website in video form and transcribed (in an all-to-rare nod to accessibility).