Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao delivers a speech at the United Nations high-level meeting on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in New York, the United States, September 25, 2008. [Yao Dawei/Xinhua]

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao Thursday urged the international community, especially developed nations, to speed up intensive efforts to realize the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

China's contribution 

Wen made the calls in his address to the UN high-level event on the MDGs. He told the meeting China has honored its commitments to the MDGs by dramatically reducing the number of Chinese living in poverty and by providing assistance to least developed countries.

China, the most populous country in the world, has accelerated development mainly through its own efforts and through reform and opening-up since 1978, and has "brought down the number of people in absolute poverty from 250 million to 15 million in less than 30 years," he said.

The nation's free compulsory education, medical care for 800 million farmers, and governance at various levels have all witnessed substantial progress, the Chinese premier said.

The vision set out in the UN Millennium Declaration is being gradually turned into reality in China, he added.

"Statistics released by the World Bank last year showed that over the past 25 years, China accounted for 67 percent of the achievements in global poverty reduction," Wen said.

Though not rich, China has honored its commitments to the Millennium Declaration and done what it can to help some least developed countries, he noted.

By the end of June 2008, China had written off 24.7 billion RMB (3.63 billion US dollars) in debts owed by 49 heavily indebted poor countries and least developed countries in Asia and Africa. It has also provided 206.5 billion RMB (30.37 billion dollars) in various forms of assistance to such countries, of which 90.8 billion RMB (13.35 billion dollars) is free aid, Wen said.

China also provided zero-tariff treatment to the goods of 42 least developed countries. It has also trained 15,000 African medical professionals, sent medical teams and provided free medicines to Africa, he added.

Joint efforts

In his speech, the Chinese premier called for joint efforts from the governments of all countries to realize the goals set out in the Millennium Declaration.

"Counting from today, we have only seven years to go before the end of 2015 to reach the goals" of halving the proportion of people living on less than a dollar a day, and "no more than 12 years before the end of 2020" to significantly improve the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers, Wen said.