The Millennium Development Goals (MDG) Needs Assessment Project is a joint endeavor of the Government of Tajikistan (GoT) and the United Nations Country Team (UNCT), supported by the Millennium Project, to identify policy priorities and generate approximate estimates of overall resources needed to meet the MDG targets, to develop a long-term national strategy on achieving the MDGs, and to coordinate international advocacy and campaigning for increasing international financial assistance for the MDG-related investments. For Tajikistan, achieving the MDGs stands as a top priority, and the government has shown sustained commitment to realizing the MDGs. Tajikistan is the only country in the Central Asian and Eastern European region where the MDGs needs assessment is being carried out by the UN specialists and Government Working Groups in education, health, gender, water and sanitation, food security, environment and infrastructure sectors. MDG Needs Assessment serves as a basis for creating MDG-focused Poverty Reduction Strategy, and for improving budgetary processes such as Medium Term Budgetary Framework. The end result of this endeavor is the government's sustained commitment to policy reforms directed towards reducing poverty and hunger and promoting sustainable human and economic development in the country, as well as increased rate and effectiveness of international aid within the country.

Purpose of the MDG Needs Assessment
The purpose of the MDG needs assessment work is the following:

•  Provide an analysis of the current development trends in Tajikistan and to discuss, explicitly, changes in national policies and sectoral strategies that may be required to achieve all 8 goals;
•  Build comprehensive, but flexible models through which the Government and its partners can discuss development scenarios, including detailed breakdowns of needs as well as estimates of both internal (government) and external (donor) resources needed to achieve the MDGs; 
• Provoke substantive discussion about the practicalities of development in Tajikistan.

There will be two important outcomes of this joint process of the Government and the UNCT:
A. A long-term national plan through to 2015 to outline the policies, institutions, and investments needed to achieve the MDGs
B. Integration of the long-term plan into operative policy documents such as the revised Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper and the Medium-Term Expenditure Framework

The MDG needs assessment focuses on seven quantifiable MDG targets: combating hunger (MDG1), achieving universal secondary education (MDG 2), achieving gender equality (MDG 3), lowering child (MDG 4) and maternal (MDG 5) mortality rates, combating the spread of disease (MDG 6), and improving access to drinking water (MDG 7).