Every effort directed at improving the living conditions of the human race needs to be encouraged if only because, in the absence of such development, Planet Earth is doomed to faster degeneration and early extinction. Seen in this perspective, there can only be praise for those who thought up the UN Millennium Declaration in 2000 and fleshed it out with the Millennium Development Goals, the target of which (according to the official UN publication) is to "bind countries to do more in the attack on inadequate incomes, widespread hunger, gender inequality, environmental deterioration and lack of education, health care and clean water".