Dynamic analysis of interventions designed to achieve millennium development goals (MDG): The case of Ghana

An increasing number of countries are orientating their development strategies based on the millennium development goals (MDG), a broad set of directives agreed to by the United Nations (UN) in the year 2000. Developing coherent plans to achieve MDG has been complicated by their multidisciplinary nature, and by the complexity of the system being managed. The “system” here is the socio-economic construct within which populations live and operate. In an effort to support this planning process, various approaches have been developed to help realize MDG within specified budgets. The work described here complements the most commonly used approaches by analyzing the impact of alternative interventions in an integrated socio-economic-environmental framework. In doing so, we utilize system dynamics, which is well-suited to support the analysis of dynamic, complex issues such as those that characterize MDG planning. Such an approach allows us to estimate impacts of MDG-related interventions on the economic and demographic development of countries under study, as well as the possible synergies between and amongst selected interventions, e.g., those involving education and health. Results indicate that failure to account for such factors can lead to sub-optimal strategies. Our objective is thus to provide policy-makers with a more comprehensive view of the outcomes generated by alternative MDG interventions, with emphasis on the ability to finance given strategies.