By Karanja Mbugua, Senior researcher at the African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes (ACCORD) in Durban, South Africa.

Conflict renders development impossible, which makes it hard to understand why the Millennium Development Goals do not include conflict resolution.

There is little doubt that the prevalence of conflict in Africa is hampering the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Conflict in Africa remains one of the continent’s biggest developmental challenges. The human, economic and developmental costs of conflict are immense; without peace and security, development simply cannot take place.

The Constitutive Act of the African Union (AU) underlines the links between peace, security and development. The Act stresses in its preamble that the scourge of conflicts in Africa presents a major impediment to the socio-economic progress of the continent.

Therefore, one finds it puzzling that the MDGs as a development framework with targets makes no reference to conflict or conflict resolution. This is even more striking given that more than 60 percent of African states regarded as fragile are affected by violent conflicts.

The MDGs were adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 2000. The rationale behind these goals was to assist developing countries in promoting change in eight core areas by 2015.

These core areas are the reduction of extreme poverty and hunger; the achievement of universal primary education; the promotion of gender equality and women empowerment; the improvement of maternal health; the combating of HIV/AIDS and malaria; ensuring environmental sustainability; and developing a global partnership for development.

According to the UN Millennium Development Goals 2006 Report, other regions of the world have made significant progress towards achievement of these goals, whereas Africa has had the slowest progress overall and has suffered reverses in certain crucial areas.

The report notes that the number of people living in extreme poverty (on 1 US dollar or less a day) in sub-Saharan Africa, for instance, has increased by 140 million between 2002 and 2003.

Furthermore, 34 percent of the sub-Saharan Africa population suffers from chronic hunger. The number of Africans going without enough food is increasing and has become the highest in the world.

The net enrolment ratio in primary education in Africa stands at 64 percent, compared to 95 percent in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Africa remains the epicentre of HIV/AIDS epidemic: sub-Saharan Africa is home to 64 percent of HIV-positive people and 90 percent of children under the age of 15 who are living with the virus. In all, 59 percent of HIV-positive adults in sub-Saharan Africa are women.

There are, of course, several responses to these grim statistics. The New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD), for instance, has development-related activities to improve the livelihoods of the poor. Further, some conflict-afflicted countries, such as Burundi, have introduced free primary education and health programmes.

In Uganda, girls have benefited from universal primary education and gender empowerment has made strides. In southern Africa, Botswana and Swaziland have taken steps to provide free anti-retroviral treatment for HIV-positive citizens, while South Africa’s programme to combat the epidemic has been credited as a strong national policy framework.

These positive trends bring to the fore the potential of many sub-Saharan Africa countries for long-term growth that could raise standards of living. According to the former World Bank president, Paul Wolfowitz, Ghana and South Africa are examples of this potential.

Overall, however, sub-Saharan Africa is not on target to meet the MDGs by 2015 as conflict in the region stands as a huge obstacle. It is ravaging the continent.

The root causes of conflict in Africa are complex and multi-faceted. Some of the conflicts in the continent have been running since 1950s and 1960s. The end of the Cold War saw an upsurge in conflicts in Africa.

Armed conflict on the continent became more widespread and cases of intra-state conflict increased dramatically as countries became afflicted by ethno-nationalist and secessionist movements.

In the short span of ten years, between 1991 and 2001, 32 of the 53 African states had experienced violent conflicts. While some of these conflicts have been resolved, others are simmering on or have escalated. In 2003, 46 percent of all developing countries in the world affected by conflicts were in Africa.

The immediate and long term consequences of conflicts are enormous. Immediate ones include increases in internally displaced persons (IDPs) and refugees and the destruction of property and the environment.

Statistics from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees for instance show that at the end of 2005 there were almost 8,4 million refugees worldwide of which about 2,75 million, or some 33 percent, were in Africa. This figure does not include IDPs.

The long term consequences include the destruction of productive human capacity and infrastructure necessary for development. This in turn disrupts production and weakens social, economic and administrative structures, and ultimately contributes to the collapse of peace-time economies.

In other words, there is a clear correlation between conflicts and conflict resolution and Africa’s continuing struggle to eradicate poverty and to achieve the other MDGs. Indeed, conflict on the continent has been connected to negative economic growth.

It has also reduced the ability of many African countries to normalise economic relations and structures and to dismantle war economies and stop predatory practices. Thus, it is imperative to factor in the reality of conflicts and conflict resolution in the approaches towards the achievement of MDGs.

Actually, the conceptualisation of the MDGs, both in theory and practice, illustrates how development is an interdisciplinary field. It clearly shows that the programmes that underpin development revolve around various dynamics with several variables such as economic, social, political, gender, cultural, religious and environmental issues.

These variables are not only interlinked but are also at the root of all inter- and intra-state conflict in Africa. Thus there is a need to take conflict resolution theory and instruments into consideration when implementing development interventions.

This entails that development institutions place conflict at the centre of their analysis and programming. Further, as the debate over the relationship between development work and conflict dynamics evolves there is need to connect the development and conflict discourse with the day-to-day realities that development practitioners encounter in African countries.

In sum, we can say that there is a growing recognition at the continental and international levels that there can be no peace without development, and no development without peace. There is also recognition that conflicts in African states cannot indefinitely co-exist with international peace.

Indeed, with increasing number of people living in absolute poverty and recurrent armed conflicts in many African countries reversing positive trends in human development, it is not possible to paint a picture of improvements in human security. In a nutshell, the current conflict trends in Africa inspire little hope of achieving the MDGs set out for 2015.