Good intentions wither fast, especially when it comes to helping the world’s poor. At the turn of the millennium, world leaders committed to cutting extreme global poverty in half and to achieving deep reductions in malnutrition and child mortality rates. They followed that up in 2005 with a pledge to increase development assistance to $130 billion a year by 2010 (about $151 billion in today’s money). That was then. Today, even as soaring energy and food prices exacerbate the suffering of the world’s poor, the richest nations are falling far behind on their aid commitments — and behind their past giving.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/24/opinion/24wed2.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin