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The United Nations (UN) compiles the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) Gap Report. The 2010 version of the report will emphasise the ‘needs gap’, which measures the gap between actual delivery on global commitments and ‘estimated needs for support’ by developing countries. This is an important gap, because it provides an estimate relating to whether the partnership envisaged under MDG 8 is effectively helping to address the needs of developing countries.

One way to analyse the needs gap and the way MDG 8 commitments could help is through in-depth country case studies of individual countries to review where the gaps are and discuss recent trends with respect to development finance. Four country studies (Bangladesh, Bolivia, Cambodia and Uganda) will focus on the needs gap in official development assistance (ODA), trade and debt relief. They will analyse whether the commitments and delivery in these three essential and interrelated areas are meeting the actual needs of these countries over 2000 until 2009, with attention regarding the impact of the economic crisis on these three areas.

This paper discusses these issues in the case of Uganda. It will first review progress towards reaching the MDGs (Section 2). It will then provide evidence on how indicators in the areas of aid, trade and debt have evolved (Section 3). This will provide the background of a discussion on how MDG 8 has already been addressing the MDG needs gaps (Section 4). Section 5 concludes.