The document discusses the United Nations' Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) which aimed to halve extreme poverty and hunger by 2015. Specifically, it aimed to halve the proportion of people living on less than $1 per day and those suffering from hunger. This goal was important because over 850 million people faced hunger every night. Some progress had been made, as rice production increased in Africa and poverty decreased in Nepal, but much work remained to fully achieve the MDGs by the 2015 deadline.