The Millennium Development Goals in Plateau State: The Role of Communication and Community Participation

Communication has proved itself worthy of mention at each point issues of development are
discussed. Communication is agreed by scholars to have a positive effect in reducing poverty
and hunger, enhancing education and gender equality, improve health and environmental
sustainability, which are among others, actions and targets identified as development
challenges in the Millennium Declaration and formally named Millennium Development
Goals (MDGs). This study draws theoretical inspiration from the Diffusion of Innovation
theory. This work explores to what extent communication has been able to encourage
community participation in the attainment of the MDG’s in Plateau State. To achieve this
objective, two-prong methodology was used namely Focus Group Discussion (for community
members) and interviews (for MDGs staff). Findings from the study demonstrate that while
discussants display high regard for interpersonal communication as a preferred channel of
communication regarding MDGs activities, participants were not adequately informed in the
process of MDGs project execution. As such, the study makes suggestion on how the MDGs
communication component can be properly repackaged and deployed to engender greater
involvement of benefiting communities.