But the timing of the report, just before next week's UN's summit in New York, the largest such gathering ever, means leaders' minds should be concentrated on the scale of the task facing the world - and the world body par excellence. That is a good thing. Unfortunately, the summit - reviewing progress since the September 2000 millennium session - also takes place in the shadow of damning new findings about the UN's Iraq food-for-oil scandal, which has exposed serious structural problems and weakened the authority of Kofi Annan just when he most needs it. Harsh words like "illicit, unethical and corrupt", used in yesterday's report by Paul Volcker on how billions of dollars went astray in the mismanaged programme to alleviate sanctions on Saddam Hussein's regime, will not help UN credibility unless they spur long-overdue reform efforts.

The annual HDR is valued for its statistical goldmine and a holistic approach that links wealth with indicators ranging from sanitation to gender equality. It again confirms the correlation between the risk of conflict and scarce resources that is depressingly familiar from Cote D'Ivoire, Darfur and the Nile Basin. Countries with a per capita income of US$600 are half as likely to experience civil war as countries with a per capita income of $250. Those with a free press rarely suffer famines like Zimbabwe's.

But the data suggests that unless there is progress towards meeting existing pledges of development aid, and further debt relief as well as fairer trade, there is no chance of achieving the eight millennium goals - covering poverty, sexual discrimination, hunger, primary education, child mortality, maternal health, the environment and disease by 2015.

The greatest achievement for the summit would be persuading the US to move from its current aid spending of a mere 0.16% of GNP to the 0.7% figure which Europeans have already pledged (with an interim target of 0.56% of GNP by 2010). But John Bolton, President Bush's newly appointed, and highly controversial UN envoy has tabled so many amendments to the planned declaration that he seems intent on wrecking it.

It was not surprising that Mr Bolton seized on the Volcker report to demand closer supervision of UN programmes - though even he acknowledged that governments had to take their share of the blame for the oil-for-food scandal. Yet the only basis for action can be the maxim that the UN - with what Mr Volcker called its "unique and crucial role" - is only ever going to be as effective as its members are committed to its enduring principles. Next week's summiteers must remember this as they look at advancing international security and human rights after the failures of Iraq, Rwanda and Bosnia. Issues such as nuclear proliferation and terrorism will be highly divisive.