United Nations Economic Commission for Africa

Title

“Harmonizing the Mauritius National Plan of Action (NPoA) with the existing development strategies and Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF)”

Monday, April 23, 2012 to Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Domaine Les Pailles, Mauritius

The Governance and Public Administration Division (GPAD) of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) Regional Centre for Eastern and Southern Africa jointly organized a Workshop on “Harmonizing the Mauritius National Plan of Action (NPoA) with the existing development strategies and Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF)” in Domaine Les Pailles, Mauritius from 23 to 24 April 2012.

The objective of the training workshop was to provide participants with information about best practices and procedures that could form the core process for harmonizing the APRM -NPoAs with pre-existing national plans within the context of a common medium -term expenditure framework.

The workshop brought together key APRM practitioners from Mauritius that are engaged in the designing, costing, implementing and monitoring of the NPoA. The targeted participants included the National APRM Focal Point, staff directly involved in the formulation of the national budget from different Ministries, representatives of Private Sectors and Civil Society Organizations. It also included Dr. M. Mekideche, Lead APRM Panel Member for Mauritius, APRM Continental Secretariat and the UNDP country office. In general a total of 55 participants have attended the two-day workshop.

Minister of Foreign Affairs, Regional Integration and International Trade, Dr. The Hon. Arvin Boolell in his keynote address underscored the importance and timely of the workshop to allow every stakeholder in the APRM governance process to reflect on how best the recommendations of the Mauritius APRM country report can be put in practice. Resident Coordinator of the UNDP for Mauritius and Seychelles, Mrs. Leyla Tegmo-Reddy made a statement by explaining the commitment of UNDP in supporting the APRM process particularly in Mauritius and also ear marked the importance of the workshop for Mauritius to have a look at the process and share experiences from other countries. Mr. Kojo Busia, on behalf of the UN Under-Secretary General and ECA Executive Secretary, Mr. Abdoulie Janneh, made an opening remark and underlined that the target of the workshop is to provide a real opportunity for the national APRM experts to learn from the experiences of peers, address the key challenges and suggest concrete tools and ways which would make the Mauritius NPoA a credible and operational document for the national socioeconomic development.

The Executive Director of the continental APRM Secretariat. Mr. Assefa Shifa, meanwhile, thanked the strategic partners of APRM, ECA and UNDP, for their continued partnership with the Continental Secretariat, and especially convening this important meeting in collaboration with the Government of Mauritius.

Plenary discussions were held on the overview of APRM as a governance improvement mechanism; NPoA harmonization; and NPoA integration with existing national plans. Three breakout sessions were also held where participants divided themselves in three groups and discussed the NPoA costing and framework, NPoA implementation through existing development plans and NPoA monitoring and evaluation. At the end of the breakout sessions, each group came out with specific recommendations, and strategies for undertaking the harmonization exercise in Mauritius.

Participants also expressed their profound gratitude to the Strategic Partners, ECA and UNDP for organizing this useful workshop. As a result of the workshop the Ministry of Finance made commitment to ensure that the NPoA would be streamlined into the recently adopted Mauritius Economic and Social Transformation Plan, the national ten-year development plan. ECA will follow-up on the recommendations made and continue providing technical assistance to the country in all areas.