NEPAD Today 17 July 2013

NEPAD Today

17 July 2013

Editor
Yinka Adeyemi
Assistant Editor
Meseret Arega
Editorial Board: Yinka Adeyemi (ECA), ADOU Jean Yves (AUC), Meseret Arega (ECA)

African countries urged to leverage their natural resources for sustained growth

President of Nigerian Stock Exchange and President of Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote, led captains of industry in pressing the need for African countries to leverage their rich resource endowments to drive growth in the productive sector of the economy.
Dangote, who was speaking on “The Growth and Challenge of the Manufacturing Sector,” asserted that global experience had proved that no nation can transform into a great and industrial economy without the contribution of the manufacturing and private sectors.
 To achieve the desired growth, he said the manufacturing sector needs to contribute a lot more to Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Africa. The industrialist noted that local value addition has to increase, to facilitate wealth creation, generate employment, develop skills and improve living standards.
ECA’s 2013 Economic Report on Africa on “Making the most of Africa’s commodities” also addresses the issue of value addition. Download at www.uneca.org)

For full story: http://www.ngrguardiannews.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=126737:path-to-industrial-development-in-nigeria-others-by-dangote&catid=31:business&Itemid=562

AU, ECA and AfDB reflect on Africa’s development agenda in 2063

Representatives of the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), AfDB, the African Union Commission (AUC), and the NEPAD Secretariat met in Tunis on 25-26 June 2013 to discuss the African Union's 'Agenda 2063', an initiative endorsed by the heads of the three pan African institutions during their meeting in January 2013 in Addis Ababa.
Africa 2063 sets out to establish a credible platform on which Africa can build its future development.

When completed, it will have taken full account of the policy difficulties and pitfalls of the past, including civil strife and poor governance, and propose strategies to overcome them. It will also seek to inspire African countries to continue emphasizing the themes of solidarity and collaboration that helped the continent emerge from colonial domination.
Development of Agenda 2063 will include consultations with stakeholders, namely governments, the private sector, women, youth, various think tanks, and civil society groups, throughout Africa. It is expected to be presented, discussed and adopted at the AU Heads of State and Governments Summit in June 2014.

Condensed from: www.nepad.org

NEPAD establishes a Monitoring and Evaluation policy

The measurement of the impact of the NEPAD Agency’s role in Africa’s transformation will now be more systematic, after the finalisation of a Monitoring and Evaluation draft Policy Framework and a plan on the alignment of programme and projects with the overall institutional system.

Senior Managers and Heads of Programmes met in the north-western town of Magaliesburg to review the draft policy framework and establish consensus on its application to regional programmes and projects.

Speaking at the opening of the workshop, NEPAD CEO Dr Ibrahim Mayaki said “The outcomes of the workshop are important for the future because the success of the Agency is hinged on the tools and systems put in place, hence the need for us to own these tools.”

Dr Mayaki said that NEPAD’s role and specific responsibility was crucial – considering that of all the development initiatives launched in Africa since the 1960s, only NEPAD that has survived, hence the need to relate what the Agency does on a daily basis to the broader picture so that our business is well constructed and perceived as a legacy.  “NPCA has played a fundamental role in shaping the continent between 2001 and 2012 – but do we have the evidence to back-up this assertion?” asked Dr Mayaki

Overall there was agreement on the need for change in mind-set to embrace a new culture of evidence-based results reporting, sharing information among programmes and develop tools and templates for implementation of the various strategic plans among them a Balanced Scorecard. Training on how these tools and templates will work, will be conducted to ensure effective implementation.

Source: www.nepad.org

Upcoming events (some dates or venue may change)

  1. The 3rd Steering Committee meeting of the Global Partnership for Effective Development Co-operation,  25 to 26 July, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
  2. Seminar on Advancing Regional Integration through NEPAD Implementation: Learning Event on Comparative Analysis of African-European Integration Studies September 2013 South Africa.
  3. Africa-NEPAD Week at 69th UN General Assembly (mid-October 2013)
  4. 21st Africa Partnership Forum – Dakar (tbc) November 2013
  5. High Level Summit and Business Conference on Africa’s Domestic Resource Mobilzation (DRM) November 2013)
  6. 5th GEO Health & Environment Community of Practice (CoP), 23-25 July 2013, Washington D.C., USA
  7. 48th NEPAD Steering Committee meeting – Dakar, End of August/Sept 2013

A production of the RCM-Africa Secretariat, AU and NEPAD Support Team, Capacity Development Division (CDD),
United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Director: Adeyemi Dipeolu
Email: ecanepad@uneca.org