ECA Launches New Major Meetings And Events Web Database

The Economic Commission for Africa recently launched of a Major Meetings and Events Database.

The Database is one of an array of tools produced by the Addis Ababa Secretariat of the United Nations System-wide Special Initiative on Africa (SIA) to foster enhanced partnership and co-ordination of UN and other development activities relating to Africa.

It is designed to be dynamic and user-driven. Users can submit information on their upcoming events and conferences via e-mail through the Web Site. All data submitted by users will reach the database moderator in ECA automatically by e-mail, who will update records online.

The Database provides a reliable and easily accessible common reference tool for planners and participants alike, as well as a mine of information for researchers and others interested in Africa. Its aim is to assist development actors working on Africa to improve the co-ordination of planning of their meetings, in line with the networking and catalytic role of the renewed ECA.

A key strategic objective behind the Database is the need to moderate the proliferation of conferences and meetings organized on African development each year, towards improved synergies and impact. Through automatically generated information notices, ECA will flag potential duplication of efforts and recommend partnership where possible.

The Major Meetings and Events Database can be found on the Web at: http://ww.unsia.org/events

African Finance and Planning Ministers Push for Progress on Debt, ODA, Capital Flight

The Joint Conference of the African Ministers of Finance and Economic Development and Planning, convened under the theme "The Challenges of Financing African Development", took place at the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) Headquarters, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia from 6-8 May 1999. Some 500 participants attended the Conference from the public, inter-governmental and bilateral partner sectors, including more than 30 Ministers of Finance and Planning from ECA’s 53 member States.

The conference took place against the backdrop of a number of important developments that pose a serious problem to financing Africa's economic and social development. These include the impact on Africa of the recent global financial crisis; the implications for the continent of declining official development assistance to Africa; and the continuing high levels of external debt service burdens.

Participants reviewed among others the following key issues: Official Development Assistance (ODA); Capital flights; Domestic resource mobilisation; Africa's external debt; and other sources of external finance.

Conference highlights included two panels, on ‘Policy Reforms and Aid Effectiveness’ and ‘Review of the African Debt Situation and Domestic Resource Mobilization in Africa’. Among senior officials and key policy makers featured were: Ms. Eveline Herfkins, Netherlands Minister for Development Cooperation; Mr. Rubens Ricupero, Director-General of UNCTAD; and Ms. Carol Lancaster, former deputy Administrator of USAID.

A Ministerial Statement issued at the end of the three-day conference called for wide-ranging measures on the debt burden, dwindling overseas development assistance (ODA), foreign direct investment (FDI), and the scourge of capital flight.

The Conference proposed a restructuring initiative to ensure broad and fast relief, relaxed eligibility, a shorter period in which to cultivate benefits, and greater resources to Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC). The Ministerial Statement included proposed that leading countries in the World Bank and IMF should agree to raising the resources of the HIPC initiative the two institutions launched in 1997 through gold sales -- without hurting the interests of Africa’s gold exporting countries. It stressed that the proceeds of IMF gold sales should be fully utilized to finance the HIPC initiative.

The Ministers also urged the G-7 group to completely cancel bilateral aid debts for the poorest countries, and to advance the 80 per cent cancellation to at least 90 per cent on all other bilateral debts.

These and other common positions on the international dimension of financing Africa's development were conveyed by ECA to the Development Assistance Committee of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and to the G-7 meeting in Cologne, Germany, in June.

Copenhagen Follow-up Process Moves Ahead in Africa: ECA and UNDP Take Joint Initiative.

 The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and the UN Development Programme (UNDP) organized two major subregional meetings in Kenya and Morocco to monitor progress in the implementation of the Copenhagen Programme of Action for Social Development drawn up in 1995.

The follow-up conference in Nairobi, Kenya from 15-17 March, organized in collaboration with the Kenyan government, drew participants from 24 East and Southern Africa subregions, and over a dozen ministers. Also in attendance were representatives from other UN agencies, NGOs and development partners.

Participants discussed, in plenary sessions and thematic groups, the four main themes of the Conference: Progress in Poverty Reduction; Progress in Employment Creation; Progress in Achieving the Objectives of the Social Sectors; and Progress in Governance.

Constraints highlighted in the ECA final report of the Nairobi conference were debt; over-dependence on rain-fed agriculture; lack of human capacity for policy formulation, implementation and evaluation; lack of adequate infrastructure, especially in the rural areas; adverse impact of HIV/AIDS; as well as ongoing internal and inter-state conflicts.

The North African Sub-regional Conference on the World Social Summit for Development was held from 23 - 25 March 1999 in Marrakech, Morocco.

Representatives of member states of the sub-region: Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Mauritania, Sudan, Tunisia and Djibouti, various UN agencies, NGOs and the youth, discussed progress in the social sector of the sub-region. Participants paid special attention to progress in poverty reduction, employment creation, achieving social sector objectives and good governance, and the integration of youth in the development process.

The North African sub-regional Conference ended after adopting the Marrakech Declaration of commitments to carry forward the implementation of the Copenhagen Declaration and Plan of Action. The Declaration, among others, enjoined member states to strengthen the mechanisms for controlling and ensuring follow-up to these commitments, programmes and projects. The Declaration also called for international financial institutions and partners to establish a 'guarantee fund' to promote the flow of foreign investments, and to strengthen programmes for social and economic development.

Visit the ECA website at http://www.un.org/depts/eca for a number of documents relating to the Social Summit follow-up process.

The African Development Forum (ADF): "The Challenge to Africa of Globalisation and the Information Age", to be held in Addis Ababa, 25-28 October 1999

The African Development Forum (ADF) is an initiative led by ECA to establish an African-driven development agenda that reflects a consensus among major partners and that leads to specific programmes for country implementation.

The aim of the African Development Forum is to present the key stakeholders in African development with the results of current research and opinion on key development issues in order to formulate shared goals and priorities, draft action programmes and define the environment that will enable African countries to implement these programmes. The Forum will meet annually on a different development issue.

This year's theme, "The Challenge to Africa of Globalisation and the Information Age", was chosen because, unless Africa breaks from its isolation from the information and knowledge available at the fingertips elsewhere, it has no chance to compete globally. Systematic work in the area of information and communication technologies must intensify in order to meet the enormity of the challenge of bridging the technological gap that exists between Africa and the rest of the world.

By concentrated activities at both national and regional level, ADF'99 proposes to enhance the implementation of African Information Society (AISI) three years after its adoption.

                At the national level: the ADF’99 preparatory process will include the elaboration of work programmes based on national information and communication infrastructure (NICI) policies and plans in African countries. The programmes will be presented at the Forum and implemented in the year 2000 at the country level with assistance from ECA and its partners. the forum will also highlight best practices from the national level.

                At the regional level: the Forum will update the regional vision of the AISI by concentration on a selected set of subthemes of particular importance to member States as the new millenium begins, under the overall theme of The challenge to Africa of globalisation and the Information Age.

For further information on ADF, visit our website: http://www.un.org/Depts/eca/adf/adf99m.htm

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