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Aid Effectiveness Network news
Newsletter - July 2006
Highlights
- Tanzania launches its Joint Assistance Strategy
- Prime Minister promises to double DFID Education Budget by 2010.
Aid Relationships
Aid Harmonisation and Alignment
- The Government of Tanzania and it's 40 development partners recently agreed a Joint Assistance Strategy in Tanzania (JAST) which is a new framework to make aid more effective. It puts into practice in Tanzania the 2005 Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness. The JAST will build on earlier efforts to improve harmonisation under the 2002-2005 Tanzania Assistance Strategy and officially comes into effect later this month following approval by the Tanzanian Cabinet. The JAST will include an action plan and matrix, based on Paris Declaration indicators, to measure performance of Government of Tanzania and Development Partners in implementation. Please contact Eunice Urio for more information.
Policy Coherence
- On Thursday 13 July DFID launched its new White Paper on International Development, 'eliminating world poverty: making governance work for the poor'. It sets out what the UK Government will do to reduce world poverty over the next five years. The White Paper sets out DFID’s priorities and explains how we will work with the rest of UK Government, partner governments, international organisations, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), academics and the private sector to fulfil the promises made in 2005 to significantly reduce world poverty.
Aid Instruments / Development Finance
- The Prime Minister last week pledged that the UK would more than double spending on education in the developing world by 2010. In his speech on the follow up to 2005, he stated that "DFID's budget for education will more than double to over £1 billion a year by 2010, up from about £450 million last year". He also used his speech to announce increased support for post-primary education to underpin economic growth, good governance and public services. A DFID policy briefing paper setting out the details will be launched shortly. African governments are already starting to build on the UK initiative. At the Financing for Development conference in Abuja on 22 May, 20 African countries committed themselves to developing ambitious, 10 year investment plans for their education sectors. Further details of the conference including session papers and the Abuja Commitment to Action can be found at the
Financing for Development website.
Scaling Up
- The 4th DAC/ World Bank meeting on Scaling Up took place in Paris on 27 June, the meeting had useful discussions of DAC members spending plans over the next three years, and World Bank proposals to hold, 'Results and Resources' meetings in five African countries to discuss national plans for scaling up. For further information, please contact Gary Jenkins in the Development Financing & Instruments Team.
Other Aid Effectiveness Information
- Policy Division's Investment Climate team participated in a meeting of the Business Environment Working Group (BEWG) in the Hague on 14 June. The BEWG is a sub-committee of the Donor Committee for Enterprise Development and was set up in 2001 to promote donor coordination and harmonisation on investment climate reform policy. At the meeting, plans were finalised for a handbook of guiding principles and best practice for donors on business environment reform policy. Regional consultations of donors, governments and private sector representatives will develop the evidence base for the handbook and promote harmonisation of donor efforts in investment climate reform. The first consultation will be held in Bangkok in November 2006 for the Asia region. The Bangkok conference will also contribute to taking forward DFID's Asia 2015 agenda, particularly it's recommendations on the role of the private sector in promoting development in Asia, as set out at the 'Business Action in Asia' conference earlier this year. Contact Tony Polatajko for more details.
Upcoming Events
- The FACT team supports a resource centre that provides web-based anti-corruption training and information. The next 6-week online course starts on 28 August. Contact the course administrator Kirsty Cunningham by 7th August for more details.
- ODI are running a series of
Recent Events
- A lunchtime seminar on 'Fostering Multi-Disciplinary Analysis for Policy Making' was held on Fri 16 June in PS 3W13, with VC to AH 101 & DFID Barbados. The seminar discussed the application of qualitative and quantitative dynamic systems to facilitate open participatory analysis and debate and was of interest to staff working on planning and PRS, policy and impact analysis such as PSIA and SEA. Please contact Peter Poulsen for more details.
- DFID (led by DFID South East Asia) are jointly organising an Asia Regional Forum on Aid Effectiveness with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Japan, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the World Bank, in co-ordination with the OECD-DAC Working Party on Aid Effectiveness. The three day event will take place in Manilla, at the ADB's headquarters from 18-20 October 2006. Two days will be spent in working level discussions with the final day bringing senior officials together for high level discussions. Opportunities include independent analysis of the aid effectiveness initiatives, highlighting the benefits and drawbacks, the chance to feed into the regional debate and bring country experience to the attention of donor HQ's, and to help other Asian countries. Asian country offices can get involved by opening the discussion with other donors about approaching government and securing participation, recommending and encouraging influential invitees and facilitation of case studies. For more information, please contact Debbie Warrener. A website will be available shortly.
- A seminar on 'DFID Country Programmes Evaluation (CPE): Bangladesh Study'
(1 mb) was held on 18 May in Palace Street. This is the latest in Evaluation Department's rolling programme of CPE's. The consultants (ITAD Ltd), who carried out the independent study presented and discussed their findings. Contact Lynn Quinn for more details.
The co-ordination of the Aid Effectiveness network, including the AE newsletter, is now being undertaken by the Country Led Approaches and Results (CLEAR) team, based in Abercrombie House. Catherine McGowan and Nicola Cairns are the new contacts. To keep abreast of the latest in aid effectiveness, please e-mail Catherine or Nicola who will add your name to the mailing list. Please also let us know of any news you have which relates to Aid Effectiveness. We will be glad to publicise anything you are doing.
Catherine McGowan and Nicola Cairns