Towards a network of regional integration networks?

Regional integration is, ostensibly, one of the new buzz words across Africa. I say ostensibly because it would appear that while almost everyone accepts that it is a good idea, the political and economic practicalities of moving towards closer regional integration are huge. Be that as it may (or not), a lengthy concept note (45pages) prepared for the recent Conference of Ministers of Public/Civil Service deserves to be widely read: the document examined the links between RECs and the African Public Service Ministers' Programme. The slew of recommendations included the need for a virtual Centre on African Governance Reform and an African Integration Forum; the latter would function as a civil society initiative for promoting NGO and private sector dialogue with African governments on regional cooperation and integration issues. I have posted the paper on the ANSA-Africa website, in the general section.

Countdown to the next APF meeting

Addis is the venue for next week's meeting of the African Partnership Forum - the vehicle for liaison between the AU/Nepad and the G8/OECD. One discussion document has already been posted on the APF website - a perspective on carbon finance in Africa. Transparency seems to rule when it comes to posting discussion documents from the meetings! The previous APF meeting, held in Japan, discussed a range of documents, including climate change and ICT issues. The two ICT-related documents drew my attention, given my KI lens. The AU/Nepad Africa Action plan is also worth a look at. An updated version will be presented in Addis.

Of fleabites and aid exit

"A year, in the timescale of international development, is barely a fleabite": so began today's Guardian editorial on Katine. Apologies for returning to it but I do like the reflective nature of the reporting and commentary on the project's interactions with the Ugandan community they have chosen to help. It marks a change from dry donor-speak about "sustainability". But we have to take the latter seriously because donors do choose to disengage from projects they initiated (often too soon it seems to me). On this theme, the Christian Michelsen Institute in Norway was commissioned by a consortium of Nordic donors to review issues around donor exit: their report dealt with projects in Botswana, Malawi, Eritrea, South Africa and India. It has just been published on the Sida website.

KI work and African agriculture

I spend a very rewarding hour or so in the evenings sourcing material for the FANRPAN website's newsflash section. My preference is for material published in the southern Africa media which illustrates the complexities of increasing agricultural production in the SADC region. Debates on land tenure and ownership, the impact of climate change, the impact of fertiliser subsidies and the such like are posted. It is lonely work. But the thought that the RSS facility allows my editorial judgements to reach a wider audience, hopefully connected in some way to policy debates, more than compensates. I think of it also as getting these subscribers "to read off the same page". The recent conference in Addis Ababa on maximising the impact of agricultural research seemed to have little to say on this personal interest. It was more concerned with conventional research outputs. But still worth a read! Take a look at the FANRPAN contribution by Francis Hale.

More on Katine

I am pleased to see that the Katine Project will shortly be the focus of a public debate at ODI - we need to hear a bit more about it beyond living off the superb project website hosted by The Guardian, one of the project's sponsors. Madeleine Bunting, who will be speaking at the ODI event, wrote a very reflective piece this week reviewing the first year of the project's anticipated three year lifespan. A few lines in a blog cannot do justice to her comments; read the article! But one turn of phase can be quoted: rural Africa is a graveyard cluttered with projects launched on idealism and ignorance... I look forward to reading a good summary of the debate.

Kenya Knowledge Network

Afrique en Ligne continues to pick up some gems: the latest being the launch last week of the Kenya Knowledge Network as an e-forum to debate development policy processes in Kenya. The process is intended to support ongoing debates around budget formulation, parliamentary perspectives and the proceedings of the National Economic and Social Council. Supported by the African Capacity Building Foundation, KNET's launch mirrors similar knowledge portals in five other African countries, including Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Ghana and Senegal.

Namibia's BIG experiment

The Millenium Villages (spread across a number of African countries) and the Katine Project in Uganda grab the headlines, analysis and reviews when it comes to debating the success of village or community level development interventions. But the outcome of a similar sort of experiment in Namibia is less well known. It pits (enthusiastic) civil society advocates of a Basic Income Grant against (cautious) researchers at Nepru, one of the most respected economic and development institutes in Namibia. At issue is just how much the BIG intervention can claim in terms of changing people's lives in the town of Otjivero. The debate is playing itself out in the Namibian press but a new article in IRIN should draw more African and international attention to the process. The debate is far from over. The experiment should be more widely watched, especially in South Africa where a vocal BIG lobby exists. An easy way to follow the press debates in Namibia is to use "Nepru, BIG" as google news search key words!