New CTA website now live

The new-look CTA website went live on Wednesday July 1, 2009. It will serve as a platform to access relevant, precise and timely information tailored to the end user, on the priorities for agricultural development and rural ACP communities. The new site, featuring a new content management system, will facilitate greater interaction and better information management on the backend of the site. The improvements to the site include a new federated search engine, an improved Google map feature to showcase CTA partners and a new thematic feed from the site.

Also check out Euforic's newsfeeds on CTA, and on agriculture

Weekly Compass: ECDPM's new information service

ECDPM has launched Weekly Compass, an information service which substantially improves on and replaces the ECDPM ACP-EU News. It provides policy intelligence, hot of the press news and access to relevant documents pertaining to a wide array of policy issues, encompassing, for example, EU-Africa relations, EPA trade negotiations or EU Neighbourhood Policy.

Built on a rapidly growing online archive of some 11,000 news resources, Weekly Compass subscribers can choose between short weekly summary of key news, an extended version, a selection of newsfeeds. You can even follow Weekly Compass on Twitter!

For more information contact the editor, Melissa Julian

Also check out Euforic's newsfeeds on ECDPM, and on information, knowledge, and communication

Spring Alliance to ensure that the EU puts people and the planet first

The 'Spring Alliance' is a movement created by the European civil society organizations: the European Environmental Bureau, the European Trade Union Confederation and Social Platform. It was recently joined by Concord, the European NGO Confederation for Relief and Development. Furthermore the Alliance is supported by a network of organizations from all corners of civil society and beyond.

According to the initiators the Spring Alliance aims to shift the policy focus of the European Union from 'growth and jobs' towards more sustainable policies which prioritizes the welfare of Europe's people and puts the planet first. In the light of a newly elected European Parliament and the upcoming changes in the European Commission the network wants to ensure that the policies of the European Union pursue simultaneously economic, environmental and social goals.

To find out more see the Manifesto of the Spring Alliance or visit its website.

Fore more information, also check Euforic's newsfeed on EU cooperation policy

CSO Development effectiveness: the key event of the Czech Presidency

Source: Concord Flash 62, June 2009

What are the key principles of development effectiveness? What is the specific role of Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) in development that could best contribute to their full potential? How is effectiveness influenced by external conditions and how to turn these conditions into advantages? These are the questions that were debated on 23-24 June by 170 representatives from civil society organisations (CSOs), donors and governments from nearly 50 countries from around the world that gathered in Prague.

Organised by the Czech NGDO platform “FoRS” (in collaboration with CONCORD) this conference was the closing event of the FoRS programme under the Czech Presidency of the European Union. Participants discussed the principles guiding their development effectiveness, the roles of CSOs in development and the framework provided by donors and governments for CSO work.

The opening sessions presented different perspectives on CSO development effectiveness, including from Europe, Africa, Latin America and the Open Forum for CSO Development Effectiveness. Additional workshops explored more details topics such as: sustainable technologies; migration and development; inclusive development; gender; democratic governance, agriculture and food security. The conference concluded with a lively discussion on the conference statement which sets out principles of CSO development effectiveness. Participants committed to deepen discussions of these principles within the Open Forum for CSO effectiveness.

Just 2 days before this conference, this Open Forum held a meeting to discuss how to organise their political dialogue with donors and government, funding issues, and how international CSO processes linked to the development effectiveness agenda (Open Forum and Better Aid) could be sufficiently funded.

Political dialogue: One of the key objectives of the Open Forum is to advocate for an enabling environment for CSOs as development actors. This should be achieved through a multi-level political dialogue that also includes those governments and donors that have so far remained reluctant to engage with civil society. To facilitate this dialogue, a group of supportive governments including Austria, Sweden, Canada and the UK, have mobilised their peers to create a multi-stakeholder working group linked to the OECD DAC Working Party on Aid Effectiveness. This working group will reach out to donors and governments and work on some CSO-specific provisions in the Accra Agenda for Action in the run-up to the next High-Level Forum in 2011.

Funding: A management group has been established. It will work closely with donors and with CONCORD for the Open Forum and IBON for Better Aid. Tentative commitments have been made by some donors, and it is expected that these will translate into concrete pledges in the weeks to come.

For further information contact Franz Josef Berger or visit www.cso-effectiveness.org and www.fors.cz/en/eu_presidency/seminars_conferences

Also check out Euforic's newsfeeds on Concord, aid effectiveness, and on the EU Presidency

A word from Simon Stocker on Europe under the Lisbon Treaty

Source: Concord Flash 62, June 2009

Which Development for the new Europe?
The newly elected Members of the European Parliament will be faced with critical challenges during their five year term of office. While uncertainty remains over the future of the Lisbon Treaty, Parliament will undoubtedly oversee the implementation of many of the Treaty’s provisions. This is important for the European Union’s relations with the rest of the world. The Treaty seeks to strengthen the Union’s role in the world through enhancing its common foreign policy capacity - an objective that is to be welcomed.

Throughout the EU’s 50 year history its development cooperation has been the centre piece of its external policy. As a collective group of nations, the EU continues to provide more than 50% of the world’s official development aid, a position that brings some responsibility for ensuring that the Union’s relations with developing countries are pursued first and foremost in accordance with its development policy. However, this cannot be achieved through aid alone.

The EU’s identity through development cooperation
The Lisbon Treaty should re-enforce the EU’s position as a global leader in development. It reflects the emphasis of development cooperation as a nurturing policy in international relations, recognising this in the context of the Union’s expanding membership. It identifies development cooperation as an independent policy area with EU competency providing the principal framework for the EU’s relations with all developing countries, and sets the eradication of poverty as the single principle objective of this policy.

In so doing it establishes the relationship of this overarching objective to other external policy areas. The objective of poverty eradication must be taken into account when actions relating to other policies are planned and implemented, thereby establishing a hierarchical relationship in relation to the EU’s approaches to developing countries.

A key question will be how the inevitable reforms to the institutions ensure the effective implementation of the Lisbon Treaty’s provisions and intentions. They will need to ensure that there is a single dedicated development service within the Commission embracing the EU’s relations with all developing countries that guarantees development as an independent policy area. Not only regarding aid delivery, but also with the capacity to assert the political interests of the Union’s development policy. This requires an experienced Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Aid sitting as an equal with all other Commissioners in the college. The creation of the Union’s diplomatic service must respect the integrity of development and humanitarian aid as a Community Policy.

In the words of Mirjam van Reisen, author of Window of Opportunity – EU Development Cooperation after the Cold War, “EU development policy reflects the EU’s identity and the importance given to values expressed in the slogan ‘unity through diversity’ - upholding international human rights, supporting accountable and inclusive democracies, creating conducive environments for the involvement of women in peace-building and conflict resolution; and creating sustainable economies with regulatory frameworks that
protect against excessive gaps between rich and poor.”

Simon Stocker, Director of Eurostep, member of the CONCORD Policy Forum

For more information, check out Euforic's newsfeeds on Concord, Eurostep, and on EU cooperation

Positive results for MDF over 2008

The Management for Development Foundation (MDF) - one of Euforic's members based in the Netherlands but with antennas in Brussels, Asia and Africa - has just released its Annual Report 2008.

MDF supports the enhancement of management practices, capacities, and skills within organisations active in the area of development and international cooperation, applying a specific and client-focused approach. Its clientele ranges from multilateral organisations to small NGOs, both in the South and in the North.

The past year has been rather positive for the organisation, showing a steady increase in activities and turnover, plus some changes in its operational management.

Check also the Euforic newsfeeds on MDF and on capacity building and cooperation management

The Heiligendamm Process and the reform of global governance

Considering the challenges the world is facing today, including the financial, energy and climate crises, there is an urgent need for an inclusive global governance structure with a high-level body fully representing the world population.

A new discussion paper by the German Development Institute looks at the 'Heiligendamm Process' as the starting point for further discussions on global governance reform. Further it offers different models for a future global governance architecture.

The Heiligendamm Process, which emerged from Germany's G8 Presidency in 2007, was an attempt to intensify dialogue with the new emerging actors, namely Mexico, China, India, South Africa and Brazil (referred to as G5). However it was seen as open process and not as a step towards enlargement, which was rejected especially by the USA and Japan.

According to the author the global economic crisis brought the enlargement-option back on the agenda:

"While this high-level dialogue [the Heiligendamm Process] was geared to an informal exchange of views and experiences as well as to confidence-building, the global financial crisis now calls for rapid action and hard-and-fast arrangements."

The Process is seen as success in terms of trust-building. It also helped to form a confident and pro-active G5, which even came up with concrete policy proposals during the recent G20 Summit in London. After the first phase of the Heiligendamm Process participants now need to decide where this governance model should be going to.

The author proposes a new out-ward looking process which includes other global governance structures and at the same time urges the G8 to explicitly deal with the enlargement issue. This discussion should also consider the role of the G20 which proved to be effective during the recent crisis.

by Martin Behrens

See the Euforic newsfeed and dossier on governance

After 2015: promoting pro poor policy after the MDGs

On June 23, a High Level Policy Forum entitled 'After 2015: Promoting Pro-poor Policy after the MDGs' took place in Brussels. It was organised by DFID, ActionAid, DSA, EADI, and IDS, in partnership with The Broker.

The MDGs have played a major role in focusing development policy since their original incarnation in the 1990s. Some development agencies, notably DFID, have gone as far as to judge their activities on the contribution to achieving the MDGs. What happens when we no longer have the MDGs? How will we promote pro-poor policy after 2015?

The Forum debated these issues and addressed three questions:

• What has been the impact on poverty reduction of the MDG paradigm?
  
• What are the major global processes shaping development up to 2015 and beyond?
  
• How can we promote pro-poor policy after the MDGs and amid global changes?
  

The Broker has published a background article 'Beyond 2015: Rethinking development policy' by Andy Sumner (IDS).

To support the communication and outreach activities of the High Level Policy Forum, Euforic has published a dossier presenting a rich collection of background information plus reports and impressions of the event. We published blog stories, blips, presentations and pictures. You can follow the discussions by subscribing to the High Level Policy Forum newsfeed.

See also Euforic's newsfeeds about the MDGs and the activities of Euforic members

Global Perspectives on the Long March to Copenhagen

Shortly after the Bonn Climate Talks the new issue of 'Global Perspectives' focuses on the outcomes of this latest session towards a Post-2012 Agreement on Climate Change.

According to observers, the negotiations are still far from the expected outcomes. While official delegates declared that progress was made during the Bonn meeting, NGOs and the majority of developing countries disapprove such claims. According to them the USA are blocking any progress especially regarding the emission reduction targets. At the same time European Union governments' commitments remain unimpressive.

"While the U.S. is holding climate negotiations hostage, Japan and the EU appear to feel comfortable hanging on to Washington's apron-strings" an observer noted.

Equally alarmingly is the fact that developed countries fail to commit substantial amounts of money and technology cooperation to enable developing countries to cope with the effects of climate change.

Senior Adviser to the UN Secretary General Nitin Desai considers it a progress that countries at this stage agreed what they disagree about. However the principle of 'Common but Differentiated Responsibility' which holds developed countries historically accountable for climate change must not be undermined. If the industrialized world met its commitments, countries like India and China would be willing to do more. However Japan, Canada and some European states do not even honor their Kyoto targets.

Also in this issue an opinion article by Andrew F. Cooper and Gregory Chin who comment on the prospects of the G20 as new global governance structure. They warn to overemphasize the Trans-Atlantic leadership of the US and the UK which they see as being outdated and not reflecting the emergence of new actors. They also stress the importance of the BRIC-Group (Brazil, Russia, India and China) as a new voice of the developing countries.

See as well an article by Julio Godoy who puts the finger on Western hypocrisy when welcoming the ICC warrant against Sudan's al-Bashir and criticizing Zimbabwe's Mugabe and at the same time keeping close relations with other dictators in Angola, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea or the Republic of Congo. In his opinion governments in Europe and North America remain silent due to their economic interests in these countries' natural resources.

Global Perspectives is a bi-lingual (English/German) joint production by IPS Inter Press Service Europe and the Global Cooperation Council, published by Globalom Media. The monthly editions on various themes of international cooperation and development are downloadable for free.

See also the Euforic newsfeeds on IPS Europe, climate change and governance

by Martin Behrens

Towards an MDG plus agenda

At the After 2015 High Level Policy Forum, held in Brussels on June 23 2009, Andrew Steer (DFID) led through the third plenary session, which discussed the question ‘Towards an MDG plus agenda’?

Louis Kasekende, chief economist of the African Development Bank, called for a rethinking of pro-poor policies after the MDGs in Africa. Recent events have shown the fragility of Africa, reflected in the income inequality and the associated social tensions in Kenya or South Africa, the vulnerability to the food crisis, or the reversal of gains in just six months after the financial crisis on the entire continent. Consequently, Mr. Kasekende made three proposals on how to re-design the MDGs:

• Refocusing economic growth: MDG 1 could be split in two goals, namely economic wealth creation and reduced inequality;
• Focus on fragile states: Action may be needed beyond regional effort, because costs for the country and their neighbours are enormous once the country has fallen into fragility like Somalia, DRC or Zimbabwe;
• Broaden ecological sustainability: for example by recognizing the danger of external shocks.
  

Claire Melamed (ActionAid UK) put forward several points, which should be taken into account in the MDG plus agenda:

• Any new narrative has to increase the understanding of the realities of power and gender, which block poverty reduction;
• We need to move to a global welfare state, which is characterized by social justice and redistribution;
• We should stop looking at averages, but move forward to the individual level. Not the average national wealth counts, but we should commit to ensure every individual has access to basic minimum services and income;
• Funding mechanisms should shift from uncertain aid provision to more predictable, redistributive mechanisms, such as innovative taxing;
• The future MDGs should rather be based on rights instead of on charity.

Being the final speaker, Andreas Rechkemmer (UNU-IHDP) put the interrelations between environment and development to the fore. Ecosystems are the precondition for any human well-being, due to the provision of cultural, provisional and regulatory services. Therefore, development, climate change and ecosystem communities have to overcome fragmentation and instead join forces. Essentially, “it is all about resilience building at ecosystem and social system level”, Mr. Rechkemmer argued. We need innovation and social learning to design a transitionary regime which can address the MDG plus, global governance and climate agenda.

See also:

• Euforic dossier on the event
• 'Blips' recorded during the event
• Debate on The Broker
  
• Euforic's newsfeeds on the After 2015 High Level Policy Forum and the MDGs

Development 'game changers' and the MDG plus agenda

At the After 2015 High Level Policy Forum, held in Brussels on June 23 2009, Jean-Luc Maurer, president of EADI, introduced the second panel which aimed to identify the key meta-processes shaping development (game changers) over the next 10-15 years and their implications on the MDG plus agenda.

Charles Gore (UNCTAD) claimed that the financial crisis is not simply a failure of the financial system, but rooted in the weaknesses and contradictions of the global development paradigm. These shortcomings include market fundamentalism, radical global income inequality, global interdependence without global institutions, the socio-institutional mismatch with the emerging new technological paradigm, and the environmental limits to growth.



So how can the current economic and development downturn be understood? According to Mr. Gore, there are long-wave cycles in development, also known as the Kondratieff cycles, of which one can last between 50-60 years.

• The Kondratieff spring was experienced in the 1950s and 1960s, when national development and economic growth were predominant
• The 1970s coincided with the summer, when economic growth was accompanied by redistribution
• The autumn in the 1980s and 1990s was characterized by global integration and the Washington Consensus .
• Since 2007, we are in the Kondratieff winter period, the focus lying on the Washington Consensus plus poverty reduction. In this downturn period, the MDGs are crucial to fill the gap to the next spring, which can be expected to start in 2012-15.
  

For Mr. Gore the way forward is not to abandon the MDGs, but to develop a new consensus on global sustainable development. We should embed the MDGs in a different policy narrative around productive capacities. MDGs could become social and economic rights which are guaranteed at the global level. In the long-term, they would not be financed through aid, but through innovative global sources of finance, such as taxes on global transactions.



Alfred Nhema of the Pan African Development Center highlighted the African view on the MDGs. Acknowledging that most African countries fail to achieve main MDGs, Mr. Nhema pledges for a coherent assessment of the current situation. How can Africa learn from other regions, such as Asia? Why did the past policies did not push Africa substantially forward on the way to reach the MDGs? Moreover, universal indicators such as the MDGs should be buttressed by locally defined measures. Public involvement from Southern peoples would be essential in the designing of a post-2015 framework.

Richard Morgan (UNICEF) argued that we need to “seriously review or even junk the results-based management approach of the MDGs”, because it is too far away from people’s real life. The basic needs approach and the participatory development approach would be good ways forward.

See also:

• Euforic dossier on the event
• 'Blips' recorded during the event
• Debate on The Broker
  
• Euforic's newsfeeds on the After 2015 High Level Policy Forum and the MDGs

Impact of the MDG paradigm on poverty reduction

The first panel of the ‘MDGs After 2015’ event in Brussels on June 23, jointly organized by DFID, DSA, EADI, IDS, ActionAid and the Broker, focused on the impact of the MDG paradigm on poverty reduction.

Lawrence Haddad (IDS) introduced the topic by underlining that the preconditions for realizing the MDGs are very different from 2000, the year of their creation. Whereas the millennium year was characterized by growth and stability, our times today are marked by climate change, financial and economic crises, pandemics, and the rise of new economies. This triggers questions on the post-2015 MDG framework: “Should the MDGs focus on outcome or process, should they be global, national or local, should there be less or more accountability, and finally, should there be MDGs or not?”

Salil Shetty (United Nations Millennium Campaign) underlined the achievements of the MDGs from 2000 until 2009. We do not spend enough time on reviewing the successes, although “the MDGs help to make change happen!" Instead of being a 'straight jacket', they are a public good, which can be interpreted differently. However, he acknowledged weaknesses, such as the donor and state-driven and technocratic nature and the ignorance for processes of change and structural causes of poverty. As key challenges, he identified the economic, food and climate crises which create a 'cloud of uncertainties'. Successes have been the weakest in the areas of maternal health and child mortality, and the trade element of MDG 8. The action plan until 2015 should, according to Mr. Shetty, focus on the 'de-aiding' process of the MDGs, move action from the global to the local, and serious reporting.

Enrico Giovannini, the chief statistician of the OECD, clarified that the word ‘statistics’ actually comes from ‘science of the state’. What we need would be 'sotistics, statistics for the society. Further, confronted with multiple crises, he underlined that we need to develop a new narrative which goes beyond mere aid narratives. Equitable and sustainable well-being definitions should be participatory and decided on local levels. “We have to be careful in preparing the repeated game in 2015”, claimed Mr. Giovannini.

Sakiko Fukuda-Parr from the New School University, New York presented her analysis of how the MDGs have influenced policy priorities and Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs). On the one hand, the MDGs were created as a reaction to the Washington Consensus, instead embracing the idea of inclusive globalization. On the other hand, the strategies of the 22 researched countries focused on the Washington Consensus (liberalization and privatization with little government intervention) plus social investments. In this way, many PRSPs undercut inclusive globalization and counteract the driving motivation of the creation of the MDGs. Despite the lack of impact on policy and the development paradigm, the MDGs did have a huge impact at a normative level. They are a very powerful message, which succeeded to shift international norms, although in a truncated way. Finally, Mrs. Fukuda-Parr underlined that we have to recast the MDG agenda. Most importantly, we have to add a goal on reducing inequality.

See also:

• Euforic dossier on the event
• 'Blips' recorded during the event
• Debate on The Broker
  
• Euforic's newsfeeds on the After 2015 High Level Policy Forum and the MDGs