ECA Media Advisory

Addis Ababa, 21 May 2007 (ECA): The Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) will co-organise a Capacity Building Workshop for selected African research centers, in Bujumbura, Burundi on 29-30 May 2007.

The meeting is a component of the United Nations project on “Knowledge networking and sharing in a south-south partnership framework to strengthen the capacity of African policy community towards meeting key MDGs ” which ECA and ECLAC are jointly implementing.

One of the primary aims of this project is to enhance the capacity of leading research and policy analysis organizations and networks in Africa to serve the policy community, including through policy advice to national, sub-regional and continental intergovernmental policy organs.

In that context, the objectives of the meeting in Bujumbura include:

•  Initiating a network of research institutions working on macroeconomic management issues.

1. Promoting knowledge sharing between African and Latin American researchers in order to create a better understanding of the most appropriate and effective strategies for improving the use of knowledge generated in research centres for strengthening national macroeconomic policies.
2. Discussion of the ways in which the tools such as macroeconomic modeling used in some research institutes like KIPPRA (Kenya) or AFRINEM (South Africa) can contribute to enhancing knowledge generation and policy making.
3. Presentation of the ECA/ECLAC project on “Knowledge networking and sharing in a south-south partnership framework to strengthen the capacity of African policy community towards meeting key MDGs” and of ECA's latest macro modeling activities.

ECA and ECLAC are therefore inviting representatives from selected research institutions in Africa and Latin America that are willing to share their experiences and to form part of a network of research institutes across continents. In addition, ECA and ECLAC are also inviting selected policy makers and senior technical officials from ministries of finance and planning and central banks to establish a link with the targeted research institutes.

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Background

Knowledge is a vital ingredient and a principal driver of economic growth and development. In other words, the success or failure of nations hinge to a great extent upon their ability to adequately use knowledge in addressing their development challenges. Unfortunately, the increasing amount of Africa-specific development research is presently not being systematically assembled, shared and applied to deal with the continent's development challenges and to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. At issue is the weak connection between the knowledge producers—African centres of excellence and research institutions and networks—on the one hand - and African policy makers—the end users—on the other. This is creating a gap between the potential and actual impact of Africa-specific research on African policymaking. In addition, to date, many of the policy recommendations of African research institutions lack a solid technical basis in terms of quantitative evidence (e.g. in terms of quantitative models), and this is limiting their credibility with policy makers.

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