Speech

By Abdoulie Janneh
UN Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission for Africa

25 February 2006
UNCC, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Honourable Chairperson of the African Union, President Alphar Konare;
Honourable Acting Chairperson of NEPAD, Professor F. Mucavale;
Your Excellency President Konare of the African Union Commission,
Honourable Executive Secretary of the African Capacity Building Foundation, Dr. Sako;
Distinguished Representatives of the Regional Economic Communities;

Ladies and Gentlemen;

Let me begin by thanking the African Capacity Building Foundation for inviting me to this very important meeting on addressing the capacity needs of the Regional Economic Communities (RECs).

As you know, the Abuja Treaty has designated the RECs as the lead agents for realising the dream of an African Economic Community. In addition, the Heads of State of the NEPAD Implementation Committee have also assigned them priority tasks to be carried out to advance the NEPAD agenda. However, in spite of being assigned such important duties, the RECs are still not being provided with resources that commensurate with the tasks they have been assigned. This partly explains why progress towards the ultimate goal of an African Economic Community has been mixed.

The first edition of the Economic Commission for Africa’s flagship publication on regional integration, Assessing Regional Integration in Africa (ARIA I), published two years ago, reports that the regional economic communities are making significant progress in several areas, including trade, communications, macroeconomic policy, and transport. However, it highlights that there are substantial gaps between the goals and achievements of most RECs, particularly in greater internal trade, macroeconomic convergence, production, and physical connectivity.

The overlapping mandates and objectives of the RECs, the duplication of integration policies and the multiplicity of membership by African countries into the different RECs, appear to be slowing down the integration agenda. At the same time, despite the efforts of the RECs and member countries, intra-African trade remains low because of factors that include existing non-tariff barriers. With regards to the movement of persons from one country to another most of the RECs have abolished tourist visas. However, most RECs are yet to implement the rights of residency and establishment for non-citizens of a member country.
The presence of so many regional economic communities also spreads limited resources thin, complicates the overall continental integration process, and puts an enormous strain on governments’ ability to cope with diverse agendas and exigencies.

Finding a solution to this problem is clearly not an easy one. The ECA is therefore pleased to be jointly organizing a series of consultative meetings on the subject with the AU Commission. One meeting has already been held and several more are planned over the coming months. The findings of these consultations will be presented to the Head of state at the AU Summit to be held in June 2006, in the Gambia.

Ladies and Gentlemen;

Top of the list of challenges facing the RECs are the capacity constraints within their individual secretariats, which are seriously impeding the implementation of their work programmes.

A survey under taken by the ECA for the second edition of Assessing Regional Integration in Africa (ARIA II) reveals that most of the RECs are understaffed and also suffer from a high rate of staff turnover. The ECA survey reports that the RECs experience a turnover of 0 – 3 years, impacting heavily on the human resource capacity needs of the RECs. They also lack technical expertise. In particular, the ECA survey indicates that more than 55 percent of the RECs reported serious gaps in the areas of IT management, law and accounts. Sectoral programmes such as agriculture, economics and political science, which are prominent features in majority of the RECs, are also seriously under-staffed. These shortages are having a serious impact on the implementation of their work programmes.

These staffing constraints could also be linked to the resources constraints. There is high likelihood that if their budgets were sufficient, most of the RECs would be in a position to deal with their technical skills shortages. Clearly, the financial crunch faced by the RECs can be explained by the failure of member States’ to fully meet the financial needs of the secretariats. However, given the multiple memberships of many countries in overlapping RECs, the ability of these States to meet their contribution obligations is also limited.

Moreover, the effectiveness and efficiency of the secretariats of the regional economic communities is hampered by the duplication of programmes at the RECs level. The ECA survey observed that RECs are duplicating their efforts in programmes related to trade facilitation and trade and market integration. Surprising the duplication of programmes in trade and market integration is not translating into increased intra-African trade.

Ladies and Gentlemen;

Today’s meeting is very important and useful for the advancement and strengthening of the capacity of the regional economic communities. You will be discussing the results of an important survey carried out by the ACBF. The survey identifies the serious capacity constraints and challenges encountered by the RECs as I mentioned above.

We, at ECA, believe that the goal of creating the African Economic Community, as enshrined under the Abuja Treaty, is still achievable if the RECs can be effectively supported to tackle the challenges that confront them. In that regard, the recommendations reached at this meeting could assist all of us in addressing the capacity problems of the RECs.

Let me end by assuring you that the ECA will continue to work diligently, in close collabaration with the African Union and other partners, to assist member States and the RECs in the strengthening of integration programmes on the continent.

I wish you a fruitful and successful meeting.

Thank you.