ECA's focus
on Africa`s key challenges now sharper, says Okello
By Yinka Adeyemi
The result of an external review of the work of the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) revealed a "significant improvement and sharper focus on addressing the key challenges confronting Africa", the ECA's Director of Programme Coordination, Robert Okello, said in Addis Ababa today.
"On
the intergovernmental machinery, much progress has been made in rationalizing
the structure and efficiency; but more could still be done to improve the oversight
functions of the machinery,"
Mr. Okello told about 25 experts from Regional Economic Communities, the Intergovernmental
Committee of Experts (ICE) and the six regional committees set up by African
Ministers of Finance who began a two-day consultation with ECA's substantive
divisions and sub regional offices.
On the relationship between ECA and the regional bodies, Okello said the external reviews had highlighted a number of notable achievements such as the growing cooperation with the African Development Bank in jointly organizing the annual meetings of the policy organs of both organizations.
"The ongoing restructuring of the African Union and the implementation of NEPAD offer fresh opportunities for collaboration with the AU and the regional economic communities," he said.
The Director added that the external review had also recommended a number of reforms which could deepen reform at ECA. These include the strengthening of the role of the member States in setting ECA''s priorities and improving the Commission's feedback, monitoring and evaluation mechanism.
The reviewers also recommended the enhancement of the modalities for disseminating ECA's work, strengthening of the Commission's intellectual leadership in Africa and setting ECA's research agenda to enhance networking with the growing community of African research and academic institutions.