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© E. Debroise, AFD
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Conference cycle on perspectives for Africa’s economy
As part of the “Ideas for Development” conference cycle, the AFD is organising three events on perspectives for Africa’s economy: "Macro-economic perspectives for Africa: sustaining growth in a more uncertain global environment", on 29 May in partnership with the IMF; "Macro-economics and politics in Africa”, on 31 May with Politique africaine and Afrique contemporaine magazines, and, on 6 June, "Who does land belong to? The transformation of African agriculture".
From 29 May to 13 June, the AFD will be organising an “Ideas for Development” cycle of five interdisciplinary conferences on a range of topic areas. These events will provide a framework for discussions on development issues with numerous experts with a professional or personal interest in this field. They are intended as a new forum for debates and meetings between researchers, students, professionals from a wide range of fields, and the general public.
The first three conferences, described below, will focus on Africa’s economy and its performance, opportunities, stumbling blocks and prospects.
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1st conference: "Macro-economic perspectives for Africa: sustaining growth in a more uncertain global environment"
2nd conference : "Macro-economics and politics in Africa"
31 May, in partnership with Politique africaine and Afrique contemporaine magazines
Although macro-economics is an area usually addressed as a theoretical corpus developed by economists and technical public policy experts, it can also be seen as above all an expression of politics. This meeting aims to offer a different perspective on macro-economics, as the theatre of social struggles and conflicts between groups that offers material to gain a better understanding of the logic of the State and the mechanisms of power. A “bottom-up” analysis of the technical aspects of macro-economics can shed light on the emergence of new players, new instruments and new positions and relationships of power – in other words, provide new ways of approaching the realities of African societies.
Speakers
Béatrice Hibou, CNRS, Sciences Po / CERI, FASOPO
Boris Samuel, SciencesPo CERI, FASOPO
To be followed by a debate with the audience.
Conference on 31 May 2011, 10 am to 12.30 pm at the AFD, 5 rue Roland Barthes, Paris 12°.
Admission free subject to seating capacity and prior registration
Find out more and register for the conference
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3rd conference: "Who does the land belong to? The transformation of African agriculture"
Publication of study “Reducing the Cost of Migrant Remittances and Optimizing their Impact on Development”
This study was led by a team of experts, under the supervision of Savings without Borders, in Morocco, Tunisia and Senegal, as well as in the Comoros. It proposes practical solutions to reduce the costs of migrant remittances and increase their impact on development.
The proposals made by the study aim to reduce the average cost of migrant remittances and to optimize their impact on the development of African countries. They specifically focus on improving linked bank accounts (dual bank accounts for migrants in their country of residence and in their home country with activities coordinated between the banks of both countries), the development of innovative financial products, support for electronic payment technologies and the adaptation of regulatory and legislative frameworks.
What are the lessons learned from the study?
Due to their importance for the recipient communities, the flows of money from migrants tend to remain stable and are less sensitive to changes in the economic climate.
How to optimize remittances and their impact on development
- Reducing the cost of migrant remittances will increase their contribution to development.
- An understanding of the local context is the key to reducing the cost of remittances and informal flows.
- It would appear that the cost of remittances in the Maghreb region and franc zone has stabilized at a level that remains too high.
- While the profile of actors is becoming more diverse, there is still a need to develop the range of services in order to be more competitive.
- An overhaul of regulatory frameworks, with the aim of promoting diversification in the range of services and financial products, would help increase competition and reduce the cost of remittances.
- Four types of financial and technological services and products can contribute to reducing the cost of remittances.
- Actors, services, tools, new technologies…: there are ultimately five areas to be explored in order to expand and strengthen the range of banking and non-banking products and encourage both a reduction in the cost of remittances and co-development.
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Support for stock farming to tackle the looming food crisis in Niger
A program to support stock farming aiming to tackle the recurrent food crises suffered by Sahelian countries was launched on 15 March 2012 in Dosso in the presence of Niger’s Minister of Livestock, Mr. Mahaman Ousmane, the French Ambassador, Mr. Christophe Bouchard, and AFD’s Director in Niger, Mr. Gianni Sartena.
This national emergency program to support the pastoral campaign, for which the agreement was signed on 21 December 2011, guarantees the supply of cereals and fodder for livestock in the country.
The survival of Niger’s cattle herd, estimated at over 35 million live cattle, would appear to be in jeopardy as a result of the current shortage of 692,000 tons of cereals, in addition to a shortfall of 10 million tons of fodder. Indeed, these food shortages represent over half the annual needs of the entire national cattle herd.
© AFD - E. Debroise
A nationwide emergency program
It is therefore an emergency program: EUR 2.48 million out of the EUR 10 million of aid will immediately be earmarked for the acquisition of the first 10,000 tons of the planned 25,000 tons of food supplements for livestock (wheat bran and cotton seed meal).
In addition to offsetting the fodder shortfall, this aid also supports herders, who have been weakened by the rise in food commodity prices, because it effectively contributes to regulating market prices. Prices have fallen by roughly 50%.
The first 10,000 tons of food will primarily be delivered in the 96 communes identified as being a priority. These communes are spread out all over the country.
This operation goes hand in hand with national livestock vaccination and decapitalization programs which aim to protect Niger’s cattle herd.
"Nigeriens feed Nigeriens"
Finally, it makes a major contribution to financing the national food security policy, the cornerstone of the 3N initiative of the President of the Republic, Mr. Issoufou Mahamadou: “Nigeriens feed Nigeriens”.
Developing an African broadband telecoms network in 29 countries
During the signing, Ibrahim Mayaki, Chief Executive Officer of the NEPAD Planning and Coordinating Agency (NPCA) and former Prime Minister of Niger, and Yves Boudot, Director of AFD’s Sub-Saharan Africa Department, had the opportunity to discuss – in addition to ICT development in Africa – the headway made by the Programme for Infrastructure Development in Africa (PIDA), an initiative led by the African Union Commission, NEPAD and African Development Bank.
AFD’s long-standing support to NEPAD’s New Information Technologies initiatives
Since 2003, AFD has been supporting NEPAD’s activities in the telecoms sector (e-Africa Program) via an earmarked grant and the joint AFD-DBSA Project Preparation and Study Fund. These funds have cofinanced preparatory services for NEPAD’s ICT operations and have provided a residential technical assistant (on assignment since July 2009) to support the project for the UMOJANET (“umoja” means “union” in Swahili) broadband transmission virtual network.
This new financing has been delegated from the European Infrastructure Fund (EU-ITF) and follows on from an €850,000 AFD grant (allocated in 2006) to support NEPAD’s initiative to develop a continent-wide broadband transmission virtual network.
Umojanet is extending Uhurunet
The grant that has been allocated will finance the study program that results from the technical assistant’s research to finish off the design of the concept and of the UMOJANET network. The aim is to extend it to the 29 countries in North, West and Central Africa. This will complete both coverage on the continent and the UHURUNET project for Southern Africa.
This project aims to offer African operators a pan-African network of fiber-optic transmission channels. The resulting interconnection offer is required to meet criteria for comprehensiveness, guaranteed quality, open access, non-discrimination and lowest possible cost. The bid invitations will be published in February 2012.
AFD’s approach in supporting NEPAD’s activities is based on its research on promoting regional integration via the construction of major communication networks as a complement to the private sector. This strategy is in line with those adopted by other donors (World Bank, ADB, EIB, KfW, DBSA…). It previously prompted AFD to provide USD9.5m of cofinancing alongside other donors in 2007 for the Eastern African EASSy submarine cable project.
The signing of this additional financing for the implementation of the UMOJANET project should allow NPCA to present an effective implementation plan for a fiber-optic broadband network in West, Central and North Africa over the next 12 months. This will complete both coverage on the continent and the UHURUNET project for Southern Africa.
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