Editor's Pick
ECDPM introduces new monthly: GREAT Insights
The first issue of
Governance, Regional Integration, Economics, Agriculture and Trade - GREAT - Insights is out. It focuses onregional integration on the African continent, following last month’s African Union Summit on “boosting intra-African trade”. GREATInsightsgathered analysis and commentary from politicians, practitioners and scholars and asked them to share their view of the major bottlenecks on the road to regional integration in Africa. As a follow up to ECDPM and ICTSD’s successful publication Trade Negotiations Insights, GREATprovides its readers with a platform for analysis and comments on the burning policy questions in the trade and development sphere, with a particular focus on Africa. As the new name suggests, GREAT’sfocus is broadened to cover a wide range of relevant economic and governance issues. The Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) negotiations update remains a feature. ECDPM’s new monthly will be delivered by email,
subscribe here.
Policy News
EC Communication on trade, growth and development: good start or missed opportunity?
San Bilal and colleagues from ECDPM’s Economic Governance Programme argue in this article on the Talking Points blog that
the European Union still needs to develop a more strategic approach to its trade and development agenda, one that would entail a vision of the EU as a key actor for developing countries, notably Africa. In this sense, the Communication is clearly a missed opportunity. Nowhere is to be seen the promise of the Lisbon Treaty of an integrated approach to the trade and development dimensions in EU external action. The Communication does not prevent such developments, but does little to stimulate it they say.
African mineral wealth: turning stones into bread
The debate about transforming African minerals into long-term sustainable development has been increasingly gaining attention, both in Africa and in Europe. As African leaders have placed the bet to implement their visions for mining by 2050, two recent high-level meetings in Addis Ababa and Brussels debated how ambitions could be turned into concrete action. An informal ECDPM
report summarizes the main points from the Brussels meeting and Isabelle Ramdoo analyses
what’s behind the current discussions in an article on the Talking Points blog. She points out that “while all agree on the principle, the gap between the rhetoric and practice remains large.” To bridge this gap, all involved stakeholders need to join forces and the first step is engaging in a frank dialogue, which should also address issues of potential disagreement, like China’s involvement, Ramdoo writes.
Mixed EC track record in promoting human rights
When the European Commission skilfully leverages its different instruments to push forward a realistic human rights agenda, it has had a positive impact in many countries. But the EC, and the European Union, are hampered by several systemic constraints, particularly the lack of clear strategies and guidelines on how to mainstream human rights in practice in specific countries, which often prevent it from optimally using its potential power and therefore missing many opportunities to build on promising local dynamics to promote human rights. These are the findings from an
independent evaluation released this week on the EC’s support to respect of human rights in its external action. ECDPM was part of the consortium that carried out the study. It recommends to upgrade the political status of human rights in EC/EU external action and agree common implementation strategies based on improved political economy analysis and inclusive dialogue as a means to ensure coherent action to support rights based on local needs and realities.
EP discusses ECDPM evaluation on cooperation instruments
The European Parliament's Development Committee gathered on 9 February to discuss financing instruments for development cooperation. At the invitation of the Parliament, ECDPM’s James Mackie
presented lessons learnt from a
recent study for the European Commission on the existing EU budget linesfor external cooperation, also called legal instruments. The study found that the instruments’ functions were not always clear and that they were not designed in a manner that facilitates their evaluation. During the presentation, MEPs agreed that “evaluability” of financing instruments matter. This is an area for potential improvement in the design of the next set of instruments, which are currently being discussed by the EU institutions.
Pieces of the puzzle: Evidence, dilemmas and the emerging agenda for budget support
This
report from the Overseas Development Institute summarises discussions and conclusions from a series of expert meetings with a consortium of experts, which included those of ECDPM, exploring the complex interactions that constitute budget support and its results. This report is structured around the main meetings of the series, presenting the chair's summary for each meeting in turn.
Additional articles in the Weekly Compass-Extended Version include:
More recently uploaded resources can be found on the
Weekly Compass-Extended Version.
