International e-Conference on Rethinking Development Cooperation
Event: International e-Conference on ‘Rethinking Development Cooperation’
Date: October 30-31, 2021
The Centre for Governance Studies (CGS) is going to organise a two-day long International e-Conference on ‘Rethinking Development Cooperation’ on October 30-31, 2021.
Multi-faceted challenges are ahead of the development community in managing continuity of its development spree in the milieu or after COVID-19 pandemic. Widespread apprehension of resource gap is imminent in the budget for the LDCs due to significant reduction of revenue from exports and remittance accompanied with shrinkage in the opportunity of bustling SME and start-ups, volatility in capital market, constant increase in trade deficit, lack of investors’ confidence and many other adverse socio economic conditions. This enhances Governments’ dependence on aid to achieve development goals, especially, SDGs across developing and LMICs. On the other hand, donors are hard hit by the COVID-19 and struggling to keep commitment of funds because of increased local needs. Therefore, a new dynamics of donor-recipient relationship will emanate that needs special attention than ever before.
Regrettably, recent experience with collaborative mechanisms between development partners and recipients such as Local Consultative Group (LCG), LCG Sector Working Group (LCG-WG) and platforms with different names or Joint Collaboration Strategy (JCS) do not support high-impact relationship in terms of result oriented development effectiveness. Perhaps, there seem to be subtle differences between the Government and DPs in relation to the management and governance of development initiatives and resources pledged for. Arguably, the transition from aid to development effectiveness agenda during the past decade also contributed to country-level motivation of Government and DPs for more active role in Global Partnership for Effective Development Cooperation (GPEDC). Moreover, it is crucial than ever to use available resources, both Government funds and foreign aid, effectively for achieving development outcomes in the post COVID-19 context. There is an established perception that LDCs could yield more results from the money it spent for the development if planning and project implementation would have been efficient and free from rampant corruption.
In this context, the existing roller-coaster system of development planning and execution needs serious overhauling to make it a good fit to manage development effectively. Likewise, DPs still in many occasions prefer to provide funds of their own area of interest ignoring alignment with government’s development priorities. In addition, they like to plant the flag in many sectors for visibility ignoring division of labour that triggers fragmented aid and proliferation of projects. In this backdrop, the COVID-19 crisis raises a strong call to both Government and DPs to change their business for improved development results.
This International e-Conference intends to unveil the issues that may thwart development cooperation in renewed economic settings and resolute actions for reshaping collaboration in or after one of the most crucial economic crises of the history.