The African Development Bank in collaboration with the Development Assistance Co-ordination Office (DACO) yesterday at the Miatta Conference hall in Freetown commenced a monitoring survey of the Paris Declaration and aid effectiveness in Sierra Leone.
Margaret Kilo of the African Development Bank, in her presentation, gave a brief history of the Paris Declaration where ministers from developed and developing countries responsible for promoting development and heads of multilateral and bilateral development institutions met in Paris on March 2, 2005 to take far- reaching and monitorable actions.
She added that, the volumes of aid and other development resources must increase to strengthen governance and improve development performance, which would impact on aid in reducing poverty, and in equality, increased growth, building capacity and accelerating achievements of the MDGs.
Margaret Kilo called on the government, Civil Society and donors to fill in the survey questionnaires and submit them to her office before the Paris Declaration Ministerial meeting to be held in Ghana in March 2008.
This, she noted, would help them present revised draft of the Paris Declaration on aid effectiveness ownership, harmonization, alignment, results, and mutual accountability for 2010.
Naomi Jeffrey of DACO, in her presentation, highlighted the 12 major indicators of the Paris Declaration on monitoring and aid effectiveness which could increase the number of partner countries with national development strategies that had longer term vision.
She also emphasized the need for civil society to put mechanisms in place to assess progress towards greater aid effectiveness in identifying challenges opportunities and synergies in agreeing to advance progress through cross country peer
Discussions and follow up action including a work plan for taking the survey forward climaxed the survey.
By Saidu Bah
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