Global Partnership for Effective Development Cooperation

The first High-Level Meeting of the Global Partnership for Effective Development Cooperation took place from 15 to 16 April in Mexico-City. – A commentary on the results by Anne-Sophie Gindroz.

This 1st High-level Meeting of the Global Partnership on Effective Development Cooperation was meant to discuss the progress made so far in development co-operation and to anchor the Global Partnership in a post-2015 development framework.

From the perspective of civil society organisations (CSO), the mounting evidences of shrinking space for civil society are indicating that no progress were made from Busan in promoting an enabling environment «to maximize CSO contribution to development». Besides, CSO contribution is seen as co-implementor of aid agencies/government programs, not as «independent actors». Switzerland adhered to the Voluntary Initiative on CSO Enabling Environment which opens opportunities for follow-up action engaging Swiss NGOs.

Private sector was at the center of this High-level Meeting. ODA allocation to business is justified by the need to «harness private sector investments». However, there are little evidences of such input additionality, aid providers being more interested in commercial viability or economic performance. There are fears that the emphasize on creating a business enabling environment will equally benefit un-responsible companies. And focus should also be put on local businesses and not just multinational corporations.

CSOs have difficulties to engage because they are more concerned by how economic growth is generated, rather than how big/sustained economic growth is. In the business agenda, the poor are perceived as consumers, suppliers, producers, but not as workers with rights and citizens with voice.

Private sector led development and Public-Private Partnership (PPP) models will lead to further commodification of natural resources, and deny access to social services for the poorest. While initiatives are launched to better measure the effective contribution of economic operators, it is of utmost importance to involve CSO as a source of independent evidences of business contribution to development from a human rights-based approach perspective.

Alliance Sud representative intervened to draw attention on the diverse reality of business engagement and on the need to address as well bad corporate behaviors which can create poverty by making farmers landless, disrupting communities livelihoods, increasing the silent masses of working poor who cannot afford a decent life. And in this respect, voluntary solutions usually promoted (guidelines, standards…) are not enough. A point was also made that in many countries, making the environment attractive to foreign investors translate in restrictions on basic rights (like freedom of assembly, association, expression, access to information…) and poor legal frameworks on workers’ rights and environmental safeguards.

While this Global Partnership expands in diversity, the risk is that it becomes less concrete in shared commitments and more unbalanced in power. For the final Communiqué, CSO had to struggle to maintain Busan level of commitments. While the human rights-based approach is still only mentioned in relation to CSO, greater transparency and accountability was finally re-introduced for private sector actors.

One major challenge remains to achieve a just development architecture to redress the inequities and injustices of the current development paradigm. An inclusive partnership does not ensure inclusive development. If a clear shift has been made from Accra to Busan in focusing from «effective aid» to «effective development cooperation», more needs to be done to address the effectiveness of development itself, in terms of gender inclusiveness, environmental sustainability and respect of Human Rights.

Anne-Sophie Gindroz attended the conference in Mexico-City on behalf of Alliance Sud.

For further information see the longer version of this article.

- See more at: http://alliancesud.ch/en/policy/aid/global-partnership-for-effective-dev...

Source: Alliance Sud.