Throughout 2019, the African Capacity Building Foundation (ACBF), the African Union’s specialised agency for capacity building, continued to press towards its mandate to build human and institutional capacity in Africa. In order to fulfil its vision of an, ‘Africa capable of achieving its own development,’
ACBF partnered with peer organisations and various partners to support a number of continental and regional initiatives and programs that enhanced the implementation of Agenda 2063 and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) while putting the continent further on the road for achieving the goal of the “Africa We Want”.
2019 will be remembered for many highs which include the following;
- Continuing in its mandate as the specialized agency of the African Union for capacity development, the ACBF held key assessments of the capacity needs of critical regional institutions, including the successful completion of a comprehensive review of the organizational structure of COMESA
- Establishment of the first ever think tank in the Union of the Comoros, the Centre for Analysis and Research on Public Policy (CNARPP).
- ACBF participated in key strategic studies to enhance the capacity required for Africa’s socio-economic transformation, which increased its visibility as a knowledge-driven institution. Key among these studies were the following:
*Africa Capacity Report 2019, whose theme was: Fostering Transformative Leadership for Africa’s Development, which provided insights into the critical role that leadership plays in achieving development goals;
*The ACBF’s Report on Capacity Imperatives for the SDGs: In line with African Union’s Agenda 2063, which identifies the capacities that African countries need in order to take advantage of the opportunities presented by the SDGs to build economies that can sustain their development aspirations.
* The Core Indicator Handbook for SDGs and Agenda 2063, which served as a depository of key data collection skills that are critical to the work of RECs in coordinating integration;
* The Africa’s Development Dynamics 2019, which provided a platform for shared experiences among African economies on their unique developmental goals;
* The 2019 Report on the Status of Regional Integration in Africa, which was presented to the African Heads of State and Government in Niamey, Niger in July 2019;
* An independent assessment and study designed to determine the sustainability of and better integration of the Centre for Ticks and Tick-Borne Diseases (CTTBD) into the AU structures, which was presented to the AU Specialized Technical Committee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Water and Environment;
* The Government of the Republic of The Gambia launched the country’s Capacity Development Strategy developed by ACBF;
- In April 2019, the Foundation hosted the 6th Africa Think Tank Summit running under the theme: “Tackling Implementation Challenges for Africa’s Sustainable Development”; whose main aim was to provide a better understanding of why policies and programs are not effectively implemented in many African countries. The Summit made recommendations for enhancing implementation to achieve desirable development outcomes.
- The Foundation successfully implemented capacity building programs for women entrepreneurs in six economies (Chad, Congo, Liberia, Malawi, Mali and Rwanda), with special focus on organization, marketing and customer service, financial literacy, planning and organizing, human resources management;
- ACBF was instrumental in enhancing farmers’ productivity and access to markets in Ethiopia;
- The Foundation was also at the forefront of enhancing absorptive capacity and M&E in Zimbabwe and promoting domestic resource mobilization in Malawi
- Supporting and enhancing organizational monitoring and evaluation systems for civil society organizations involved in tobacco control, which has led to the passage of tobacco control legislations in Côte d’Ivoire, Ethiopia and Kenya.
- Enhancing the contributions of knowledge networks and communities of practice, including the African Think Tank Network and the Africa Communities of Practice (AfCoP) on Management for Development Results; documenting and sharing lessons learned in capacity development and increasing access to and use of knowledge on capacity development, and;
- As a knowledge-driven institution, the Foundation enhanced its visibility through increased media coverage, which saw it presented as a thought-leader on capacity building.
