The NEPAD Agency Chief Executive Officer Dr Ibrahim Mayaki has said that the shift from aid effectiveness to development effectiveness has been a critical turning point for Africa and an essential mechanism for effective public policy design and public finance management. Dr Mayaki was speaking on May 14 at a public lecture on development effectiveness in Africa at the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa.

Addressing graduates and young professionals of the Graduate School of Public and Development Management and the Institute for the Study of International Development, Dr Mayaki cited a statement by Christine Lagarde, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund in which she stated that “Africa’s public finances today are better managed than Europe’s and huge progress has been made in achieving development effectiveness.”

Dr Mayaki’s public lecture is among a series hosted by the NEPAD to debate Africa’s development agenda and NEPAD’s role in supporting effective development planning and implementation on the continent.

“In the past, aid dependency meant efficient nominal relationships between donors and aid-dependent countries. National interests were not taken into account. Development effectiveness is an invention of African countries for African ownership and less dependency on aid”, Dr Mayaki explained.

Aid today was still necessary, “but now it has a catalytic role to play in supporting national development systems for development effectiveness”, Dr Mayaki said.

As the implementing Agency of the African Union, the role of NEPAD is to support these processes, Dr Mayaki explained.

Speaking on human capital development, Dr Mayaki referred to the example of Tunisia where despite high literacy levels, infrastructure development and agricultural-led growth, youth unemployment was one of the main triggers of the Arab revolution. Drawing on lessons from Tunisia and addressing the needs of the biggest proportion of Africa’s population, the youth, will be key to “define what the future of our continent will be,” Dr Mayaki said.

It is for this reason that “Africa’s development effectiveness agenda must be about transformation and inclusive growth. African governments need to focus on a combination between bottom-up and top-down approaches. The citizens and the private sector have to play a more active role”, Dr Mayaki said.

Graduates and young professionals from Wits University discussed how to better integrate the continent and manage its natural resources, ensure food security and sustainable development, and what NEPAD’s contributions have been to Africa’s development agenda.

Responding to the question what NEPAD is doing to increase food security on the continent, Dr Mayaki said that the Agency was working through the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) towards empowerment of small-scale farmers so as to uplift 80 per cent of Africa’s population out of poverty.

The development of regional infrastructure was tackled through the Programme for Infrastructure Development in Africa (PIDA), Dr Mayaki said.