A two-day preparatory consultative workshop on aid effectiveness opened at the Kigali Serena Hotel Tuesday drawing delegates from different parts of the world.

The workshop, jointly organised by the Governments of Rwanda and Ghana, is preparing for Africa Region Accra Third High-level Forum (HLF-3) due to take place from September 2-4 in Accra, Ghana.

The Kigali forum is a stepping stone to help build consensus by sharing experiences so as to have meaningful contributions in Accra.

"As you recall, partner countries and development partners endorsed the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness (March 2005), committing to advance the implementation of the core principles of ownership, alignment, harmonisation, managing results, and accountability to improve aid effectiveness and better achieve development results,” Philibert Afrika, a top official of the African Development Bank (AfDB) explained.

Africa, the Director of Operations Policies and Quality Review Department  pointed out that the forum aims to review progress, identify challenges, and key actions needed to broaden and deepen the implementation of the commitments undertaken in Paris.

"We also aim at sustaining and enhancing political support for concrete actions particularly at the country level,” he added.

The Minister of Finance and Economic Planning, James Musoni, told the delegates of the need to keep the momentum on aid effectiveness.

"Let us use this opportunity to share experiences and reflect on the way the Paris Declaration targets will be met. Let us define how African countries can contribute and shape the agenda of the Accra High-Level Forum to address their specific priorities and constraints,” Musoni stressed.

Participants will also tackle aid effectiveness in fragile and conflict situations, sectoral application of the Paris Declaration, and implications of new aid architecture on aid effectiveness. The issue of increased volume and predictability of aid is also expected to be discussed.

"The Accra Forum needs to go beyond the issue of quality of aid to address the need for scaling-up and predictability of aid,” Musoni urged.

The African Development Bank (ADB), World Bank, Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), DFID and UNDP are sponsoring the Kigali event.

The AFDB is organising a ministerial round-table on aid effectiveness on May 11, 2008 in Maputo, Mozambique.

Ends