Launch of the Malian CoP on MfDR

The Malian Community of Practice in Managing for Development Results (CoP-Mali/MfDR) was launched on April 22, 2010, in Bamako, Mali, with the support of the African Development Bank (AfDB). The highlight of this national event was the holding of the CoP-Mali/MfDR constitutional assembly, where participants adopted CoP-Mali/MfDR’s charter and formed its steering committee. The steering committee comprises 11 members with a two-year term of office.

The Minister responsible for the Budget presided at the opening ceremony, in the presence of the AfDB representative in Mali and the lead technical and financial partner (TFP). About a hundred people took part in this workshop, including parliamentarians, civil society, technical administrative services, local communities, trainers, researchers, and experts. The work was carried out in a participatory spirit. Discussions were open, honest, and constructive. TFPs took the opportunity to express their satisfaction that CoP-Mali/MfDR had been established, and reiterated their willingness to be supportive.


Mali’s Experiences in MfDR

In accordance with its charter, CoP-Mali/MfDR aims to promote the MfDR approach in Mali’s policies and strategies. CoP-Mali/MfDR will do so through information, awareness, training, and communication activities. CoP-Mali/MfDR plans to become an influential stakeholder in achieving poverty reduction objectives and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). This initiative is in line with the Government of Mali’s determination to make poverty reduction the number one development priority, with the support of its TFPs, especially the cooperation of Canada (as the lead TFP) and the AfDB.

For this purpose, the Government of Mali has launched several initiatives compatible with a Management for Development Results approach. TFPs have thus developed a Joint Country Support Strategy (SCAP) in consultation with Mali. The SCAP aims to provide effective support in implementing the Growth and Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (CSCRP).

How CoP-Mali came into being

In the context of these determined efforts to achieve results, a group of Malian managers belonging to the African Community of Practice in Management for Development Results (AfCoP-MfDR) deemed it necessary to establish a national community of practice in Mali. Prior to that, they had already mobilized to carry out the following activities:

• Discussion meetings were held among Malian members of the online platform of the African Community of Practice in MfDR
• Malian members engaged in advocacy with the poverty reduction technical unit, certain TFPs, and other practitioners. The emphasis was on demonstrating the value added of a national CoP to anchor MfDR culture in national development processes. Stakeholders hailed the initiative and said they understood the issues and challenges of MfDR. Some even said they were familiar with existing national communities. We sensed a growing awareness among stakeholders in these sessions. In practice, results are very mixed, since not all stakeholders have access to the same degree of information. For example, some regional, communal, and local levels may not yet have been introduced to MfDR.
• Malian members took part in AfCoP’s third annual meeting, held in Dakar in March 2010. Malian representatives discussed ways to institutionalize AfCoP in a sustainable manner and to increase the impact of its national communities on their respective countries. In particular, the meeting provided an opportunity to learn from the experiences of the Senegal and Niger communities.

Following these activities, practitioners were invited to volunteer to become involved in planning the CoP-Mali launch workshop. A roadmap was developed in this regard, and an organizing committee was formed at the first meeting.

Next steps

CoP-Mali has established five key goals for the next 12 months. The CoP-Mali will:

• seek TFP support for CoP-Mali/MfDR, based on an action plan.
• support development stakeholders – government, administrative technical mechanisms, technical and financial partners, civil-society organizations, the private sector – in applying results-based management (RBM) to all development programs and projects.
• establish RBM/MfDR focal points in the regions.
• adapt the CAP-Scan MfDR capacity self-assessment tool to the Malian environment, while defining analytical criteria.
• generalize result culture through awareness and training activities, especially for development stakeholders.
• create synergy between stakeholders and activities.

For any additional information, please contact CoP-Mali at cop-mali@afcop-grd.org.

This article was first published here.