Second day of West and Central Africa regional implementation workshop: A pledge to have more performing projects in 2011!

On the second day of the West and Central Africa workshop participants were already sharing and exchanging their experience and knowledge at breakfast! After all that is the best moment of the day to share “fresh” ideas and the ‘thoughts’ you’ve slept on - and be ready to hear the reports of the four different working groups who the previous day had discussed the following topics.

• Rural entrepreneurship
• Professionalization of organizations
• Financing modes and modalities
• Good governance

The 4 working groups did an excellent job in identifying the fundamental pillars of successful value chain projects. They did an equally great job in identifying how the above four topics could and should be seamlessly integrated in the design and implementation of value chain projects.

The presentations sparked an animated and informed discussion during the plenary session. It was great to see the strong will of participants and their desire to succeed and work together so that next year the list of s

uccessful projects would become longer and longer.

Today, during the plenary session, the participants applauded Senegal’s Agricultural Development Project in Matam - Phase II, Niger’s Project for the Promotion of Local Initiative for Development in Aguié (PPILDA), Cape Verde’s Rural Poverty Alleviation Programme, Gambia’s Rural Finance Project, Ghana’s Rural Enterprises Project - Phase II and Mauritania Oasis Sustainable Development Programme.

Wondering why they got almost a standing ovation? Because they were the best top six 2010 performing projects in the West and Central Africa portfolio.

With 2011 just a couple of months away, the plenary discussed the challenges of how to improve project implementation so that next year the list of poor performing projects comes smaller or better even completely disappears and the list of top performers becomes even longer, thus offering more participants to share their successful stories and experiences.

This led to the afternoon sessions, where the participants discussed: the following topics:

• Monitoring and evaluation
• Withdrawal applications and procurement procedures
• Decentralization of IFAD
• Upscaling

Stay tuned, we’ll blog the outcomes of these discussions in the next couple of days. Tomorrow we’ll be going to the field and will be visiting a government funded projects.