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Implementing the Paris Declaration & AAA and Launch of the Capacity Development Facility for Development Effectiveness

Welcome Remarks by
Rajat M. Nag
Managing Director General
Asian Development Bank

12 March 2009
ADB Headquarters, Mandaluyong City

Distinguished participants from the member countries, development partners, friends and colleagues.

A very warm welcome to all of you! We are delighted to have you in Manila for the Launch of the Capacity Development Facility for Development Effectiveness (CDDE). This facility is being hosted by ADB in partnership with UNDP, the Government of Japan, OECD-DAC and the World Bank.

ADB is strongly committed to the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness and has signed up on the Accra Agenda for Action (AAA) in September last year. The CDDE Facility reflects the commitment of ADB and other CDDE partners to provide a joined-up approach to strengthening capacities for development effectiveness in Asia-Pacific. In this regard, I would first like to make 3 brief comments regarding this initiative: The CDDE Facility is a demand-driven process: it responds to a demand that partner countries expressed during the 2008 DAC Survey and at the HLF-3 regional consultation process and it will, and should, remain demand driven in its design and approach.

The usefulness & success of CDDE depends on its members: all of us in the room are members. In this room we have rich expertise from a wide range of stakeholders – central ministries, line ministries, civil society, parliamentarians and donors. Each brings their own expertise and we hope that all of us as CDDE members will both benefit from the 3 concrete service lines the Facility offers, and help in delivering them.

CDDE, Innovation and global initiatives: the Facility will help us learn from each others experiences, help us codify them and share them – and in this way the CDDE Facility will, we hope, greatly contribute to and strengthen other international initiatives such as the International CD alliance, the UN Development Cooperation Forum and the OECD DAC working party on aid effectiveness.

I could talk much more about what this Facility will achieve and what support it will provide for long-term capacity development to the countries for the implementation of the Paris Declaration and the AAA. But instead I would like to challenge you with some key questions, which we should all think of carefully as we move forward on this initiative:

• How do we ensure that the CDDE facility is actually partner country and demand driven, and not donor driven?
• How do we ensure that the service lines under the Facility help the partner countries to improve their own development effectiveness, and not just aid effectiveness?
• How do actual peer-to-peer learning or south-south networks be established among the Asia Pacific countries, which aim to provide real improvements in national capacities for development effectiveness?
• How to ensure that countries in the region actually contribute to the institutional strengthening of the global aid architecture?

I believe the deliberations of the two days will discuss the three service lines that the Facility is proposing to provide. I will encourage the partner countries, the civil society organizations and the parliamentarians representing different countries to actually question and debate on these service lines. Ensure that whatever is decided here today will actually meet the development needs of the countries and the people, and lead to improved growth and poverty reduction in the region.

I will also urge you to question and fully understand the process through which your country and organization can seek resources and help from the facility.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for coming to this workshop and to wish you success in your deliberations.