Paris High Level Forum .1 Participants and agenda

The second HLF was held in March 2005 in Paris. It was attended by 60 partner countries; 30 bilateral aid-providing countries and 30 development agencies, including multilateral and regional development banks; and civil society organisations. This was a much larger and more diverse audience than at the Rome HLF. There was also a much greater participation at the ministerial level than at Rome.

The Paris Agenda addressed an expanded agenda. It added “development results” to Rome’s two issues, as recommended by a Marrakesh meeting in 2004 (OECD DCD/DAC, 2005). Paris experienced a visible increase in partner countries’ engagement. Roundtables addressed concrete issues of aid effectiveness around five themes: ownership, alignment, harmoni-sation, managing for development results and mutual accountability.

Although partner countries were more vocal in the debate, the agenda and many contributions were led / made by aid providers, with the WB playing a substantial role. It chaired the Steering Committee set up to deal with substantive issues and chaired or co-chaired five of the Working Party’s five sub-groups (World Bank, 2005a).

CSOs were represented by 14 agencies. Some were based in more developed countries, including the Japan NGO Center for International Cooperation, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, ENDA Tiers Monde and the Canadian Council for International Cooperation; others were based in partner countries, such as the Tanzania Social and Economic Trust, Afrodad, and Reality of Aid network.

3.2.2 The Paris Declaration

The PD was an ambitious undertaking for its scope of commitments (56 in total) and the number of countries / institutions endorsing it. It called for adopting an elaborate set of 12 indicators, targets and a monitoring system to assess progress. These were organised under the five themes stated above, which later became known as the Paris Principles.

The 12 indicators were to be applied nationally and monitored inter-nationally. Box 11 at the end of Chapter 7 gives a list of indicators and targets agreed. The Declaration was also viewed as being a more balanced document of concrete commitments on both sides. Box 2 gives a review of the substance underlying each principle.

The 12 indicators had different targets, set for 2010. For ownership, at least 75 per cent of partner countries were to have operational development strategies by the target year. Under alignment, 50 per cent of technical cooperation flows were to be implemented through coordinated programmes. Aid not using partner countries’ public financial management systems was to be reduced by two-thirds. For harmonisation, 40 per cent of missions to partner countries and 60 per cent of analytic work were to be jointly conducted. For managing for results, a one-third reduction was to be achieved in the number of countries without transparent and monitorable performance-assessment frameworks. And for mutual accountability, all partner countries were to have mutual assessment reviews in place.⁸

The full text of indicators and targets, with the methodological basis for their application, gives an even more complex account of challenges ahead. Measurement soon became an issue in determining what data to gather and how to assess their significance in assessing progress. We will come back to this important issue later, when we discuss the monitoring surveys conducted for that purpose.

8 Despite a consensus on objectives and indicators, a persistent disagreement among aid providers on indicators and “targets” for 2010 threatened efforts to reach a final consensus on the whole package of commitments, which would have rendered the Declaration (or at least part of it) non-operational. It was the facilitating skills of the chair of the DAC, Richard Manning, using a Japanese compromise proposal, which finally led to an agreement to endorse the Declaration, except for the items in dispute – involving mainly Japan and the United States – which were to be sorted out by September 2005.

Box 2: The five Paris Principles – 2005

 Ownership: Partner countries were to exercise effective leadership over their development policies and strategies, and coordinate development actions. These included establishing prioritised results-oriented programmes and taking the lead in coordinating aid at various levels.

 Alignment: Aid providers were to base their overall support on partner countries’ national development strategies, institutions and procedures, including the use of strengthened country systems and supporting partner countries in strengthening their development capacities.

 Harmonisation: Aid providers were to implement common arrange-ments and simplify procedures; follow up on Rome commitarrange-ments;

reduce the number of separate, duplicative missions and field reviews;

agree on a more effective division of labour to deal with excessive aid fragmentation; and deliver effective aid to fragile states.

 Managing for development results: Managing and implementing aid was to be done in a way that focusses on achieving results, with partner countries acting to strengthen the links between development strategies and budget processes, and establishing frameworks to monitor progress against key dimensions of these strategies; and with aid providers committing to link country programmes to results and align them with performance-assessment frameworks.

 Mutual accountability: Partner countries and their aid providers were to become accountable in the use of development resources to their respective constituencies, as well as to each other, by strengthening the role of parliaments and reinforcing participatory approaches involving the broad range of development partners, and by aid providers providing transparent and timely information on aid flows.

Source: Author

Mindful of the challenges ahead, delegates stressed the importance of sustained political support and of engaging a wider circle of stakeholders.

Two monitoring surveys were to be carried out in 2006 and 2008 to assess progress. For now, there was a sense of accomplishment among delegates, in that the PD drew a roadmap for future actions, recognising aid

effectiveness as a joint responsibility. At the same time, partner-country delegates felt that the Declaration was essentially driven by the OECD/DAC and the WB. Some questioned the fairness in allocating responsibility for actions between partner countries and development partners. But it was too late to argue this point now. The key message carried home by partner-country representatives was the urgency of translating the PD into national action plans.

In a press release at the conclusion of the Paris meeting, Richard Manning stated:

In 2005, poverty and development are the issues of the year. Aid flows to developing countries are on the increase after a sustained drop for many years. So we must demonstrate that we are using that aid effectively. This will give people the confidence that aid helps the poorest people in the world, and that more aid is a sound investment in all our futures. (World Bank, 2005b)