This was during a one-day steering committee session that brought together government officials and UNDP partners on April 8, 2024, in Yaounde, Cameroon.
Cameroon’s government through the Ministry of Economy, Planning and Regional Development (MINEPAT), the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), and some ministerial departments associated with this support program met on Monday, 8th of April 2024 in Yaounde.
The steering committee which gathered several officials and representatives of ministries involved in the program, was chaired by MINEPAT’s Secretary General, Jean Tchoffo.
For close to four hours, participating experts were subjected to a review of the challenges and constraints of this program during 2023; examining activities to be carried out in 2024 and outlining some core recommendations that will serve as a roadmap for the projects’ duration.
At the kick-off of the session, it was indicated that one of the areas of the fruitful cooperation established between UNDP and the government of Cameroon is the support program for strategic governance and economic resilience which is divided into two components: the project to support the production of national strategic instruments (PAPRINS) and the project to support economic resilience (PAREC).
In his keyword address, Martin Hart-Hansen, Deputy Resident Representative of UNDP, first retraced the genesis of this program that was created in 2023, in an attempt to move away from the traditional siloed project approach and structured around participatory and synergistic approach between the PARRINS and PAREC projects, benefitting from many years of experience on the issues of strategic instruments, monitoring of public policies and improving the resilience of economic entities, notably small and medium-sized enterprises, start-ups and cooperative societies.
Mr. Hart-Hansen took advantage of this meeting to unveil the positive results yielded through the PAPRINS and PAREC projects from 2019 to 2022.
“PAPRINS provided strategic support to the government in the development of the NDS 30 and the production of several instruments and tools for analyzing public policies as the guide for integrating the sustainable development goals, SDGs, and the vision of the NDS30 into the municipal development plans; cost of the SDGs; the voluntary national reports on the SDGs; sectoral strategies; evaluation of public policies, etc. PAREC, for its part, contributed to strengthening agricultural value chains of cassava, beans, onions rice, peanuts, cowpeas, and corn in the pilot communes in Northern and Eastern Cameroon; the establishment of a market information system (CAMIS) to reduce the asymmetry of information on prices; improving the digital ecosystem of eight microfinance establishments; to the development of a digital transformation strategy for these microfinance institutions, following which a shared cost banking system and a payment aggregator were acquired.” He said.
He further underscored the strides recorded during the previous year (2023) within the framework of these two key projects. The numerous business opportunities to which the PAREC project contributed and multiple actions emanated from that of PAPRINS.
Mr. Hart-Hansen also praised the dynamism and relentless desire of the government of Cameroon and UNDP to support efforts in favor of development that address the problems of the population.
Regarding prospects for the current year (2024), he called on the national coordinators of the two projects to strengthen synergies.
The National Director of PAPRINS project, Dr. Saidou Hamadou said the holding of this first steering committee meeting for the year 2024, was aimed at reviewing effective means and strategies that will help boost the financing of these two projects englobed in the support program.
Dr. Saidou Hamadou reassured the media about the various communication plans that were put in place to address the needs of targeted populations as well as effective and timely interventions that were set in motion in the course of the program.
Elise Kenimbeni
