Delivering the Local Development Practices and Instruments in West Africa

and their relationship to the Millennium Development Goals

A Synthesis of Case Studies from UNCDF Programmes in Benin, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Mali, Niger and Senegal.

September 2006

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Foreword

It is a pleasure and an honour for me to present this report on UNCDF’s experiences with local development and decentralization in West Africa. The report represents a synthesis of studies on UNCDF work in six countries of the sub-region (Benin, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Niger, Mali and Senegal). Its purpose is to present new thinking and approaches to local development and also to stimulate and support an exchange of ideas among practitioners, locally-elected officials, citizens and development partners.

We do not pretend to have produced an exhaustive study of the problems and dynamics of decentralization and local development in West Africa. Rather, we wish to move the discussion in such a way as to advance decentralization and local development policies and encourage policy makers and practitioners to take the Millennium Development Goals into account in all activities at the local level.

This report presents an analysis of the political and legal contexts in which local development projects take place and explains how this environment influences their implementation. It also highlights the difficulties UNCDF and its development partners face in implementing decentralization policies and programmes in the region. Furthermore, the report describes the instruments and tools commonly used in UNCDF’s decentralization and local development projects and focuses on the development results obtained. Finally, the report pays a great deal of attention to partnership in all its forms. On a broader note, the report seeks to link decentralization and local development in local communities in rural areas with the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.

We believe this study fills an important gap among practitioners worldwide concerning decentralization and local development in West Africa. It also makes a valuable and unique contribution to knowledge about community development experiences in rural areas. This region of Africa is a constantly evolving testing ground for experimentation. New approaches and tools are tried while others are improved so that governments and development partners can make use of them to help achieve the Millennium Development Goals. It is in this context that we are pleased to present our experiences and to show how governments, local authorities and citizens can work together to solve the problems they are facing.

I would like to express my appreciation to our UNCDF colleagues in the countries concerned, our development partners and collaborators and to our closest and most important partner, the UN Development Programme, with whom we worked closely in every country and without whom this study would not have been possible. Lastly, I would like to express my special and deep appreciation to Christian Fournier, UNCDF’s Regional Technical Advisor in West Africa, who was the leader and driving force behind this important study.

Richard Weingarten
Executive Secretary, UNCDF
September 2006