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Enhancing local governance in Asia and Africa

23 January 2007

The Commonwealth Secretariat is organising a programme for senior officers from Asia and Africa to enhance local government services in metropolitan cities.

The workshop, designed for about 30 officials involved in planning, policy formulation, implementation and management of local urban services, is taking place in New Delhi, India, from 29 January to 3 February 2007.

“A major challenge faced by managers in metropolitan cities in the Commonwealth is to make the urban services efficient, equitable and cost-effective,” said Richard Gold, Interim Director of the Secretariat’s Governance and Institutional Development Division (GIDD), which is managing the workshop.

“It has to be done not only by providing quality services and through the creation of urban infrastructure, but also by catering for the incremental population.”

The programme will focus on a number of issues relating to the sustainability of metropolitan cities in light of contemporary trends and best practices across the world.

“Local governments, especially in the big cities, have to strengthen their capability to take up new responsibilities and to strengthen service delivery through the productive use of existing assets,” stated Dr Srinivas Sampath, Adviser and Head of the Asia-Pacific Section in GIDD.

He added that the workshop will focus on building bridges between local government and private sector partners for the development and provision of local government services in metropolitan cities.

“Though it is a regional programme, selected countries from Africa have been invited to promote South-South dialogue and to share their experiences,” GIDD’s Programme Adviser Munawwar Alam said.

The programme is supported by the Commonwealth Fund for Technical Co-operation. It will be delivered in collaboration with the Society for Development Studies, India.