One year after Lisbon: the EU-Africa partnership at work
This Commission staff working document provides a first indicative overview of concrete short- and mid-term deliverables proposed by the Commission for the Africa-EU strategic partnership. Based on the results of the College-to-College meeting of October 2008 between the European Commission and the African Union Commission (AUC), preliminary discussions in the EU Implementation Teams, and a series of internal inter-service consultations, this working document identifies ongoing or planned activities through which the EU, and in particular the European Commission, could contribute the 8 thematic partnerships of the Action Plan.
However, the document recalls that successful implementation of this strategic partnership relies on the shared responsibility between African and the EU side. Within the EU, success depends on effective burden sharing, division of labour and coherence between Member States and the Commission.
The paper discusses the Commission’s plans and priority actions in the following areas: peace and security partnership, partnership on democratic governance and human rights, partnership on trade and regional integration, the MDG partnership, the energy partnership, the partnership on climate change, the partnership on migration, mobility and employment, partnership on science, information society and space, as well as addressing cross-cutting issues of the Joint Strategy and the Action Plan, such as gender and communication.
The Commission will also intensify its bilateral activities with the AUC in the field of institutional capacity building and administrative cooperation.
Over the coming months, the Commission will identify in greater detail the inputs from services which hold primary responsibility for the implementation of the thematic partnerships, as well as the financial instruments and resources that will be used. It describes the DGs involved.Regular inter-service consultations will review this paper as a 'living document'.
Such an updated “tableau de bord” will allow Commissioners and the Senior Management to provide the impetus for wider EU and euro-African efforts, and to exercise the necessary guidance and managerial oversight over the Commission internal implementation process. This should in particular improve the monitoring of progress, the addressing of possible shortfalls, and the allocation of the necessary financial and human resources to underpin the implementation architecture and - process.
A regularly updated review will also facilitate the compilation of consolidated EU inputs, bringing together Member States' and Commission initiatives, as contribution to future joint (EU African) progress reports.
A review of this working document will therefore be established before the first Ministerial EU-Africa Troika in 2009. Based on feedback from European and African stakeholders, this revision should also address the financing of the working arrangements and institutional architecture agreed in Lisbon, including the possible use by the AU of the EUR 55 million capacity building programme – managed by the AUC - to support further the participation of the African side.