Mobilising sufficient resources has been a challenge for low income countries, particularly those in the Sub-Saharan Africa region. Official development assistance (ODA) has been declining, while commitments to provide more aid have largely remained unfulfilled as donor countries have cut back on development assistance budgets. The need for governments to mobilize additional and more sustainable  development financing through other sources has generated renewed interest among governments and development practitioners.

As part of effort to support member countries’ endeavour to mobilise additional resources for implementing national, continental and global development agendas, MEFMI offered an e-learning course on Development Financing Options from 23 April to 14 June 2019. The main objective of the course was to enhance participants’ understanding of the main sources of and trends in development finance. Specific objectives were to:

• Enhance participants’ understanding of the magnitude of development financing requirements as well as implications of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Agenda 2063 for scaling-up development finance;
• Enhance participants’ understanding of the opportunities and challenges arising from the evolving development finance landscape; and
• Enhance their knowledge of the main sources of and trends in development financing options, associated costs and risks as well as highlighting opportunities, challenges and complexities associated with allocating and channelling them to fulfil continental and global goals.

A total of 37 officials from 10 MEFMI member countries participated in the course. Participants indicated that the course met the learning objectives, adding that it was practical, relevant and impactful. One summed it as follows: “As a developing country, the need for concrete policies in development financing and options to meet the development needs and therefore reduce poverty and achieve better living standards cannot be gainsaid. The course is therefore important towards implementing concrete strategies to sustainably mobilise resources in the face of the changing financing landscape and debt sustainability imperatives. It also informs and provides a good basis to influence policy buy-in and drive the agenda on resource mobilisation”

As part of efforts to support member countries’ endeavour to mobilise additional resources for infrastructure development, MEFMI plans to hive-off some modules of this course and offer them as stand-alone courses, starting with the domestic debt operations and local currency bond market development in 2020 and international sovereign bond issuance in 2021. The objective is to widen the scope for content to be pitched to the level that better captures the intricacies of each financing option, knitted closely with how countries could tailor strategies to attract and manage such flows. The Institute will also provide technical assistance on these areas to member countries in the form of in-country training and missions.