China Consultations on CSO Development Effectiveness
Under the umbrella of the Open Forum for CSO Development Effectiveness the China Association for NGO Cooperation, CANGO together with a core group of six other Civil Society Organizations hosted the China Consultations on CSO Development Effectiveness in Beijing from July 31 to August 02, 2010.
The first two days saw an event for CSO representatives only with more than 40 participants from all over China. On the third day they were joined by representatives from the government, donor organizations and other development actors for a multi stakeholder dialogue.
The China Consultations were part of a global CSO consultation process on development effectiveness which started after the Accra Forum on Aid Effectiveness in 2008 to form a special CSO contribution to the international discussion on aid and development effectiveness leading to the next High-Level Forum in Seoul 2011.
A very important event was the Paris High-Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in 2005 which came up with the Paris Declaration stating five principles to improve aid effectiveness as an agreement between donor and recipient governments (www.oecd.org/dac/effectiveness). These principles focus on the needs and the integration of the developing countries, reforming aid architecture towards a more equal role of donor and recipient countries.
The Accra Agenda for action as the outcome of the Accra Forum in 2008 clearly mentioned the significant role of Civil Society Organizations and included paragraph 20 as a landmark achievement for the recognition of CSOs as independent development actor.
However, CSOs are not signatories to the Paris Declaration and they were not officially part of the process ahead of the agreement. The latest since 2008 CSOs have been thinking about their own perspective and role in terms of development effectiveness.
With the Open Forum for CSO development effectiveness they started their own discussion process on how to increase the effectiveness of their work in order to serve the people of their target groups, i.e. especially the poor and marginalized ones.
The Open Forum process includes international, regional and national meetings from 2009-2011.
At the China Consultations Chinese CSOs discussed elements of a CSO development effectiveness framework including dimensions, key principles, indicators, implementation guidelines and mechanisms as well as minimum standards for an enabling environment of CSO development work. Each topic was introduced by a resource person followed by group discussions of the CSO representatives.
The China Core Group consisting of CANGO, the Ewenke Women Sustainable Development Association, China Development Brief, Xiamen Green Cross Association, Shaanxi Western Development Foundation, Chongqing Green Volunteer Association and the Asia Pacific Mission for Migrants, Hong Kong will work on a concise report of the China Consultations to be provided to the organizers of the Open Forum and integrated into the global CSO process as contribution to the High-Level Forum in Seoul 2011.
In order to make it a sustainable process also within the country Chinese CSOs have been discussing to establish a China Development Effectiveness Network providing related information and an exchange platform for all Chinese NGOs to participate in.
