Dr. Paul Engel ECDPM Director APEI Technical Meeting 26th & 27th September 2013 Lilongwe, Malawi

1. APEI Technical Meeting
26&27 September 2013
Lilongwe, Malawi
Public-private dialogue and
learning for
economic transformation
Dr Paul Engel
Director

2. We focus on the relations and cooperation between
Africa, the Caribbean, the Pacific and Europe
We think ‘development’ is not just a problem in
Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific
We link policy and practice for development – What
works? What doesn’t? How? Why?
We help improve the quality and impact of policy
reform processes
We help accelerate structured dialogue processes
between policy makers and relevant stakeholders
We study, assess and share the (intended and
unintended) effects of policies in practice
We work together with national (knowledge)
institutes in what we do
ECDPM – Independent European Centre
ECDPM Page 2

3. • Governments engage more with the private sector
as engine of growth; recognize the need to improve
the business environment in their countries
• Development finance institutions & banks: long
tradition of engaging the private sector; but so far
limited attention to improving the environment
businesses operate in
• Engagement of donors with private sector is more
recent for many; mixed feelings by donors (and
business)
• New context…
Private sector and development
ECDPM Page 3

4. “We want economic reform…”
= economic transformation
ECDPM Page 4
AIDA

5. “We want to engage the private
sector…”
ECDPM Page 5

6. • The private sector is going there anyway…
A billion good reasons: private financial
flows…!
ECDPM Page 6
…but largely to extractive…
and great risk of jobless growth

7. No such thing as THE “private sector” => need for
tailored approach to diverse clusters
Engaging the ‘private sector for development’
• Contribution to which development objectives?
• CSR or core business?
• Opening new markets/changing business models
• Profit or non-profit? Large or SMEs? Domestic or foreign?
• Employment, sustainability?
Not without policy and practical reform and ‘private
sector development’ as well:
• Improving the business environment &
• Building private sector capacity
Different types of engagement
ECDPM Page 7

8. • Private sector development
i.e. Trade agenda: domestic enterprises, value-addition,
exports, firm-level skills, …
• Private sector investment for development
New agenda: international, partnering with
(international) firms, offset risk, link producers &
suppliers, value chains, CSR to Shared value
• Private sector finance for development
Leverage private finance for development
• Public-private dialogue and economic reform
Business environment: identifying business drivers and
bottlenecks; define opportunities for policy and/or
practical improvement; i.e. in government regulations;
credit-access, industrial policy, etc.
Tailored approaches and roles:
ECDPM Page 8

9. • Diversity of countries
• Diversity of level of development
• Diversity of economic structures
• Diversity of business framework & organization
• Common integration objectives
• Converging interests
• Converging agenda
• Sharing experiences
=> APEI public – private dialogue; diversity is a
strength
No such thing as regional uniformity
either - APEI
ECDPM Page 9

10. APEI - Human Development Index
0
0.1
0.2
0.3
0.4
0.5
0.6
0.7
0.8
0.9
201220112010200920082007200620052000
H
D
I
V
A
l
u
e
Malawi
Mauritius
Mozambique
Seychelles
Zambia
Human
Development
Index
(HDI)
value
2012
2011
2010
2009
2008
2007
2006
2005
2000
Malawi
0.418
0.415
0.413
0.401
0.392
0.381
0.373
0.363
0.352
Mauri4us
0.737
0.735
0.732
0.727
0.725
0.72
0.715
0.708
0.676
Mozambique
0.327
0.322
0.318
0.312
0.306
0.301
0.291
0.287
0.247
Seychelles
0.806
0.804
0.799
0.795
0.793
0.792
0.785
0.781
0.774
Zambia
0.448
0.443
0.438
0.431
0.42
0.411
0.405
0.399
0.376

11. • Choose focus: Define policy and/or practical areas where
business interests & development objectives converge (i.e.
food security, credit, customs)
• Set objective: Create ever more business-friendly
regulatory environment … to promote business-driven
economic transformation…for sustainable & inclusive
development – define indicators for progress
• Connect to and/or build (knowledge) networks: to provide
timely inputs; business options, and to document lessons
and experiences; communicate results.
• Understand prerequisites for success: Requires political
will and a continuous active public-private sector
engagement…(i.e. monetary and time costs!)
…and often, accompanying measures
⇒ Sustained public – private dialogue
⇒ The process is as important as its content
Structured Public-Private Dialogue:
ECDPM Page 11

12. APEI –Doing Business Comparison
Economy
Ease
of
Doing
Business
Rank
Filtered
Rank
StarHng
a
Business
ProtecHng
Investors
Trading
Across
Borders
Enforcing
Contracts
Mauri4us
19
1
2
2
1
8
Seychelles
74
6
16
9
2
14
Zambia
94
8
7
13
30
15
Mozambique
146
20
10
5
16
22
Malawi
157
26
26
13
39
27
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 180
Ease of Doing Business Rank
Filtered Rank
Starting a Business
Protecting Investors
Trading Across Borders
Enforcing Contracts
Rank
WB Doing Business Indicators
Malawi
Mozambique
Zambia
Seychelles
Mauritius

13. “The objective is to create mutual engagement on the
part of governments and businesses to undertake policy
reforms with a view to improving the overall business
environment so as to strengthen the competitiveness of
enterprises, encourage linkages and facilitate exchanges
among APEI countries.” (ToR)
APEI Objective: public private
engagement for economic reform
ECDPM Page 13

14. How?
Facilitating APEI Government – private
sector engagement and progress
• Define common challenges
• Focus on solving business bottlenecks; set goals and
monitor progress.
• Build on existing national government and domestic
business experiences and, knowledge networks for
documenting, sharing and learning.
• Connect with APEI national and regional formal policy
making processes.
• Key principles: stakeholder drive and ownership of the
process; adequate knowledge and information
support; effective and efficient (virtual and face-to-
face) meetings; clear outputs and outcomes in line
with goals set.
Page 14ECDPM

15. • Independent, non-partisan foundation
• Strong orientation on process and ownership
• Intense connection to African policy and practice
• Experienced facilitators of structured dialogue and
multi-stakeholders sharing and learning
• Proven capacity to collect, synthesize and share key
information in brief handy formats
• Building on relevant experiences elsewhere –
successes & failures
• Close attention to the political economy of economic
transformation
• Experience in reporting back to governments and
business partners
ECDPM assets & possible roles
Page 15ECDPM

16. • Is the government committed to ‘going the extra
mile’ to improve the business environment in the
country?
• Which sector/cluster of the economy has priority?
• In this sector/cluster are business interests and
and development objectives converging?
• For each country, who should take part in the
structured dialogue in this cluster/sector?
• Will these stakeholders, in particular the private
sector, be interested in participating?
• How is this different from what is being done now?
• What can be done to make sure specific, visible
results are being achieved?
Some questions for discussion:
ECDPM Page 16

17. Thank you
www.ecdpm.org
Prof Dr Ir Paul Engel
pe@ecdpm.org
Director
Page 17