Italian development aid in brief

1. Background and main reasons for the presence of Italian Cooperation

The Italian cooperation with Mozambique dates back to the beginning of the 70’s, with strong bilateral ties established since the support to the independence of the country. In the 80’s, Italy gave a strong support to infrastructures rebuilding and, after the signature of the Peace Agreement, it focused on a more institutional support to foster the post-war recovery. For Italy, as stated by the DGCS Three Year Guidelines (TYG), Mozambique is one of the most important priority countries in Sub-Saharian Africa.

The Italian action will be inspired by the principles of shared responsibility among stakeholders (Government, with its central and peripheral bodies, private sectors and civil society) and an active and transparent collaboration among all the involved actors; cooperation activities in the Country are based on their impact and on the available resources.

In agreement with Italy’s support to a holistic (“whole of country”) approach focused on economic growth as a tool to fight poverty, Italy pays attention to the mobilization of the different financial tools (commercial, private sector funds, innovative financial leverages, etc.) levered by all the stakeholders participating to the “Sistema Italia di Cooperazione”: thus, not only public funds but also those of the local government bodies, the private sector and the civil society.

On September 2nd 2010, Italy and Mozambique signed in Maputo a new Cooperation Framework Agreement, renewing the previous one dating back to 1996. At the same time, a new Cooperation Program was signed by the two Governments, in order to sustain the PARP, the strategic program to fight poverty drafted by the Mozambican Authorities.

The Program focuses on three main sectors: Agriculture and Rural Development, Health and Education.

2. Other international donors, coordination and opportunities of division of labor, joint evaluation exercises (Harmonization)

Italy, once the first donor in Mozambique at the beginning of the 90s, has progressively lost positions andis not among the first ten donor countries anymore. These are the USA, the UE, the UK, Sweden, the BAD, World Bank, Ireland, the Netherlands, Germany and Canada (source: ODAMOZ).

The European Commission, with its 2008-2013 EFD program, worth 746 million euro, is active mainly on road infrastructures, agriculture and rural development and regional economic development. Besides, governance remains a focus for the Commission, while it has announced its disengagement from the Health Common Fund. Almost half of the EU financial envelope is channelled by General Budget Support.

In December 2012 Mozambique was included among the countries considered for the experimental launch of the Joint Programming exercise. However donor coordination is still challenging and is mainly pursued in the G-19 forum (Italy holds currently the Presidency of the Group), gathering all donors taking part in the General Budget Support.

The main goal of Donors harmonization is to align their action with the PRSP, locally known as PARP (Action Plan to Reduce Poverty 2011-2014), which is the main strategic programming document for the Government of Mozambique as well as for its development partners.

3. Other expressions of the Italian Cooperation System in the country (NGOs, universities, local authorities, private sector) and strategies for their involvement

More than 20 Italian NGOs are present in the Country. They are co-financed by the DGCS, by EU funds or privately raised funds. Their main working areas are agriculture, health, environment protection, garbage recycling.

The Italian cooperation system also includes activities related to corporate social responsibility, directly managed by private sector enterprises, in particular by ENI, the Italian Gas&Oil State Company, which are now in the formulation phase. ENI finances a mix of activities implemented by Italian and International NGOs as well as by UN Agencies.

The Italian Embassy is actively involved in supporting NGOs action and maintains a constant dialogue with other Italian stakeholders including the private sector. This dialogue is mainly aimed at forging a systemic approach, creating synergies and added value to the different actions carried out in partnership with Country. The R&D italian system (Universities of Rome, Sassari, Sardegna Ricerche) is a well established presence cooperating with the E. Mondlane University or, as in the case of CNR, to support the Government’s action in the field of climate change. Italian local administrations are also active in the Country (Provincia di Trento with a development program at District level, Provincia di Bolzano and the Municipality of Reggio Emilia, with education initiatives and rural development).

4. General objectives of the Italian cooperation in the country, sharing with counterparts and consistency with international guidelines on aid effectiveness

Italian cooperation’s main goal in Mozambique is to actively support the Government in its pro-poor action plan as portrayed in Government’s strategic documents and specifically in the PARP, singed in Maputo on May 3rd 2011.

In this context, the Government of Mozambique has defined a range of sector plans, each of them describing policies and objectives to which the Italian cooperation is aligned. These documents are the results of a consultative process with all the development stakeholders and the civil society. Furthermore, as per the case of agriculture and education, they are the result of regional policies dictated by NEPAD and AU.

Italy is a member of the G-19 group, i.e. the donors group supporting the State General Budget and financing the Common Funds in Health, Agriculture and Education. This is the forum where the political dialogue takes shape. Beside these, Italy finances bilateral programs drafted to support the national sector plans. Italian bilateral contributions are recorded in the State Budget of the State of Mozambique.

In Mozambique, Italy feels particularly committed in implementing the recommendations born by OSCE/DAC Conferences on Effectiveness, the last one being Busan.

The changing Mozambique’s economic context, its fast growing economy, the huge mineral reserves are creating new challenges; these need new answers, developing an innovative strategy producing partnerships uniting the Italian Cooperation, the private sector and the Government of Mozambique.

To do this, Italy is conducting internal evaluations leading to the elaboration of one or more models to create synergies between development cooperation and private capital modalities of action, with the aim, common to all stakeholders, of reducing poverty and generating income.

5. Sectors of intervention and expected results

The Italian cooperation will carry on its action in support to its traditional sectors assuring continuity to its initiatives. Although in Mozambique the Division of Labour’s process is far form being fully and efficiently operational, donors, being EU Members or not, work in close partnership with the Government, each one concentrating in the sectors were they have a demonstrated comparative advantage (with the possible exception of the BRICS). As a result, in a view of strengthening harmonization, Italy will concentrate financial resources in three principal sectors: agriculture and rural development, education and health. The Italian cooperation, applying the principle stated in its Three Year Guidelines, will pay particular attention to governance as a cross-cutting issue, putting particular emphasis on gender mainstreaming in all initiatives.

• Agriculture and rural development: Italy will continue its initiative in two provinces (Sofala and Manica). This is aimed to promote food production and productivity, the development of chain value and the support to the private sector by creating a Service Center strictly connected to CEPAGRI, the rural development body of the Government of Mozambique. The initiative will support the development of forest inventories aimed at enhancing and rationalizing the use of natural resources, with focus on environment as another cross-cutting issue. The goal is to increase both income and production of the population living in those two Provinces, by shortening the chain value and improving the distribution of the increased income. The program, financed with 16 million euro, started in 2009 and its end is foreseen by 2015.

• Education: three initiatives will be activated. The first one will confirm the Italian participation to the Common Fund FASE. Italy will contribute to it with 3,4 million euro. The second will extend the Italian support to the vocational education sub sector, by delivering a 35 million euro soft loan. The initiative aims at rehabilitating technical school buildings (agriculture and tourism) and at reinforcing the educative system providing better service. By their nature, technical institutes should be linked to the territory and the productive sector, thus the initiative will actively search synergies with the private agro-industrial Italian sector. Third, the program to support the University E. Mondlane is now in its starting phase. The aim is to foster research capability, to connect it to the Italian university system and to the international research network.

• Health: Previously approved initiatives will be continued in order to sustain the health sector through hospital rehabilitation and human capital reinforcement, as well as the Italian support to the Common Fund PROSAUDE. The Italian cooperation contribution for the three afore mentioned initiatives amounts to 7,5 million euro. Linking agriculture to nutrition is one of the mandates of AgRED and SESTAN. Italy is evaluating the possibility to activate a specific initiative in this field. Finally, the trilateral program Italy – Mozambique – Brazil for the rehabilitation and sanitation of the Chamanculo C slum should be considered as an activity supporting the general welfare of the area’s residents.

• As far as the Italian contribution to governance is concerned, the activities are focused on the participation to the General Budget Support (5 million/year), to the SISTAFE (0,7 million euro).

Italy intends to start a new initiative in support of the National Statistic Institute (INE) to foster its capability to produce solid data, useful in evaluating and monitoring Government’s performance in implementing the PARP.

Another field of activity is the support of governmental efforts in environmental protection. A community based approach for the development and economic exploitation of the trans-boundary (South Africa, Zimbabwe and Mozambique) National Park has a great potential. The creation of a regional network for the protection and management of the natural resources and genetic biodiversity is another possibility under evaluation, as is the drafting of a project aimed at increasing transparency in the extractive industry, in line with the priorities of the G8.

The program to build the Nhacangara Dam and to rehabilitate the Maputo draining systems is still active, although facing some challenges.