Welcome to NeST Africa!

SAIIA is proud to have co-hosted with Oxfam the first meeting of this chapter.

Background

NeST was established in 2014, on the side-lines of the Mexico High Level Forum on Effective Development Co-operation, and in response to the 2013 Delhi Conference of Southern Providers and subsequent meetings in Beijing. It is a forum of think-tanks and academics from the global South committed to generating, systematising and sharing knowledge on South-South approaches to international development co-operation.

The NeST Africa chapter was established at the beginning of 2015 as a multi-stakeholder platform to discuss the issues, challenges and opportunities of development co-operation in Africa, and unpack the role of South Africa, other emerging donors, and the contribution of south-south co-operation to the development of the continent.

The work of NeST Africa will span from analytical frameworks and toolkits, evidence-based field research in Africa, capacity-building and training services, policy support and improving data quality and availability in the arena of South-South Cooperation.

NeST Africa provides inputs into global and regional debates such as the African Platform for Development Effectiveness (AP-Dev), Africa Vision 2063, the Post-2015 Development Agenda, Financing for Development (ffd), BRICS/IBSA Africa Summits and the Global Partnership for Effective Development Co-operation (GPEDC).

NestAfrica poster — Click here to download larger version SSC framework.

Members

Some of the members of NeST Africa include the South African Institute of International Affairs, the Wits School of Governance, Oxfam South Africa, Reality of Aid Africa, Afrodad, the Uganda NGO Forum, the Institute for Security Studies, the University of Johannesburg, among many others. African government agencies and multilateral organizations are also closely involved in NeST activities. Click here for a list of all members.

Events

Since the beginning of the 2015 NeST Africa has:

Launched the NeST South Africa reference group, 28 January 2015
Hosted a Multi-Stakeholder Policy Dialogue on ‘Emerging Donors in Africa’, 3 March 2015
Hosted a NeST technical workshop dedicated to developing a conceptual and methodological framework for south-south co-operation, 2 to 5 March 2015
Hosted a NeST technical working group meeting to develop indicators to measure the quality of South-South relations and processes, 2 to 4 September 2015
Hosted a NeST South Africa meeting, 2 September 2015
Launched a book on Institutional Architecture and Development: Responses from Emerging Powers, 4 September 2015
Held a seminar, ‘Peace-building and Development in Africa through South-South Co-operation’, on 23 November 2015
Held a NeST technical working group meeting, ‘Defining, measuring and reporting South-South Cooperation,’ on 17-18 December 2015

Resources

Book: Developing institutions for South-South Cooperation

South-South Cooperation has been increasing dramatically over the last thirty years. But how is this assistance co-ordinated, and how do Southern countries deal with the institutions required to manage and disburse this assistance? A new book, Institutional Architecture & Development: Responses from Emerging Powers tackles these questions.