SWAC openings

The Sahel and West Africa Club

Dakar, 30 March 1976 th

• In 1974, France and USA declared the need for emergency aid to the Sahel following the 1973 drought. They asked Maurice Williams - Chairman of the Development Assistance Committee (DAC) and Special Advisor to President Carter on the Sahel - to consult the leaders of the Sahel countries to find out how the OECD could support them.

• Anne de Lattre (FRA) and Roy Stacy (USA) were appointed to lead the initiative, with a founding conference of the Club des Amis du Sahel (CAS) held in 1976, attended by the Presidents of of Senegal and Mauritania, the Secretary General of the OECD and the Chairman of the OECD's Development Assistance Committee amongst others.

The Club Since 1976, a large number of structures and initiatives have been created to deal with different crises that have hit Africa and the region more specifically. The Club endures in its niche, uniquely borne of the idea that it is when we are overwhelmed by emergencies, we most need to step back and look to the future.

• The Club was founded on the conviction that crises and change are inextricably linked.

• The Club was not created to manage crises, but to better anticipate them.

• The Club was not created to change policies itself, but to give policymakers the evidence and analyses of the structural changes they will have to accompany; and of the crises they will have to anticipate.

Our Members & Technical Financial Partners

The Club’s Mandate By now called the Sahel and West Africa Club (SWAC), in 2009/10 the Members revised the Mandate and the structure of the Club into what it resembles now…. “…an instrument of monitoring, prospective analyses and dialogue that ensures an independent analysis of the socio-economic and political evolutions of the region, as well as the relationship between these evolutions and global issues.

The Club contributes to the effectiveness of action taken by its Members and other stakeholders by providing information and prospective analyses to help better anticipate the potential for development and conflicts in West Africa.”

The President is nominated by the Members for a mandate of 4 years, which is renewable once.

Recent Honorary Presidents : 2009 - 2018: Francois-Xavier de Donnea (BEL) 2019 - 2022: Ibrahim Assane Mayaki (NIG) 2023 - : Hadizatou Rosine Sori-Coulibaly (BUR) Ms. Rosine Sori-Coulibaly was nominated in early 2023.

SWAC Governance Structure

Strategy & Policy Group (SPG): Honorary President Director of the Secretariat

Secretariat The Strategy and Policy Group, composed of SWAC Members and technical financial partners.

It appoints an Honorary president, who represents the Members and to whom the Director reports. It meets at least once a year, usually in June.

Programme of Work & Budget (PWB) OUR NETWORKS

OUR DATA PLATFORMS

The Food Crisis Prevention Network (RPCA) aims to build a coherent and shared understanding of the region’s food and nutrition situation, and to inform decision making. It is co-animated with the CILSS.

Africapolis is our research and data visualisation tool used to map, analyse and understand urbanisation and urban growth in Africa. It provides, uniquely, a standardised and geospatial database on urbanisation dynamics in Africa.

OUR REPORT SERIES

Mapping territorial transformations in Africa (MAPTA) is SWAC’s interactive platform, identifying the territorial transformations the region is facing, particularly focusing on several topics: security, climate and gender.

The West African Studies book series examines current economic and social issues in West Africa focusing on urbanisation and security. Our two flagship publications, regularly published, are: Urbanisation and Conflicts in North and West Africa and Africa’s Urbanisation Dynamics.

The West African Papers explore African socio-economic, political and security dynamics from a regional and multidisciplinary perspective.

Food-security.net provides analyses, reports, data and maps on food and nutrition security (FNS), produced in collaboration with key regional actors (CILSS, ECOWAS and UEMOA) and other stakeholders of the Food Crisis Prevention Network (RPCA).

The ECOWAS Agricultural Trade Programme (EAT) A GIZ – ECOWAS programme to “Strengthen the capacity of the ECOWAS Commission to Promote Regional Agricultural Trade“ 1. Strengthening the quality of trade and market intelligence in the region • Estimation of intra-regional food flows in West Africa / food and nutrition security / Agricultural development /Designing coherent food, agricultural and trade policies 2. Assessing the current trade policy environment in ECOWAS • Private / public sector perception surveys / inform trade policies and instruments 3. Strengthening ECOWAS Trade Policy Promotion • Policy dialogue / collaborations / networks

What we (still) know

“In marked contrast to official intra-African trade, unrecorded transborder trade (UTT) appears to be on the increase throughout much of Africa. Despite the constraints of poor transportation, difficult communications, and government restrictions, many Africans are responding to market signals transmitted through UTT.” (1990, P. Barad, The Long-term Perspective Study of SSA,

“Intra-Sub-Saharan African Trade: is it too little?”

(1993, F. Faroutan and L. Pritchett, World Bank)

World Bank)

Why does it matter

40% of GDP

1

60% of employment

2

50% of HH budget

(Share of food economy in West Africa)

2016, Emerging opportunities in West Africa’s food economy, SWAC/OECD 2 2018, Agriculture, food and jobs in West Africa, SWAC/OECD 1

1

Something new?

“Regional Food Balance Sheet (RFBS) [...].The RFBS will inform data-driven decisions around production support, trade policy, and stock management by governments, business decision-making and investment by the private sector […]. This initiative was in response to the lack of reliable, timely, and accurate data for food and nutrition security related decision-making in many Sub Sahara Africa countries […]. In recognition of these data gaps and needs, COMESA Council of Ministers, in 2020 directed COMESA Secretariat, to implement a COMESA-wide RFBS initiative.”

(2022 comesa.int)

“…giving information to traders increases switching across markets and routes, leading to large increases in traders’ profits and significant formalization of trade. Consistent with the model, this has general equilibrium effects – specifically, a 7% reduction in consumer prices in agricultural markets. Taken together, the results point to the centrality of information frictions in informal trade and highlight the promise of new information technology.”

(2023 E. Wieseman, Border Trade and Information Frictions: Evidence from Informal Traders in Kenya)