1st USAID African Global Competitiveness Hub Meeting

March 3-5, 2008 - Accra, Ghana

In order to promote knowledge sharing and dialogue among the three African Global Competitiveness Hubs and their stakeholders, the USAID Knowledge Sharing and Analysis project (KSA) supporting the African Global Competitiveness Initiative and the West Africa Trade Hub (WATH) held the first annual meeting of Hub implementers, their USAID counterparts, and other stakeholders to engage in dialogue on the challenges of implementing regional trade programs, best practices and knowledge sharing, as well as certain management aspects of the Hubs themselves.

The organizers envisioned the Meeting to achieve five primary objectives. These objectives were to:
1. establish dialogue between the Hubs and their respective missions;
2. refine the common understanding of the goals and implementation strategy of the Hubs and AGCI at large;
3. achieve an exchange of best practices and lessons learned from past activities;
4. identify and promote areas of technical collaboration and knowledge sharing; and
5. develop a common message to highlight at the 2008 AGOA Forum in Washington.

Background documents
• Meeting agenda
• Meeting notes and session summaries
• Attendee list

Presentations

Monday, March 3, 2008
• Welcoming remarks - Henderson Patrick, USAID West African Regional Mission Director
• Best practices in supporting regional trade bodies - Ron Black, East and Central Africa Trade Hub
(file size: 20 MB PowerPoint)
• Best practices in supporting regional trade bodies - Andy Cook and Nathan van Dusen, West Africa Trade Hub (file size: 1.8 MB PowerPoint)
• Best practices in supporting regional trade bodies - Paulina Elago, Southern Africa Global Competitiveness Hub (file size: 0.8 MB PowerPoint)
• Managing regional-bilateral project relationships - Candace Buzzard, USAID East Africa Regional Mission (file size: 0.1 MB PowerPoint)

Tuesday, March 4, 2008
• Export Business Development - Finn Holm-Olsen, East and Central Africa Trade Hub and Addis Alemayehou, VEGA Ethiopia (file size: 31 MB PowerPoint)
• Export Business Development - Addis Alemayehou, VEGA Ethiopia (file size: 0.5 MB PowerPoint)
• Export Business Development - Amanda Hilligas, Southern Africa Global Competitiveness Hub
(file size: 1.1 MB PowerPoint)
• Export Business Development - Vanessa Adams, West Africa Trade Hub
(file size: 7.2 MB PowerPoint)
• Export Business Development - Abou Fall and Christine Nicolino, West Africa Trade Hub
(file size: 1.2 MB PowerPoint)
• USAID Business Growth Initiative - Marialyce Mutchler, USAID Business Growth Initiative
(file size: 0.9 MB PowerPoint)
• AGCI & RATES - Barry Fisher, USAID Regional Agriculture Trade Expansion Support (RATES) project
(file size: 14 MB PowerPoint)
• Overcoming infrastructure constraints - Andy Cook, West Africa Trade Hub
(file size: 25 MB PowerPoint)
• Overcoming infrastructure constraints - Silas Kanamugire, East and Central Africa Trade Hub
(file size: 14 MB PowerPoint)
• Overcoming infrastructure constraints - Gloria Magombo, Southern Africa Global Competitiveness Hub
(file size: 1 MB PowerPoint)

Wednesday, March 5, 2008
• Supporting public-private partnerships in Africa - Gerry Greeve, Intel
(file size: 4.4 MB PowerPoint)
• The future of the trade hubs - Jeffrey Cochrane, USAID West African Regional Mission
(file size: 0.3 MB PowerPoint)
• Dialogue on the 2008 AGOA Forum - Tony Carroll, Manchester Trade

Photos

Thumbnails	Captions (Click on Download if you need full size photo)
	(l to r) Henderson Patrick, Tom Herlehy, Sutherland Miller, and David Fischer open the 2008 Annual USAID African Global Competitiveness Hub Meeting. Download full size photo.
	Paulina Elago describes the Southern African Global Competitiveness Hub's best practices in supporting Regional Economic Communities. Download full size photo.
	Jeff Cochrane poses a question to the panelists. Download full size photo.
	David Fischer, Christine Nicolino and Paulina Elago deliberate in a group exercise on what defines a "best practice". Download full size photo.
	Ron Black, Amanda Hilligas and Jean-Paul Gauthier discuss performance monitoring indicators during a group exercise. Download full size photo.
	Marialyce Mutchler introduces the USAID Business Growth Initiative as a source of best practices in Enterprise Development. Download full size photo.
	Amanda Hilligas and Addis Alemayehou share their best practices in promoting export business development. Download full size photo.
	Tony Carroll provides some strategic insight into the upcoming 2009 AGOA Forum. Download full size photo.
	Andy Cook describes truckers reaction to the current West African road governance environment of bribes, delays and corruption. Download full size photo.
	(l to r) Christine Nicolino, Paulina Elago, Jeff Malick, Nathan van Dusen and Jeff Cochrane collaborate on a group exercise. Download full size photo.
	Gerry Greeve outlines Intel's success stories with public-private partnerships in Africa. Download full size photo.
	Jeff Cochrane poses a series of thought-provoking questions to the participants. Download full size photo.
	The group celebrates a successful first meeting of all four African Global Competitiveness Hubs and the three Regional Missions. Download full size photo.

For information, please contact:
David Fischer
Deputy Project Manager
Knowledge Sharing and Analysis (KSA) Project
USAID African Global Competitiveness Initiative
http://www.usaid.gov/locations/sub-saharan_africa/initiatives/agci.html
email: dfischer at ip3 dot org