National Liaison Officers Meet to Discuss the Technical Cooperation Programme in Africa

In his opening statement, Dazhu Yang, IAEA Deputy Director General and Head of the Department of Technical Cooperation, underscored the essential role of NLOs and AFRA NCs in the implementation of the TC programme, particularly in the development of a high quality programme, the establishment of national regulatory infrastructure, the monitoring of the programme and the development of partnerships. “You are central to national ownership of the TC programme and its successes,” said Mr Yang. “Without you, the TC programme could not be carried out effectively.”

Omar Amer Youssef, Ambassador of Egypt, representing the Chair of the Vienna-based African Group, also addressed the opening session. “This meeting is as an important opportunity for enhancing our collaboration with the IAEA.” Ambassador Youssef said. “The Vienna-based African Group encourages Member States to pay in full and on time, their financial contributions, TCF target shares and obligatory National Participation Costs.”  The opening session was also attended by representatives of the IAEA Permanent Missions in Vienna.

During the plenary and breakout sessions, the participants explored how to strengthen the project design process so as to respond more directly to national development needs and enhance the ownership of the TC programme, and they identified best practices gleaned during their implementation of national projects. Together, the 63 attending participants closely reviewed the implementation of the 2018–2019 programme, and discussed how to strengthen approaches to ensure the efficient implementation of the current cycle, which was launched in January 2020 and will continue to the end of 2021.

“NLOs and AFRA NCs need to enhance coordination with all relevant national stakeholders by establishing intersectoral committees to manage the TC programme,” said Shaukat Abdulrazak, Director Technical Cooperation Division for Africa.

The outcomes of and recommendations made by the participants of the five-day meeting were adopted and collated into a plan of action which will inform the way the TC programme is implemented in Africa for the next two years. The NLOs expressed their readiness to take follow-up actions at the country level to implement the meeting’s recommendations and to ensure the continuing high quality of the regional programme.

NLOs and National Liaison Assistants (NLAs) from 43 African Member States attended the meeting, including delegates from: Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Cote d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Sudan, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, the United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.