Gaborone, 29 September 2022 (ECA) - The Economic Commission for Africa's (ECA) invited the government of Botswana to showcase its experience in applying the Integrated Planning and Reporting Toolkit (IPRT) to other countries after a successful IPRT training. The four-day workshop took place from 26-29 September 2022 in Gaborone, Botswana, and was organized by the ECA's Development Planning Section located in the Macroeconomics and Governance Division and the ECA Sub-regional Office for Southern Africa, in collaboration with the National Planning Commission of Botswana.
The main objective of the IPRT training was to enable Member States to understand the functionalities of the IPRT and use it in the planning and alignment of the Sustainable Development Goals (2030 Agenda), and Agenda 2063 with national development plans. Whilst monitoring the progress of both agendas towards their implementation. Reflecting on the success of the workshop Chief of the Development Planning Section of the Macroeconomics and Governance Division at ECA, Bartholomew Armah noted “the IPRT training helped Botswana digitize their National Development Plan. It also helped bring attention to Agenda 2063 which has not been given adequate attention compared to Agenda 2030. ECA will continue supporting Botswana in its journey to achieve its Vision 2036.”
Mr. Armah also highlighted that the way the country’s planning processes adhered to Results Based Management Concepts and Principles was remarkable. He expressed Botswana could be the IPRT champion, hence it will be invited to showcase its experience in applying the toolkit to other countries.
Moremi Moremi, Director of Population and Sustainable Development Coordination within the National Planning Commission of Botswana, thanked both the ECA for its excellent execution of the training and the diligent work of participants stating “I believe that the knowledge, learnings and lessons acquired from this Training will be put to good use for the betterment of the lives of the people of Botswana, going forward.”
Also in attendance was United Nations Resident Coordinator’s Office (UNRCO) representative, Mr. Taimur Khilji. Speaking about the value of the workshop Mr. Khilji said “this is a training that could not be missed. This is an important training to be able to apply the integrated agendas, both 2030 (the SDGs) and 2063, into the National Development Plan (NDP 11) as the country embarks on the formulation of the next national development plan (NDP12)”
This four-day event is a follow-up of two preparatory training sessions on the IPRT organized by the ECA in collaboration with the National Planning Commission of Botswana from 1 to 4 November 2021 and 1 to 5 August 2022. These workshops entailed the training of statisticians, planners, monitoring and evaluation experts from the various ministries as well as team establishment and access to the IPRT system.
Issued by:
Communications Section
Economic Commission for Africa
PO Box 3001
Addis Ababa
Ethiopia
Tel: +251 11 551 5826
E-mail: eca-info@un.org