Yaoundé, July 29, 2024 (ECA) - The third joint session of the Intergovernmental Committee of Senior Officials and Experts (ICSOE) of Central and East Africa will be held in Yaoundé, Cameroon, from October 15 to 18, 2024. His Excellency Alamine Ousmane Mey, the Cameroon Minister of Economy, Planning and Regional Development, has agreed for a joint organization between ECA and his department. “I would like to thank ECA for choosing Cameroon as the venue for this high-level event. Am happy to express the support of the Ministry of the Economy in ensuring a successful meeting of the Inter-governmental Committee”, he said.
The audience on July 29, 2024 gave Jean Luc Mastaki, Director of the ECA's Sub-Regional Office for Central Africa, the opportunity to officially present to his host the stakes and implications of this statutory meeting, which will see strong participation from East and Central Africa. “Cameroon is our host country, and ECA is proud to hold its statutory meeting at home. This session of the ICE will bring together two ECA offices, and we hope that Cameroon's leadership in the sub-region will serve as a guide to ensure that Central Africa benefits fully from this experience,” emphasized Jean Luc Mastaki.
The previous two sessions of the joint ICSOE of ECA’s Offices for Central and Est Africa were respectively held in the Seychelles and Burundi, therefore in East Africa. In 2024, discussions will focus on “Rapid implementation of research and innovation solutions to accelerate economic diversification in Central and East Africa”. For His Excellency Alamine Ousmane Mey “this theme is a clear follow-up to the discussions on the Douala consensus adopted in September 2017. Research and innovation have accelerated economic development and particularly industrial progress wherever they have been integrated. If we want to achieve the high level of value addition, we definitely need to strengthen research and innovation systems.”
Today's meeting was also an opportunity for the Minister in charge of the Economy and ECA-CA’s Director to review the cooperation between Cameroon and ECA. Alamine Ousmane Mey praised “the quality of cooperation, which is rich, dense and fruitful at both regional and subregional levels, with Africa aligning itself on a common position for the reform of the global financial architecture, ECA's support in drawing up and implementing the national development strategy (SND30), the national strategy towards a successful implementation of the AfCFTA Agenda, the review of the industrialization masterplan, the development of value chains through the Special Economic Zone for timber in Bertoua and the Kribi-Edea-Douala growth triangle. We are delighted about this, and know we can count on ECA's support when it comes to large-scale and transformative projects like the AfCFTA. This major market will drive investment, industrial transformation and job creation.
Jean Luc Mastaki praised the good collaboration between experts from the Ministry of the Economy and their ECA colleagues on several pieces of work at national and sub-regional level. “We are fully committed to pursuing our engagement on improving economic and environmental statistics, strengthening foresight, implementing the AfCFTA Agenda, promoting green finance and carbon credits for cameroon’s economic transformation,” he said.
The forthcoming meeting of the Intergovernmental Committee of Senior Officials and Experts of Central and East Africa will provide an opportunity to consolidate this partnership.
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