IFES Country Director in Guinea Elizabeth Côté and Board Member Gérard Stoudman attended the Peace, Economic Development and Solidarity conference 8 September to 11 September in Yamassoukro, Côte d'Ivoire. 

Hosted by Charles Konan Banny, former prime minister and current head of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Côte d'Ivoire, the conference brought together over 50 high profile delegates from 15 countries, mostly African, to discuss development-related issues and challenges.

In addition to addressing issues related to governance, agribusiness, communications and global partnerships, the participants made concrete recommendations to the preparatory technical committee for the upcoming G20 meeting in France in November.

The recommendations emphasize the vital role Africa’s natural resources and growing population will play in global development in the near future, and they highlight areas where the G20 and international partners can work with African governments to secure prosperity and stability. These areas include supporting civil liberties and good political leadership, fighting corruption, encouraging business development and a just judiciary, tackling food security and infrastructure issues, and promoting regional integration and international partnerships.

The full recommendations, written in French, can be read here.

To ensure that strategies to improve Africa's greatest development problems continue to be addressed, the participants established the African Initiative Group, a pan-African think tank created as an African offshoot of the Aspen Institute.

Participants in the conference came from both the private and public sector and included the president of the West African Economic and Monetary Union, the heads of the French Development Fund and the African Development Bank, members of government and other political leaders.

Stoudman, of the Council of Europe, and former IFES consultant and Minister of Foreign Affairs in Guinea Bakary Fofana were both panelists at the conference.