Luxembourg's development cooperation - Annual report 2018

The bilateral action that Luxembourg’s development cooperation is implementing in its partner countries is being complemented by a regional and sub-regional approach on three continents – Africa, Asia and Central America. This approach aims to offer solutions to the problems faced in common by several neighbouring countries, particularly by using synergies and sharing lessons learned and best practice.

In this context, West Africa and the countries of the Sahel strip continue to be one of the priority regions for Luxembourg’s foreign policy. With partnership relations based initially on development cooperation, Luxembourg’s action in the Sahel is now the prime example of its “3D” approach, which creates a consistent framework for linking its actions in diplomatic, defence and development terms. Under this approach, Luxembourg’s enhanced commitment to security and defence runs in parallel with enhanced cooperation promoting governance and respect for human rights and international humanitarian law in the Sahel. In 2018, Luxembourg’s development cooperation, among other actors, contributed to drawing up a compliance framework for the respect for human rights and international humanitarian law for the operations of the G5 Sahel Joint Force, the headquarters of which are in Bamako, Mali.

In order to underline its subsequent commitment to the development of the region, in March 2018 Luxembourg joined the Sahel Alliance, an initiative launched in 2017 by France, Germany and the European Union which aims to provide a joint, effective response, in security and development terms, to the multi-dimensional challenges facing the member countries of the G5 Sahel. The Sahel Alliance has a limited number of priorities, such as vocational training and youth employability as well as access to basic social services of high quality – sectors in which Luxembourg also plays the role of lead partner in some of its partner countries in the sub-region.

Luxembourg has also strengthened its commitment to infectious disease control. The HIV, hepatitis B (HBV) and papilloma (HPV) viruses are all at the root of serious public health problems in West Africa. In effect, the HBV virus is the primary cause of death by liver disease in West Africa and HPV causes cervical cancer, the most common cancer affecting women in Senegal, although it can be prevented by vaccinating young women. In this context, the CARES project, short for “Casamance Research-program on HIV-resistance and Sexual Health”, supports efforts in scientific research and skills development to increase access to diagnosis and treatment for these three infections. Co-financed by Luxembourg’s development cooperation and in close partnership with the Luxembourg Institute of Health (LIH), the international NGO ENDA Santé, the Centre Hospitalier de Luxembourg (CHL), la Fondation Recherche sur le SIDA, the Laboratoire Nationale de Santé du Luxembourg and the Luxembourg NGO Stop Aids Now/ACCESS, the main aim of the project is to improve the qualitative care of HIV-infected people in the Ziguinchor region in Senegal and in Guinea Bissau and to reduce the mortality connected with the VIH, HBV and HPV viruses.

In the field of information and communication technologies (ICT), Luxembourg continued its support as part of the African Union’s “African Internet Exchange System” project (AXIS) – Luxembourg has since 2010 been responsible for financing this project via the EU-Africa Infrastructure Trust Fund. We should note in particular that among the achievements of the project was the launch in February 2018 by Mali – one of Luxembourg’s development cooperation’s priority partner countries – of its own internet exchange point (IXP). The aim of the project is to put in place robust internet infrastructure across the continent of Africa and it will enable Mali, following Senegal in 2017, to enter a new phase in developing its digital economy. The establishment of the IXPs should produce major savings for the African countries – estimated at 300 million euros annually – since internet traffic will no longer have to be channelled via exchange points located outside Africa.

In South-East Asia, the focus of the regional approach is the development issues shared by the countries bordering the Mekong River. Firstly, Luxembourg’s development cooperation is strengthening land governance via a new phase of the “Mekong Region Land Governance” project, approved in 2018 and implemented in cooperation with Switzerland. In its new phase, the project is supporting, among other things, the organisation of regional forums on land, the monitoring of “Learning and Alliance” activities, including the construction of research and information platforms as well as the adjustment of the subsidy mechanisms. Secondly, Luxembourg’s development cooperation is supporting the responsible management of the natural resources of the Mekong River via the “Mekong River Commission”, which continues to bring the countries concerned by shared issues to the table to find joint solutions for water use.

At another level, we should note the regional support given by Luxembourg through the Ministry of Finance, and in collaboration with the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, to the countries of the sub-regions of South-East Asia and West Africa via the Asian Development Bank and the African Development Bank respectively.

In Central America, as part of the Central American Integration System (SICA), an organisation with eight sub-region member countries based in San Salvador, in 2018 Luxembourg’s development cooperation funded a regional project supporting female entrepreneurship with CENPROMYPE as well as another regional project promoting the inclusion and political, economic and social participation of vulnerable groups, in collaboration with the General Secretariat of SICA. In addition, Luxembourg’s development cooperation and the Ministry of Finance jointly contributed to the third phase of the CAPTAC-DR (IMF’s Regional Technical Assistance Center for Central America, Panama and Dominican Republic) technical assistance programme. This centre, based in Guatemala, provides technical assistance to its seven member countries by targeting institutional and human capacity building for the implementation of healthy macroeconomic and financial policies. Luxembourg had already taken part in the second phase of this project.

In Central America, Luxembourg also continued to support the promotion of inclusive finance, especially microfinance. Thus the Luxembourg NGO ADA (Appui au Développement Autonome) is supporting the regional network REDCAMIF, the aim of which is to promote the microfinance industry. Finally, Luxembourg’s development cooperation is financing the technical assistance programme for the Luxembourg-based fund called the “Forestry and Climate Change Fund” (FCCF), the objective of which is to re-establish the secondary or degraded forest areas of Central America and to make them economically, ecologically and socially viable by involving local communities, while still guaranteeing a long-term return for investors in this fund.