Japan's Official Development Assistance White Paper 2010
5. Cooperation with Diverse Stakeholders
(1) Strengthening partnership with NGOs
Forming partnerships with NGOs — implementers of grassroots assistance in developing countries with a wealth of expertise about the field — is gaining in importance for carrying out more effective development cooperation.
With a view to hearing the opinions and recommendations of NGOs and in order to draw on them to plan and implement the ODA policies of the Ministry, the NGO Advisory Group (Note 5) was established under the leadership of the Minister for Foreign Affairs and exchanges of opinions took place. Furthermore, to be able to flexibly support NGO activities financially, the funding schemes, such as the Grant Assistance for Japanese NGO Projects and JICA Partnership Program, were reviewed and they have expanded budgets and support programs.
In addition, in order to draw on the expertise of people with NGO experience for policy-making, the Ministry will explore the possibility of promoting personnel exchanges between NGOs and the Ministry and JICA and strive to further strengthen its partnership with these stakeholders.
(2) Partnership with the private sector
Japan announced the Public-Private Cooperation for Accelerated Growth in 2008 and has taken a variety of steps to promote public-private partnerships in the context of ODA programs. In particular, in order to further integrate the needs of the private sector during the ODA project proposal and formulation stages, Japan is working to enhance the scheme of private sector-proposed projects. Since 2010, Japan has conducted preparatory studies on Public Private Partnership (PPP) infrastructure projects based on proposals submitted by private companies, bearing in mind future ODA support such as ODA loans. Japan is also developing new methods of ODA support for Base Of the economic Pyramid (BOP) businesses, receiving proposals from the private sector related to BOP business-ODA partnership, conducting preparatory studies, establishing the BOP business center (Note 6), and so on.
(3) Partnership with international organizations: Strengthening multilateral-bilateral partnership
Through strengthening partnership between bilateral aid and multilateral aid (multilateral-bilateral partnership), Japan aims to reflect international aid trends in bilateral aid policy as well as mainstream bilateral aid approaches that Japan has comparative advantage in on an international scale. In addition, Japan aims to effectively integrate bilateral and multilateral assistance and improve aid effectiveness.
(4) Partnership with emerging donors
In recent years, emerging donors have had a growing influence on development. To improve aid effectiveness as a whole, it will be imperative that emerging donors provide assistance in line with international efforts. At various opportunities for dialogue, Japan has been urging emerging donors to carry out transparent and responsible assistance. In 2010, Japan introduced its aid schemes and experience to aid practitioners in China and Eastern Europe and exchanged opinions with them. In dialogues with other donors and aid organizations, opinions are exchanged and information is shared on the issue of emerging donors, and at the same time, the possibility of cooperation is explored for urging emerging donors to support the aid effectiveness agenda.
Notes:
(5)As a forum for hearing the opinions and recommendations on Japan’s international cooperation from those actually in the field, the NGO Advisory Group was established under the leadership of Minister for Foreign Affairs Okada. Six representatives of Japanese NGOs were individually selected by the Minister for their wealth of knowledge and experience in international cooperation to participate in the Group as regular members. At the first meeting on May 25, 2010, opinions and recommendations on the ODA review were heard. Meetings were held about once every two months, and exchanges of opinions took place on a variety of themes regarding international cooperation.
(6) The BOP business center, established in October 2010, is an inclusive business support system for BOP businesses which provides comprehensive support for such businesses. Its members include private enterprises, NGOs/NPOs, international organizations, aid agencies, and academic institutions, and its main functions are as follows: providing information through a portal site as a centralized source of information; matching support (promotion of information exchange and collaboration among related parties); and consultation services.