Mo Ibrahim Foundation calls for more sound data for the African Governance Report
The African Governance Report which was published last week, by the Mo Ibrahim Foundation highlights areas where policy efforts can be focussed on to tackle current governance challenges.
The Foundation in a statement said that the report also highlights the urgency of addressing the data gap in Africa to ensure progress can be assessed as well as shortfalls.
The report reviews the themes with the highest overlaps between the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals Agenda, the First Ten-year Implementation Plan of Agenda 2063 and the Ibrahim Index of African Governance (IIAG), which are access to and quality education, health and nutrition, women and youth inclusion, prosperity and economic opportunity, security, justice and strong institutions and highlights priority areas to address.
Mo Ibrahim, Chair of the Mo Ibrahim Foundations called for sound data for governance in order to ensure inclusive development, while he welcomed continued efforts to improve governance, which is crucial to achieving the SDGs and Agenda 2063 goals, but, they are worried by the inability to accurately monitor progress against these targets on the continent.
“Data is essential foundation for effective policy making and resource mobilisation, because, without data, we drive blind, policies are misdirected and progress on the road to development is stunted, therefore we mus all act urgently to close the data gape, if indeed we aim to leave no one behind,” Mo Ibrahim added.
Meanwhile the recently released report highlights that education aligned with market needs can be advanced if governments and partners take a closer look at prioritising active engagement with private sector, to assess the requirements of the job market.
In health the report states that special attention should be paid to the availability, quality, affordability and capacity of health services, while also tackling food security.
For prosperity and economic opportunity, the report noted that governments and partners should look at diversifying economies, accelerating progress in infrastructure, specifically physical transport, electricity and ICT, increasing investment in the rural sector and strengthening regional integration to make efficient progress.
Important correlations between IIAG measures are outlined in the Report to help create a more conducive environment for achieving development targets. It has pictured up that there are data challenges across the continent, because almost half of the targets of Agenda 2063 are not directly quantifiable and so far, few than 20% have an indicator to measure progress. On the average fewer than 40% of the indicator for the SDCs have sufficient data to track progress accurately on the continent.
The report highlights that over half of the data sources types on SDG indicators on Africa are estimation, modelling or global monitoring, in particular only one third of data sources on SDG indicators on Africa are from direct country sources, therefore the ability to monitor progress towards development targets in Africa is compromised.
Since the adoption of both Agenda, coverage and frequency of publicly available data for key data categories in Africa have declined. Critically, one of the areas that has seen on average, large deterioration is population and vital statistics.
Furthermore, only eight African counties have a birth registration system that covers 90% or more of the population over the last ten years and only three have a death registration system that covers 90% or more of the population. Without accurate and complete vital statistic, it is impossible to implement effective solutions to any development challenge and to deliver for citizens, the report notes.
