STORIES FROM THE FIELD - UNDP in Turkey

©UN Photo/John Isaacto capture support channelled directly throughthe national budget.By 2010, under the “Kigali Statement ofAction”, all development partners agreed thatRwanda’s systems for managing aid had becomesufficiently reliable and the use of them shouldgrow. While more progress needs to be made,usage has risen, including that of national budgetand procurement systems. Aid included in thenational budget increased from 52 per cent ofRwanda’s ODA in 2007 to 71 per cent for 2010although this fell short of the 85 per cent target.Rwanda’s successes equipped it to be a vocalpresence before and during Busan, a positionencouraged by the UN country team. AfricanStates selected Rwanda to champion an Africanposition paper at the forum, and PresidentPaul Kagame gave one of the keynote openingspeeches. He called for a fundamental shiftin thinking to treating aid as an investment formutual gain. He emphasized the obligation fordevelopment partners to apply aid to strengthennational systems because a country needsto manage its resources in order to be heldaccountable for them.Officials from Rwanda and other African Stateshighlighted the importance of national aidmanagement indicators to complement globalmeasures; the forum agreement noted that theseshould be adopted where initiated by developingcountries, and by 2011, 28 countries had doneso. Rwanda’s push for aid transparency helpedto propel agreement that transparent practicesare the basis for enhanced accountability for aid.As a member of the UN country team, UN-Women provided specific assistance to theGovernment as it moved to highlight thegender aspects of development effectivenessin the Africa platform, which contains multiplereferences to that issue. At Busan, aninternational agreement on aid effectivenessemphasized for the first time that gender equalityand women’s empowerment are integral toachieving development results.18 Synthesis of 2011/2012 Resident Coordinator Annual Reports