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the MDGs. The newly re-energised sub-regional offices (SROs) willplay an active role as operational arms of the Commission and assub-regional hubs of ECA’s peer learning and knowledge sharing initiatives.They will also work as privileged partners of the regionaleconomic communities to advance the African development agendaat the sub-regional level. The General Assembly has supported theSecretary-General’s Action Plan for the SROs and made additionalresources available to them. The Business Plan also provides for evenhigher levels of support to these offices during the plan period.We are also continuing to scale-up cooperation and collaborationwith other Pan-African institutions, notably the African Union Commissionand the African Development Bank. The second AUC Conferenceof Ministers of Economy and Finance (CAMEF II) recommendedthat the AUC and ECA should harmonise their conferences of ministersresponsible for finance and economic development. This isa matter on which we would like the ministers to make a positivepronouncement. Our collaboration with the other sister pan-Africaninstitution, the African Development Bank, remains strong. LastSeptember our two institutions held a retreat to discuss and agreeon areas for joint and collaborative activities. The outcome of thatmeeting was an aide-memoire, the implementation of which has alreadycommenced. In addition, ECA and ADB jointly organized theBig Table and will, as usual, collaborate on the Ministerial Roundtableand High Level Seminars at the Shanghai meetings of the AfDB.We continue to strengthen our partnership with our UN system colleagues,notably the UNDP with which we signed Memorandum ofUnderstanding last year. Both institutions are supporting MDG-basedplanning in member States.These partnerships - and new ones that we hope to build and nurturein the coming months - have one thing in common: to enhance ourability as your institution to more effectively accompany our MemberStates in their development journey, including in their efforts toreach the MDGs by the target date.I have touched on many of the issues. A number of them, includingAid-for-Trade, SROs, financing for development, and statistics wouldrequire resolutions from you. But there are other issues, includingthe African Institute for Economic Development and Planning (IDEP)14 Part One