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sustain this growth so as to significantly reduce poverty and achievethe other Millennium Development Goals in the whole continent bythe target date of 2015.Central to this effort is the mobilisation of domestic and internationalresources to enhance productive investments, boost growth andreduce poverty. The ideal would have been to raise the required resourcesthrough domestic or, indeed, regional savings. However, thereality is that for several of our countries this is not possible in theshort run due to a low-income base and an underdeveloped financialsector. External sources of finance are therefore required to meetthe financing gap in Africa. This critical role of finance was recognisedby world leaders in the 2002 Monterrey Consensus on Financingfor Development.High oil and food prices are also a matter of immediate concern forseveral African countries because of their impact on balance of paymentsand because resources that are being used to meet these highcosts detract from what could otherwise be used to provide infrastructureand social services. This situation also requires vigilancebecause disquieting economic conditions in major industrial economiesraise the spectre of the 1970s when a commodity boom wastruncated by policy responses to stagflation in developed countries.These events foreshadowed the lost decade of the 1980s, and giventhat several African countries are still weighed down by a debt overhang,there is need for vigilance, well-considered responses and continuedclose engagement with the international community.Without a doubt, the international community has placed Africa’sconcerns squarely on its agenda and pledged support for its developmentefforts. This commitment to up-scale the quality and quantityof official development assistance has been demonstrated in severalways and acknowledged as such by African leaders. However, thereis still much to be done as the quantum of support remains inadequateand the translation of commitments into reality remains achallenge. Despite the possibility of global economic slow-down,this is not the time to reduce assistance and all efforts should bemade to keep Africa’s improved economic performance on track. Indeed,the case for counter-cyclical action seems quite evident fromrecent actions in several developed countries to boost spending inorder to keep their economies on track.26 Part One