The South-South cooperation meeting to take place in Bogota this month (March 2010) is significant in providing the impetus that has been low since Bueno Aires meeting in 1978 (30 years ago) which initiated South-South
cooperation.

South-South cooperation was to contribute to significant shifting of
development cooperation by enhancing demand driven cooperation, strengthening
global south ownership and management of development programs and by having
greater impact at the beneficiary countries level. The South-South
cooperation was to enhance appropriate technology transfer as the countries in
the global south have relatively similar development challenges. The
South-South cooperation in a nutshell was to expected to address the flaws that
had been experienced through the North-South cooperation and to provide clearer
rules of engagement and significant development impact in the global south.

To date, there is minimal documented evidence that the high expectations of the
South-South cooperation have been achieved. In fact there are fears that some
of the emerging global south donors are adopting the same practices in aid
architecture and development cooperation that have been criticized in the past.


It is expected that the meeting in Bogota will address these challenges and
flaws and promote best practices that will lead to greater impact in poverty
reduction and development interventions in the global south through enhancing
demand driven interventions and ensuring broader ownership of the development
programs by the South-South cooperation recipient countries.

By Rose Wanjiru