BMZ launch event with the economic sector

Partners in Transformation – New Networks for Business and Development

From 2024, the BMZ will realign its cooperation with the private sector. Under the guiding principle of the socio-ecological transformation towards greater sustainability, all offers to the private sector will in future be oriented towards the political priorities of German development cooperation and focus on the needs of partner countries. On 26 September, the BMZ launched its new strategy for more effective and efficient cooperation with business partners through Federal Minister Svenja Schulze and invited guests from politics, business, associations, trade unions, implementing organisations, civil society, academia and the media.

Development Minister Svenja Schulze: “Our economic cooperation should become more social, sustainable and effective. It is important to me that women and trade unions are given a greater role in the planning and implementation of the projects. Because the goal is that more people benefit from the results – especially those who are economically deprived. In the future, we will also check all projects for climate protection, social and environmental standards. And for the first time, there will be an area-wide impact evaluation for economic cooperation.”

The German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development  will integrate the potential of the private sector for the global socio-ecological transformation even more strongly in the future and create networks to jointly develop solutions. In doing so, the BMZ is also taking up critical assessments of previous cooperation with the private sector. Under the new brand “Partners in Transformation – Business & Development Network”, BMZ’s business cooperation will in future be more social, sustainable, efficient and effective:

• More social through a broader understanding of the economy and the inclusion of additional actors: Trade unions as partners, more women entrepreneurs and women in business, participation of international civil society and academia in our networks and steering groups.
• More sustainable by focusing projects on decarbonisation and higher environmental and social standards in companies.
• More effective through better linkages between business cooperation and government development cooperation
• More effective through the Agency for Economic Affairs (AWE) as a one-stop shop with communication, advice and networking for all economic actors in Germany, Europe and the partner countries of German development policy, as well as an overarching monitoring and evaluation system for all programmes.

BMZ launched its new strategy for more effective and efficient cooperation with economic partners through Minister Svenja Schulze. Approximately 250 – 300 guests from politics, business, associations, trade unions, implementing organizations, civil society, science and research, and the media came together in Berlin.

The [digital.global] network was also represented: At the event, the initiative”FAIR Forward – Artificial Intelligence for All” showcased a long-standing collaboration with the Mozilla Foundation: Together they are promoting openly available AI training data for African languages. As digital public goods, these datasets are crucial building blocks for spurring local innovation with speech technology.