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ASIST Africa

The Advisory Support, Information Services and Training (ASIST) Regional Programme for Africa (ASIST - Africa) was established in 1991 to promote and support employment-intensive investment approaches in the infrastructure sector. ASIST - Africa provides technical advisory support, information and training to African governments and their development partners on employment-intensive investment approaches for urban and rural infrastructure provision and maintenance including roads, irrigation, afforestation, soil and water management, slum upgrading, drainage, sanitation and waste management. Support is provided in the following areas:

Policy formulation, reform and operationalisation - to create supportive institutional frameworks and legislative environments for the successful implementation of employment-intensive approaches
Local level investment planning
Private sector and community participation
Project and programme planning, implementation, monitoring and review
Research and development of tools, processes and techniques to facilitate employment-intensive approaches
Capacity, knowledge and skills building
Knowledge management and sharing

The ASIST-Africa Programme is based in Harare, Zimbabwe with a liaison office in Nairobi, Kenya. The programme reports to the African Regional Office in Abidjan and to EMP/INVEST in Geneva, and collaborates closely with the ILO's Subregional Offices (SROs) in the region. ASIST - Africa provides a link between country level activities, sub-regional programmes and EMP/INVEST. The Programme has recently launched a new strategy document entitled "Targeting Investments of Working Out of Poverty". The strategy responds to the current needs and challenges and to the calls to action against poverty emanating from African Heads of Government and their development partners through the New Partnerships for Africa's Development (NEPAD), the Declaration of the Extraordinary Summit for Employment and Poverty Alleviation, September 2004, and The Commission for Africa Report (March 2005). ASIST - Africa's 2005 - 2007 strategy targets poverty through:

Optimizing employment creation potential of investments in infrastructure
Early intervention in post-crisis situation to link recovery with long-term development policies and programmes
Broadening the application of local resource based employment-intensive approaches from the transport sector to other infrastructure sectors including urban slum upgrading, irrigation, water and sanitation and environmental conservation
Emphasising integrated and employment-focused local resource based planning approaches in investment planning and service delivery

ASIST - Africa receives core funding from the governments of Denmark, Great Britain, Norway and Sweden and from the ILO.

ASIST Africa

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