[afro-nets] Compliments of the Season

[Peter Burgess <Profitinafrica@aol.com>]

Compliments of the Season
-------------------------

Dear Colleagues

Another year is coming to a close. Looking back, it is sad to
see how little progress is being made in handling the big prob-
lems of the day... whether it is the global AIDS pandemic, or
all the other health issues including malaria, whether it is
shortage of food and adequate water, shortage of tillable land,
shortage of fuel wood, shortage of jobs, and so on. Not to men-
tion the tsunami, earthquakes, hurricanes, floods and other
natural disasters.

There is no shortage of technological knowledge... but there is
a sad deficit in how technological knowledge is used. There is,
especially in Africa, an enormous stock of natural resources.
But in spite of technological knowledge and natural resources,
Africa and other parts of the world have terrible poverty and
deprivation. The modern economic paradigm works for the 'north'
but does not work for the poor 'south'.

None of this is new news. The reports of the major relief and
development organizations have documented the problem for going
on 30 years... and the problems seem to get worse and not bet-
ter.

But I think there is a new relief and development paradigm in
the making... but as of this moment I am not prepared to de-
scribe what it is. I sense that there will be a new wave of 'in-
formation' used to help manage relief and development... and
this will not be information that is 'controlled' by the incum-
bent relief and development organizations, but will be truly
'public accountability' where resource use is tracked and its
benefits assessed not by reference to phantom measures of pro-
ject goals, but by real durable benefit delivered to deserving
beneficiaries in their communities around the world.

During the year 2005 there has been a big improvement in the
availability of relief and development fund flow information...
but it is not yet incorporated into an effective 'management in-
formation' framework. My goal for 2006 is to get a Tr-Ac-Net da-
tabase analysis system that will prototype the sort of manage-
ment information framework that will help the public to hold
their leaders accountable for the use of relief and development
resources. And for those of us who live in the 'north', we
should also be holding our leaders accountable so that 'words'
get turned into useful action. The goal is to be able to relate
the consumption of resources with the resultant benefits... a
results orientation to replace the idea that disbursement is all
that matters!

I hope that in 2006 we can make progress in holding the corpo-
rate world accountable for their impact everywhere... including
the communities where they work, 'north' and 'south'. The busi-
ness model and value chains that drain value from Africa (and
elsewhere in the 'south') should be documented and corporate
leadership and corporate stockholders should understand their
role in the global poverty crisis. The era of European empire is
long gone... but is an era of Imperial Corporations that much
better? The good news is that there is a growing interest in so-
cially responsible corporate behavior. A goal is to help create
a management information framework so that corporations will
benefit from socially responsible behavior and cannot hide (as
at present) from remote misdeeds.

There is a lot that is possible... a lot to do. I am optimistic
that a lot is going to get done. Thanks to technology, nothing
mentioned in this posting is particularly difficult... and I am
very much encouraged by the many professionals all around the
'south' who have given me and Tr-Ac-Net encouragement this past
year... and I hope that Tr-Ac-Net will not let anyone down.

Best wishes to all for 2006, and thanks to my friends and col-
leagues for their support.

Sincerely,

Peter Burgess
Tr-Ac-Net in New York
Tel.: +1-212-772-6918
mailto:peterbnyc@gmail.com
The Transparency and Accountability Network
http://tr-ac-net.blogspot.com
http://www.tr-ac-net.org