IGAD Blue Economy Conference
The Intergovernmental Agency for Development (IGAD) is hosting its first Blue Economy Conference to raise awareness on the thrust of the Blue Economy among the key stakeholders in its member-states for enhancing of the entrenched process of economic transformation, shared prosperity and environmental stewardship for the common good of the sub-region.
The two–day conference on BE is the first regional event and offers an opportunity to discuss BE development in the IGAD region at large as well as offers platform for the region to show case its BE components and their linkages to different sub-sectors of the regional economy. It further offers the opportunities available in the region to Investment, International Donors’ communities, Development Partners, investment Funds as well as the private sector. It will also provide an opportunity to learn and get information on global and continental good experiences and practices on BE development.
The conference provides a regional multi-stakeholder, multi-sector and multi-scale platform to identify potential BE priority areas to the region and exchange on the prospects for mainstreaming BE potential priority areas into the regional and national development strategies.
The main objectives of the event are:
- To create awareness on the role of BE in contributing to the socio-economic development of the region
- To explore the BE Concept and Blue Growth Principles in the regional socioecological context in common but differentiated approach.
- To review the development prospects and challenges of well-integrated traditional and emerging BE sectors for leapfrogging accelerated and shared growth.
- To identify the capacity needs and gaps for rolling-out the envisaged BE Strategy at the national and regional levels in the spirit of effective cooperation.
Outcomes
- The role of BE for sustainable socio-economic development understood
- Best practicesdocumented and shared
- Road Map for developing the envisaged IGAD Regional Strategy developed
- Network of professionals on BE created.
