In a bid to achieve gender equality and improve upon the regional human capital development indices by 2030, a zoom ministerial meeting organized by the ECOWAS Commission was held to validate the 2022 Report on the 14th of June 2022.
Speaking during the session, the President of the ECOWAS Commission, Jean Claude represented by Vice President Finda Koroma highlights the significance of the meeting noting that it will help member states to make progress in the area of human capital development.
According to her, the ECOWAS Commission had set an ambitious objective to become Sub-Saharan Africa’s top-performing Regional Economic Community (REC) in HCD by 2030, hence the need for the Draft Report to enable HCD Validation Strategy so as to enhance the West African regional growth.
“ECOWAS Commission has identified six (6) areas of intervention to assist Member States in making progress on each of the four (4) priority levels under the ECOWAS Strategy for 2030, namely (a) Advocacy, Policy and Communication, (b) Monitoring and Evaluation, (c) Capacity Building and Knowledge Sharing, and (d) Resource Mobilisation. The six (6) areas related to the updating of (i) the HCD index, (ii) the HCD gender index, (iii) HCD implementation monitoring and evaluation dashboard, (iv) ECOWAS HCD report 2022, (v) the organization of capacity building sessions and exchange fora between the National HCD Focal Points and ECOWAS HCD squad, and finally, (vi) the conduct of a study on gender-transformative action for HCD.”
At the meeting Chaired by Honourable Cecilia Abena Dapaah, Minister, Sanitation and Water Resources, the Republic of Ghana commended the ECOWAS Commission for championing the development of the Integrated Human Capital Development Strategy and its implementation documents for the region.
She stresses that such an initiative will boost growth and productivity while appealing for better involvement of women and girls in the formal and informal economic sectors for sustainable wealth production activities.
