Report of mission on technical advisory board meeting for the Africa futures program, Cairo, 26-29 March 2000

The 6th Advisory Board meeting of the African Futures program was held from 26- 28 march in Cairo, and was hosted by the Regional Information Technology and Software Engineering Centre (RITSEC). The Africa Futures program is entering a critical phase of supporting member states to operationalise the long term visions it has helped several African countries to develop, while at the same time, resources have been cut by UNDP, the traditional donor. It was also reported that other sponsoring agencies like the World Bank, and the African Development Bank have not honoured their obligation, whereby they were supposed to provide funding of one million each. The meeting was also informed that the Economic Commission for Africa is also a sponsoring agency and that although it was not expected to make cash contribution, it has not provided the active support, to the African Futures program, that was anticipated.