Supporting Development Through Regional Cooperation: Evidence from North Africa

Abstract

This report uses evidence from North Africa to shed light on the developmental benefits of regional cooperation. From the available evidence, countries in North Africa (as well as the Middle East region) would reap substantial economic, environmental, and security benefits if they establish successful regional cooperation and integration schemes. In some cases, regional economic communities were motivated not by economic but by political goals such as security, governance, democracy and human rights. Many donors and external development partners prefer to utilise a regional approach to implement development programmes because they may yield better outcomes. Moreover, regional donor programming tends to be very useful when development programmes involve the management of regional resources. Evidence from key regional programmes implemented in the North Africa region shows that regional cooperation facilitates the development of countries. Likewise, regional programmes instituted outside the North Africa region facilitated the realisation of effective development outcomes. K4D helpdesk reports provide summaries of current research, evidence and lessons learned. This report was commissioned by the UK Department for International Development