Spotlight: Informing development strategies in Mozambique
Using advanced forecasting, the ISS’ African Futures and Innovation programme is helping Irish and Mozambican officials make data-driven decisions for sustainable growth.
Published on 18 December 2024 in
Impact
Mozambique faces complex development hurdles, including low agricultural productivity, weak governance, and limited economic diversification. With international aid contributing 14% of its gross national income, effective planning is critical to sustaining progress and reducing poverty.
Since 2017, the Institute for Security Studies (ISS) African Futures and Innovation (AFI) programme has helped inform Irish development strategies and investment in Mozambique. Ireland has worked in Mozambique since 1996, partnering with government, United Nations (UN) agencies, civil society, research institutions and donors to deliver its development priorities including gender equality, strengthening governance and climate action.
‘The ISS is a strong and robust source of information,’ says Inocêncio Macuácua, Governance and Trade Adviser to the Irish Embassy in Maputo. ‘The AFI forecast was used extensively to inform our new strategy and helped to define new areas of engagement in Mozambique.’
AFI enables development partners and Mozambique’s government to take a long view on agriculture, education, financial flows, governance, health, demographics, infrastructure and trade. Its data and forecasts informed the 2025-2030 strategic plan and spending priorities of the Embassy of Ireland in Mozambique.
‘Gathering information in Mozambique is not easy, but they did an excellent job in a difficult situation. The ISS is very professional and one of the best ranked as a research organisation assessing economic development pathways in Africa,’ says Macuácua.
AFI uses the International Futures (IFs) forecasting platform developed by the Pardee Institute at the University of Denver. Its analysis showed that after decades of conflict Mozambique made significant development progress for 20 years but then stagnated and began to reverse in the past decade.
AFI also showed that development challenges included low agricultural productivity, limited economic diversification, weak governance, corruption and infrastructure bottlenecks.
‘The AFI forecast was used extensively to inform our new strategy and helped to define new areas of engagement in Mozambique’
Mozambique was likely to miss most targets in its 2023-2043 national development strategy. Even with the most positive gas revenue scenario, it would on its current trajectory – with rapid population increase and relatively slow economic growth – have more people living in extreme poverty by 2043.
Significant delays in gas production meant government income would increase only from 2032, presenting an extended period of insufficient public investment and widening public service and infrastructure gaps.
The AFI work commissioned by the Irish Embassy was done in consultation with economists from development cooperation agencies and Mozambique’s Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF). It included a lead MEF representative trained on the IFs platform.
The updated AFI forecast is due to be presented to the Mozambique government early in 2025, following delays due to political unrest after contested elections in October.
AFI’s longer-term structural analysis complemented a short-term growth diagnostic study by the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) Growth Co-Lab for the government of Mozambique in partnership with USAID, IMF and AfDB. The AFI and LSE work was coordinated to give policymakers options to accelerate growth and efficiencies in the short term, and show how such policy adjustments could contribute to longer-term sustainable growth.
Irish diplomats say they appreciate AFI’s long-term view and ability to include multiple social and economic variables in its forecasts.
‘What we see in the African Futures approach is an ability to bring together adjustable narratives and cut through complexity,’ says Niall Tierney, who previously served as Senior Advisor to the UN Resident Coordinator in Mozambique, and Deputy Head of Mission to the Embassy of Ireland in Mozambique.
‘AFI contextualises the public sector within the wider economy and political space and presents ten-to-forty-year forecasts in a non-prescriptive way. The AFI approach looks at policy options within a real political context for what could be transformative investment areas. It presents trade-offs between many policy options with an eye on the long-term potential of decisions.’
Donors and governments benefit from a more informed view of how investments in one place may have consequences for another. The IFs model helps donors go beyond poverty alleviation and understand and support forward-thinking policy analysis for Africa’s decision-makers.
‘African Futures lets government take ownership of planning in a very informed way, and it helps to overcome short-term silo thinking in the development sector,’ says Tierney.
‘Futures can be incredibly powerful. I don’t see another model that presents these capabilities at a continental scale. Futures joins the dots of development planning and partnerships. The model informs long-term narratives with adjustable policy pathways. These narratives are urgent and vital if the transformative change sought in national development visions, and broader initiatives like the African Continental Free Trade Area vision, are to be achieved.’
For more information, contact:
Jakkie Cilliers, ISS: [email protected]
