Nairobi, 29th June 2022 – This morning, the agreement between the Nairobi regional office of the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation (AICS) and the Global Health Center of the Meyer University Hospital has been signed. The Center is the hub for international health cooperation initiatives of Tuscany Region, Italy. The program is worth an investment of 5.5 million Euros in total, and it aims to develop a regional health network in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda to improve the quality and access to health services for women and children. The initiative plans to intervene on over 30 health facilities, covering a total population of about 6.2 million people in the three countries.

The agreement was signed by the Head of AICS office in Nairobi, Mr. Giovanni Grandi, and the Director of the Global Health Center, Ms. Maria José Caldés Pinilla. The program is funded by the Italian Cooperation, and the Global Health Center is the technical and scientific coordinator also in charge of monitoring and evaluation activities over expected results.

The initiative will be realized in partnership with the Ministries of Health of the three countries and aims to strengthen south-south and north-south collaboration through the exchange of good practices, knowledge sharing activities, data collection and performance evaluation. In addition, the project will intervene with infrastructural interventions and supply of medical equipment aimed at enhancing health centers functioning and the management of obstetric-neonatal emergencies. Finally, technical assistance and training activities at national and regional levels will be realized.

The Covid-19 pandemic has highlighted how global challenges cannot be faced with local responses, and how health is key for human development. The Italian Cooperation promptly responded to this need by implementing a program targeting the most vulnerable sections of the population in the three countries, and in particular women and children.

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Dar es Salaam, 15th June 2022 – This afternoon the Italian government and the Tanzanian government signed the agreements that officially kick off an important program worth around 20 million euros disbursed through a soft loan that will promote the creation of new employment opportunities for young people through the strengthening of technical and vocational education in Tanzania. The agreements were signed by the Ambassador of Italy in Tanzania, Marco Lombardi, and the Principal Secretary of the Ministry of Finance and Planning of Tanzania, Emmanuel M. Tutuba, at the presence of the representative of the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation (AICS) in Tanzania, Paolo Razzini, and a delegation from the Italian Cassa Depositi e Prestiti (CDP) composed by Dr. Antonella Baldino and Dr. Lisbi Carina Valdez, who flew to the country to sign the financial agreement. The agreements see the Embassy of Italy in Tanzania, CDP, the Ministry of Finance and Planning of Tanzania and AICS put their efforts together to strengthen different technological institutes through the creation of new training courses that can enhance employment opportunities for young people, while strengthening the technological innovation.

The Italian Cooperation in Tanzania has intervened in the past with a grant program concluded in 2014 aiming at improving the quality of teaching and learning in scientific and technological education, with a special attention to promoting women access to this type of education. This new initiative stems from the success of the previous one and means to significantly contrast the phenomenon of youth unemployment. Planned activities include the creation of four Centres for Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Technology Transfer (CEITT), which will include start-ups incubators and laboratories for innovation; the creation of new training programs at the Dar Es Salaam Institute of Technology (DIT) in the fields of energy, civil engineering, tourism and agriculture; the creation of a centre of excellence in leather processing technologies; the creation of new curricula in technologies for renewable energies and for environmental protection and conservation.

The initiative intervenes in sectors of excellence for Italy, as it covers areas in which the Italian System has developed a high-level expertise representing an added value within the creation of strategic partnerships between the two countries (professional training, artistic-cultural heritage preservation, technologies for renewable energies, conservation techniques of agricultural products).

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Nairobi, 12th of April 2022 – The Ambassador of Italy to Kenya, Alberto Pieri, and UN Women Regional Director for East and Southern Africa, Maxime Houinato, signed this morning the Agreement to officially kick-start the third phase of the project “Let it not happen again: Enhancing Prevention and Response to Violence Against Women in Elections”. The event counted on the presence of Mr. Giovanni Grandi, Head of Office of the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation in Nairobi, Ms. Anna Mutavati, UN WOMEN Country Representative for Kenya, representatives from the Ministry of Public Service, Gender, Senior Citizen Affairs & Special Programmes, representatives from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Right (OHCHR), from the National Police Service and from the civil society.

With this new phase the overall initiative is worth a commitment of more than 1 million USD from the Government of Italy, which has greatly contributed to strengthen the response and accountability mechanisms with regards to gender-based violence (GBV) in sensitive periods such as the elections and the COVID pandemic in the counties of Nairobi, Kisumu, Bungoma and Vihiga.

As Ambassador Pieri said, “the strategic partnership between the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation (Aics), UN WOMEN and OHCHR ensures on one hand the reinforcement of the capacities of key public institutions and on the other hand the empowerment of civil society organizations and human rights defenders’ associations in their advocacy efforts towards duty bearers”.

According to Dr Houinato, “In Kenya, electoral violence has been predominant since the introduction of multi-party democracy in the early 1990s. The “Let it Not Happen Again” project will address persisting challenges that hinder access to justice for survivors, building on the previous implementation.”

The Government of Italy is one of UN WOMEN’s top donors and stands with Kenya in the fight and prevention of gender-based violence: the promotion of gender equality is a priority and transversal theme for the action of the Italian Cooperation in Kenya.

Brief background info
“Let it not happen again: Enhancing Prevention and Response to Violence Against Women in Elections” is financed by the Government of Italy and represents the third phase of the "Let It Not Happen Again" initiative. The first two phases were focused on improving the access to justice for victims of GBV and in particular during electoral periods, while strengthening the institutional mechanisms for prevention and response. Concurrently, the initiative has intervened to strengthen civil society organizations engaged in human rights defense.
Among key results achieved during the first two phases (2019 – 2021) are the establishment of the first Gender Directorate at the National Police Service; the enhancement of the capacities of 484 professionals in the sectors of justice, security and health in the prevention and response to sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) and the improved access of survivors to essential services, with 930 SGBV survivors accessing medical-legal services.

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Kisumu (Kenya), 18th May 2022 – During the first day of the Pan Africa conference ‘Africities’, dedicated to sustainable urban development, the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation (AICS) Office in Nairobi has participated in the session dedicated to the nexus between the blue economy and intermediary cities. AICS has presented the cooperation initiative "Go Blue" financed by the European Union, aiming to stimulate a debate with the various representatives of local and subnational governments present at the panel on the potential offered by the coastal resources for the sustainable development of the country. The session was organized by UN HABITAT with the participation of AICS and the economic bloc of coastal counties (JKP Secretariat), and counted on the participation of various members of the Council of Governors, the organization bringing together the governors of Kenya’s 47 counties. The panel offered a unique opportunity to stimulate an interactive dialogue with local and subnational authorities on themes such as territorial development, knowledge sharing and coastal cities growth, and has represented a precious opportunity for the Agency, who has an important portfolio of initiatives underway in the sectors of urban regeneration, slum upgrading, improvement of social services, construction of infrastructures, creation of employment in Kenya and Africa.

The session was focused on the unexploited potential of the resources offered by the blue economy: according to the 'Nairobi Statement of Intent on Advancing Global Sustainable Blue Economy', oceans, seas, lakes, rivers and other water resources are key assets for achieving the ambitious goals set in the 2030 Agenda by the United Nations.

Mr. Paolo Damato, coordinator of the Italian component Paolo of the Go Blue Programme, started the debate by recalling the theme characterizing this ninth edition of the Africities Summit ("The Role of Intermediary Cities of Africa in the implementation of Agenda 2030 of the United Nations and the African Union Agenda 2063'') and highlighting the importance of secondary cities in a context like Africa, interested by very rapid urbanization processes and with a rapidly growing population often concentrated in intermediary cities. He then underlined how the strategic relevance of investing in intermediary cities has been acknowledged by development partners: intermediary cities have indeed the potential to catalyse the growth of entire regions. If on one hand these cities have less resources and possibilities to invest in long-term strategic planning, on the other hand they can drive inclusive and balanced economic development in different ways - for example, they are more easily manageable in comparison with megacities, and communities are generally more structured due to their sizes.

The session then concentrated on the nexus between the blue economy and intermediary cities, with a focus on the Go Blue initiative: the Italian Cooperation component intervenes in fact to support the economic development of coastal cities by strengthening the blue economy value chains. It was emphasized that while investments in the blue economy have the potential to catalyse the development of the Kenya coast, an adequate operational environment is also required, with efficient waste management systems that can actually preserve coastal and marine environments and enable the development of fishing and tourism; a network of urban and regional infrastructures to support the logistics for the blue economy development; a resilient urban planning to manage rapid urban growth.

Some representatives of the Board of Governors underlined the importance of identifying knowledge sharing mechanisms in order to be able to benefit from the best practices developed within the Go Blue Programme, also to possibly incorporate lessons learned in sectoral policies.

Damato stressed that within the Go Blue Programme AICS encourages a constant stakeholders’ engagement, promoting dialogue with the private sector, with research centres and universities, passing through the authorities and with the involvement of the local communities.

The CEO of the JKP Secretariat, Mr. Emmanuel Nzai, reaffirmed the importance of policy dialogues with County governments to improve interventions’ sustainability, and underlined that Go Blue is developed in accordance with the local development strategies (the 'County Integrated Development Plans').

The Coordinator of UN HABITAT for the Go Blue Programme, Mr. Florian Lux, stressed that the interventions carried out within the initiative are complementary to the actions already undertaken by local governments, so that UN HABITAT catalyse the investments already adopted at local level.

Finally, all participants agreed on the success of the event and on the fact that continuous dialogue coupled with the involvement of all stakeholders is essential for the success of cooperation initiatives.