CEO’s FORUM: Lessons from Far East: Page 2 of 3

in the post-war period was presented by Mr Tsutomu Shibata, Chief Consultant at the Japan Economic Research Institute in Tokyo, Japan, in which he outlined the role that DFIs had played in Japan’s economic success. He indicated the key elements of success in the contribution of the financial sector was in independence of the DFI management, respect for the market economy, close relationship with government plans as well as targeting of finance to export and import opportunities for the Japanese economies.

In prefacing the discussion on JICAs technical cooperation programme, Mr Toshiyuki Nakamura, JICA’s Chief Representative in South Africa, pointed out that JICA was the world’s largest bilateral donor. He said that the Japanese government’s overseas development assistance was previously focused on Asia, but was now increasingly prioritising Africa through the Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD).  Africa was now the top recipient of Japanese ODA.  He also advised that JICA was ready to work with SADC DFIs based on its past experience with Asian DFIs.

Dr Tetsuya Fukunaga, TICAD Advisor at the DBSA from JICA, discussed JICAs experience with supporting DFIs in Asian countries, by elaborating on the technical cooperation in Vietnam and Mongolia. He also proposed technical assistance programme in which a Japanese experts would be assigned to undertake diagnostic studies of selected SADC DFIs, involved in infrastructure development, with a view to developing training and other interventions which would assist these institutions. He also advised of the availability of financial resources from the Japanese government which could be accessed through bilateral arrangements between the Japanese government and respective SADC governments.

In conclusion, the workshop recognised that DFIs have an important role in the development process. For this to happen, it was necessary for each institution to develop a strategy to ensure independence, integrity and