South-South and Triangular Cooperation Featured Partner
Message from the Director General
At the Presidential Agency for International Cooperation of Colombia (APC-Colombia), as an entity that coordinates and manages international cooperation, we focus on efficient technical and financial cooperation to generate the greatest benefits for the people and communities of Colombia and partner countries.
In developing the vision we have institutionally outlined for 2023, of becoming a national and international reference in innovative cooperation management, we have oriented our work towards results and are convinced that the exchange of knowledge through good practices is a mechanism for solving common development challenges.
The lessons learned in this last year have necessitated a review of the methodologies and tools applied in development cooperation. We have learned that as South-South cooperation actors we must take advantage of the immediacy of the digital world to get closer between countries of the Global South. The commitment to accelerating the fulfillment of the 2030 Agenda will need us to find innovative and new ways to share knowledge.
We recognize that platforms for knowledge exchange, capacity building and collaboration with peers such as South-South Galaxy are essential to narrowing the gap between problems and solutions; therefore, in this year in which we celebrate the first decade of existence of APC-Colombia, we are honored to be on this platform as Partner of the Month.
How APC-Colombia Manages Cooperation
APC-Colombia focuses on non-reimbursable technical and financial cooperation and ensures that it yields the greatest benefits for the peoples of Colombia and the Global South, in accordance with their public policy instruments. The organization’s goal, by 2023, is to be a national and global reference in the innovative management of international cooperation.
International Humanitarian Assistance
Colombia is committed to Humanitarian Assistance. In this sense, APC-Colombia annually allocates economic resources for the prevention and attention of disasters as well as to address other crises of a political or economic nature in other countries of the global South. Proof of this is that for the year 2020, Funds of US$ 1.2 million for International Assistance were provided by AIC Colombia, allocated as follows:
- Climatic phenomena: USD 260,000
- COVID-19 emergency: USD 730.000
- Solidarity with countries of the Global South: USD 220,000
Official Development Assistance (ODA)
APC-Colombia adopts the definition provided by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) that defines ODA as flows directed to countries that appear on the list of recipient countries of the Development Assistance Committee (DAC) and Multilateral development institutions destined for recipients of the same list of countries and which are provided by official bodies, including state and local governments, or by their executive agencies. Each of whose transactions:
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- is administered with the primary objective of promoting the development and economic well-being of developing countries.
- is concessional in nature and carries a donation element of at least 25 percent (calculated at a discount rate of 10 percent).
South-South Cooperation - Good Practices in Relation to the SDGs
In response to the call to action for the achievement of the SDGs from APC-Colombia, an effort has been made to align the projects and specific actions to the achievement of this Agenda. Considering the great challenges for their compliance, the organization believes that SSC and TrC are tools that must be put at the service of the most vulnerable communities to reduce the impact of the risks they face and seek progress towards the achievement of sustainable development. In general, the main SDGs to which the SSC and TrC initiatives are aligned contribute to improving the conditions and capacity of those social factors that help to overcome situations of poverty and structural inequity such as education, health and employment services as well as projects with Science, Technology and Innovation components.
The South-South cooperation portfolio is made up of good practices from Colombian entities that have broad international recognition and that, in recent years, have been requested on various occasions by other countries of the Global South. This portfolio includes practices aligned with the objectives of the country’s Foreign Policy and that explicitly contribute to cooperation for equity within the framework of the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Two pie charts present the main SDGs contributed through the South-South cooperation projects by APC-Colombia. You can download it here (in Spanish).
Triangular Cooperation respects the principles of South-South cooperation, responding to the needs of the requesting country, carrying out horizontal work and applying principles of transparency, co-responsibility and mutual benefit, among others. In this way, the thematic agenda of the projects developed by APC-Colombia responds to the needs raised by our partners. For 2019, the projects focused on issues of agricultural and rural development, environment, social policies, education, culture, extractive industries and strengthening of public institutions, mainly identified with SDG 4, 11, 16 and 17. In 2020, as a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic, the work methodologies had to be adjusted to virtual environments and the themes of the projects were especially aligned with issues of professional training, labor inclusion, citizen security, sexual and reproductive health and land use planning, mainly related to SDGs 3, 4, 8, 11 and 16.
Knowledge Hub
The Hub is a space for learning and collaboration to identify and publicize good practices, offer training, facilitate online learning, strengthen work networks and, above all, it is a space to share Colombia’s Offer for the Global South, within the framework of Sustainable Development.
It is a virtual tool offered by Colombia for South-South Cooperation. The Hub has short courses on the main policies and good practices of the country which are offered to r partners in the Global South. Through the Hub, APC-Colombia hopes to strengthen cooperative relations and, eventually, advance in opening up avenues of cooperation in the area of commerce.
