The spokesperson for the meeting, Mozambique's National Treasury Director Antonio Laice, said that the caucus wanted to see an increase of 20 per cent in the resources for IDA-15.
This is a consensual figure, since it is what the IDA management itself has called for.
If IDA-15 is 20 per cent bigger than IDA-14, that will mean an increase in IDA funding of 26.3 billion special drawing rights (about 39.8 billion US dollars). Over 50 per cent of the IDA-15 money is likely to be spent in Africa.
But it is by no means certain that the target figure for IDA-15 will be reached - that all depends on the IDA donors in the developed world. Laice said that the caucus was urging African governments to undertake serious advocacy work with the donors, stressing how urgent a full replenishment of the IDA is to the continent's efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals.
Countries where IDA loans have been used to good effect are being asked to publicise their successes, to show that the money was well spent.
Laisse added that past and present African leaders (such as the former presidents of South Africa and Mozambique, Nelson Mandela and Joaquim Chissano) would be asked to give their moral weight to this lobbying campaign.
The caucus also wants African parliamentarians to lobby their opposite numbers in the developed world about the importance of IDA replenishment - since, in the final analysis, foreign aid comes out of budgets, and budgets are approved by parliaments.
Discussions on the replishment take many months, and have not yet reached the stage of donors putting any money on the table. Laice said nothing would be promised until a meeting in December.
Laice added that the caucus also began discussing the IMF's role in Africa - and noted that the Independent Evaluation Office (IEO) set up by the IMF has concluded that the Fund's missions to Africa do not always live up to the organisation's lofty goals.
The IEO's report on IMF aid to sub-Saharan Africa criticised "ambiguous" IMF policies towards poverty reduction, and the mismatch between IMF rhetoric and what the Fund was actually doing in low-income countries.
The caucus was clearly irritated at IMF attempts to micromanage African economies. Laice said the IMF was criticised for "excessive vigilance" over exchange rates. The ministers believed that programmes supported by the IMF should be explained and argued for with African societies, and not just with governments.
Asked whether the collapse of the Zimbabwean economy has been mentioned at the meeting, Laice said the caucus is not looking at specific countries.
SOURCE: AIM
