2023 New Year Wishes from Jérémie Pellet, Chief Executive Officer of Expertise France
Dear Partners,
At the start of this new year, I would like to wish you all the best on behalf of Expertise France. I wanted to share with you the fact that this year, once again, we have achieved our objectives for 2019-2022. Expertise France’s international technical cooperation activity remains very dynamic: in 2022, it exceeded its record level reached in 2021. This shows that French and European expertise remains very much in demand in all areas.
The start of 2023 also marks the agency’s first year as a subsidiary of Agence Française de Développement, which has strengthened the Group’s role at international level. We are proud of the collective dynamic that has developed. The growing strength of the partnership with AFD has been confirmed with a marked increase in the portfolio of projects and synergies that are increasingly being developed.
Following the Covid-19 crisis, our agency has demonstrated its capacity to adapt and bounce back. Once again this year, the hundred or so countries of operation where we conduct our projects have faced further crises related to the effects of climate change, security issues and the repercussions of the food, energy and economic crisis following the conflict in Ukraine. As in the past, we have done our utmost to support our partner countries through our projects.
I think, first and foremost, of the war in Ukraine which, back in February, shook our continent and beyond. We have refocused our action in Ukraine and neighbouring countries to address the emergency.
Our agency is also deeply committed to the climate and the conservation of biodiversity, which are major issues for our world, through our flagship programmes which we promoted at COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh and COP15 in Montreal.
In 2022, Expertise France consolidated its position as a major actor in global health. The increase in France’s contribution to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, announced by the French President in September, has been coupled with an unprecedented reinforcement of L’Initiative, the bilateral mechanism for the contribution to global health targets managed by Expertise France, for the next three years. It is a sign of great confidence by the State which honours us and gives us obligations.
Lastly, I think of all the achievements, which I cannot list here, in our other fields of expertise: from the assistance of the project to support public finance management in Mauritania to the start of our activity in Yemen, and including the launch of ambitious programmes in the education and vocational training sector.
In 2023, our agency will maintain a strong commitment to its partners in order to support, in all our geographical areas of operation, public policies that are essential for the response to the challenges of our time. The support for the just transition, governance, sustainable and inclusive growth and social and human development will remain central to Expertise France’s mandate.
I am aware of the extent to which this result is due to the confidence that you, Dear Partners, have shown in us once again. The projects we conduct are collective ventures combining the best expertise at the local, French and European levels. Our field presence has been further strengthened this year. We have coordinated, sector by sector, the ecosystem of our French partners and gathered all our international technical experts for the first time. At European level, Expertise France’s action has to date concerned 60 Team Europe initiatives. We will continue to be an integral part of this collective Team Europe dynamic in 2023, by holding the Presidency of the Practitioners’ Network for European Development Cooperation.
We thank you for the strength of the partnerships we develop year after year, without which we would be unable to accomplish our missions. I wish you all a very happy New Year 2023.