AFC and ADG Strategic Partnership: Celebrating a Decade of Success

16.03.2017
Undefined

AFC Agriculture and Finance Consultants (AFC) and the Academy of German Cooperatives (ADG) held its 9th annual Financial Expert Day on 9 to 10 January 2017 at Castle Montabaur. Furthermore, both institutions celebrated 10 years of a successful strategic partnership during a festive event on the second day.

The Financial Expert Day has become a regular event since both companies started cooperation in 2007. The workshop brings together AFC’s and ADG’s project managers with selected international Financial Sector Development consultants and experts.

This year’s theme, “Reflecting Trends & Achieving Impact in Financial Sector Development Projects” is driven by the vision of becoming the leader in the most current sector practices. The leading questions for discussion were rather self-critical, such as “Are we setting the right focus?” and “Are we implementing our project the right way?”

These guiding questions stimulated lively discussion among the participants, who were exchanging experiences from various projects all over the world. In addition to the discussion of technical questions, everyone took the opportunity to network with colleagues. The second day continued with an intensive group work on the effective use of impact evaluation data. Colleagues from GOPA’s Monitoring and Evaluation/ Quality Unit (MEQ) presented the Group’s approach. The discussion gave insights into the diverse experience from a variety of projects and working methods.

The day continued with a festive event in the afternoon where Mr. Johannes Buschmeier, Managing Director AFC, and Mr. Rüdiger Meister, Head of ADG International, gladly welcomed and introduced the participants. Both highlighted the successful and always constructive cooperation during the joint implementation of more than 70 projects within the last ten years. Dr. Martin Güldner, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director at GOPA, emphasized the importance of the Financial Sector Development projects and its role within the GOPA Group. It was a great honor that also representatives of the most important donor organisations, namely GIZ, KFW and the European Investment Bank shared interesting views on the future trends of financial sector development. To address the important topic of migration and refugees, a presentation was given by Ms. Sahar Tieby of Sanabel Network in the MENA Region.

AFC and ADG consider this year’s Financial Expert Day and the anniversary celebration as great success and are looking forward to another decade of successful partnership.

We thank all participants for coming to the castle of Montabaur which was nicely covered by snow.

For further impressions on the event please click here and for further information please contact Holger.Christ [at] afci.de