SouthViews No. 176, 6 March 2019

South Africa’s South-South cooperation 40 years after BAPA

By Neissan Alessandro Besharati

As member states and the United Nations (UN) prepare to come together for the 2nd High Level Conference on South-South cooperation (SSC) forty years after the adoption of the Buenos Aires Plan of Action (BAPA), this article reflects on the journey South Africa has made in implementing technical cooperation with developing countries (TCDC). Although the Apartheid government of Pretoria was excluded from the discussions in Buenos Aires, in the last two decades South Africa has played a major role in SSC, promoting capacity building, exchange of experiences, and TCDC in Africa and intra-regionally. The article will explore the degree of compliance by South Africa with the 38 recommendations (Recs. 1-38) set out in the BAPA, and the follow up work still required, both nationally and globally, to advance the SSC agenda. (more…)