Jeddah, 28 June 2011: A meeting of the Special Program for the Development of Africa (SPDA) was held on the sidelines of the 36th annual meeting of IDB Board of Governors in Jeddah, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The session tackled the current economic situation in the African continent and defined the role of the IDB Group and its African members in the medium and long-term and the shift in aid architecture from the traditional North-South to South-South. It also reviewed alternatives of triangular cooperation and solutions for economic development. Chairing the session, IDB Vice President of Operations, Birama Boubacar Sidibe highlighted the significant positive elements seen across Africa and stated that this was due to four main reasons; strong economic growth, rapid progress of the Millennium Development Goals leading to drop in poverty across many African countries, increased investments in the private sector and high return on investment as well as robust climate for market-oriented, pro-poor reforms which has led to prudent economic policies. "The IDB has acknowledged that the situation in Africa is not what we had envisioned, the urgent need to provide much needed resources and the participation of the member countries to help sustain and further develop the growth of the African continent is a major factor for us and we are here to discuss ways to bolster our relationships and share knowledge and ideas", stated Sidibe. The Panel discussion on the theme "Weathering the Recent Crises – Drawing Lessons to Leverage Opportunities", was attended by H.E. Dr. Amadou Bobacar Cisse, Minister of Planning, Land and Community Development of Niger, H.E. Samir Redhwan, Minister of Economy of the Republic of Egypt, H.E. Abdelaziz Khelef the Director General of the Arab Bank for Economic Development in Africa (BADEA) and Professor Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University. Dr. Dahlan Siamat of the Indonesian delegation shared lessons learnt on Retail Sukuk and Dr. Metin Satir discussed the Turkish Authority's success stories with SME development.