The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Commission and the Government of Sweden recently held a strategic meeting focused on resilience-building in West Africa. The event took place at the ECOWAS Commission Annex, River Plaza, Abuja, Nigeria.
Leading the Swedish delegation was Mr. Joachim Beijmo, Head of Development Cooperation in Africa at the Embassy of Sweden in Ethiopia. Dr. Sintiki Tarfa Ugbe, Director of Humanitarian and Social Affairs, represented Professor Fatou Sow Sarr from ECOWAS. Ms. Reshmi Theckethil attended as Project Manager for the United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) Sahel Resilience Project.
Dr. Ugbe thanked Sweden for its ongoing support to Sahel countries and ECOWAS Member States through the Sahel Resilience Project. She stated: “She commended Mr. Beijmo’s leadership and collaboration, which have significantly strengthened ECOWAS interventions across the region.” Dr. Ugbe also reaffirmed ECOWAS’ commitment to advancing their work with partners and highlighted efforts to implement the Regional Resilience Strategy for West Africa (2024–2025), adopted by the Council of Ministers.
Mr. Beijmo praised ECOWAS’s leadership and acknowledged technical teams from both ECOWAS and UNDP for progress under the Sahel Resilience Project: “He highlighted the Regional Resilience Strategy for West Africa (2024–2050) and ongoing work on recovery preparedness and urban resilience, expressing confidence that ECOWAS, in partnership with UNDP and other stakeholders, will continue to build on these successes to benefit the communities.”
During the meeting, technical staff from Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Risk Management presented achievements related to recovery preparedness, early warning systems, disaster risk governance, and urban resilience initiatives.
The Swedish delegation also toured the ECOWAS Disaster Operations Centre (DOC), where they observed live demonstrations of early warning products and response systems. These demonstrations showed how DOC serves as a regional coordination hub by facilitating data exchange among member states, improving collective disaster preparedness, and supporting rapid emergency responses.
Both parties reaffirmed their commitment to collaborate with UNDP and other partners in strengthening resilience, disaster preparedness, and sustainable development throughout West Africa.
ECOWAS works towards cooperation among its member states through harmonized policies covering trade, transport, agriculture, infrastructure development, social programs spanning 12 countries in West Africa—and aims to extend these efforts further across the region (official website). The Commission is led by a president supported by vice presidents and commissioners (official website). In 2022 it launched a multilingual website to increase transparency about its activities (official website). Through its treaty authority it aligns economic frameworks such as common external tariffs among members (official website).