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Governance Forum Afghanistan targeted 2016's research topics on governance

The Governance Forum Afghanistan (Govern4Afg), a platform for policy dialogue on governance topics in Afghanistan, discussed research topics for 2016. In the upcoming months, Afghan--German expert teams will develop policy papers on 6 specific research questions, providing recommendations for the Afghan government on how to accomplish important reforms. These activities are funded by the German government. Recently, representatives of the Independent Directorate for Local Governance (IDLG), the Ministry of Economy (MoEc), the Ministry of Finance (MoF), the Afghan-German cooperation, the Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit (AREU) and Govern4Afg as well as policy advisors from various line departments and national experts discussed a list of 25 relevant research topics. These topics had been collected through interviews with Afghan politicians. The list included subjects related to oversight and monitoring in local governance, the improvement of civil society organization’s legal framework as well as urbanization. During the meeting cut the number of proposed research topics down to 10. They demanded Govern4Afg’s experts to conduct research on topics such as service provision by key ministries, the role of non-government organizations (NGOs) in the development sector and how agriculture could support economic development in Afghanistan. In the near future, the Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit (AREU) will designate 6 research topics that will be conducted throughout the current year.