“A cornerstone of influence that helps spread our values”

France and Europe have been facing increased geopolitical competition. The French Government has therefore taken firm action to enhance the resources needed for our development and international solidarity policy. This policy—and especially its dimension implemented by Expertise France—is a cornerstone of influence that helps spread our values.

I’d like to congratulate all the Expertise France employees for the results they achieved in 2022 in terms of activities, geographical and sectoral priorities, and impact. They’ve once again demonstrated their commitment and professionalism, even under sometimes difficult situations of degraded security, as in Ukraine and the Sahel. I thank them very much for those efforts.

Expertise France projects, especially in Africa, have helped mobilize domestic resources, support entrepreneurship, digitize government administrations, and make public policies greener. In this way, it has fully participated in achieving our official development assistance goals.

The year 2022 was marked by the integration of Expertise France into AFD Group. This will lead to greater clarity and stronger linking between their actions, but several challenges will arise for the agency in 2023.

I’d like to see increased synergies with AFD and Proparco, so that our partners are proposed integrated offers combining financial support and technical expertise. A lot of progress has already been made in this area, but there’s room for more, including in terms of functional synergies to help consolidate Expertise France’s business model.

Projecting France’s economic influence is another priority, and one that my ministry is supporting directly by increasing the number of international technical experts (ITEs), who contribute to promoting and disseminating our interests in priority regions and sectors. Credit should be given to Expertise France’s role here in identifying, coordinating, and deploying the best experts to our partners.

Strengthening Expertise France’s position as a benchmark operator of EU projects is another strategic priority, as we can see in the increased importance of Team Europe initiatives and the “Global Gateway” strategy. Expertise France is a privileged partner in their implementation, and I hope it will continue to be so when these projects are in line with France’s geographical and sectoral priorities.

These various projects will be considered in the strategic reflection to be undertaken in 2023 during the meetings of the Presidential Development Council and the Inter-ministerial Committee for International Cooperation. At these events, we can redefine our priorities in a changing and unstable global context, and we can rethink our tools to maximize their impact. We should also be able to reaffirm France’s role in providing support through greater deployment of technical expertise abroad, which is destined to continue to grow. I’m counting on Expertise France to help us make this ambition a reality.

Editorial composed in May 2023