The African Economic Research Consortium (AERC), established in 1988, is one of the most robust Research and Capacity Building Institutions in the world, with a focus on sub-Saharan Africa. The Consortium’s mission is to strengthen local capacity for conducting independent, rigorous inquiry into the problems facing the management of economies in sub-Saharan Africa. The African Economic Research Consortium (AERC) held a successful senior policy seminar, the twentieth in the series with a broad theme as Regional Integration in Africa on March 12-13, 2018. A total of four papers were presented followed by a policy roundtable. The roundtable was a mix of policy makers, paper presenters, and private sector actors.

The four main objectives of the Senior Policy Seminars were:

• To identify possible areas of policy-oriented research for AERC-funded researchers to consider.
• To improve prospects for policy involvement by AERC-funded researchers.
• To increase AERC visibility in the policy community, highlighting the growing capacity in the region for policy research.
• To provide an opportunity for policy makers and researchers to exchange their experiences and views on macroeconomic policy.

These are achieved in four ways:

• By synthesizing and disseminating the results of AERC-funded research to senior policy makers.
• By generating an interaction between the policy makers and AERC-funded researchers on the results of existing AERC research.
• By encouraging sharing of experiences among policy makers, on the lessons and details of macroeconomic policies.
• By receiving feedback from policy makers on the key current policy-related research issues in Africa.

The concrete outputs of the seminar were:

• Major input into AERC’s policy-oriented research agenda, in the form of suggestions for key priorities in each of the policy areas examined.
• Ideas for methods and structures to promote closer collaboration among policy makers and researchers, both within individual countries and collaboratively across the continent.
• Wider dissemination of AERC materials to policy makers, and ideas for forms and methods of dissemination most convenient to them.
• Proposals for how to follow-up the seminar.

Outcome of the senior policy seminar (SPSXX)

• Raised awareness and knowledge among senior policy makers, private sector and non-state actors on the role of Regional Integration in Africa through evidence-based research.
• Identification of enabling government policies for regional integration, and exchange of country-specific experiences through a roundtable discussion.
• Enhanced relationship between researchers and policy makers by bringing them together to discuss key policy research issues in regional integration.
• Provide an opportunity to policy makers and researchers, along with the private sector and non-state actors, for uninterrupted dialogue on a set of key regional integration issues considered significant to policy.
• Equip African policy makers in decision making using up-to-date research findings.

Themes of Previous AERC Senior Policy Seminars