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Well, good morning everyone, and it really is good to see you. And I had thought that I was coming in by video, but I came back early; we had one of those really whirlwind trips where we were in Kenya and then, as things began deteriorating in Bangladesh, I wanted to be sure that we were there. We, USAID, was there in Bangladesh at that time of need and then on for Thanksgiving in Darfur and Jeddah and Sudan, and then Ethiopia and then coming back last night for the beginning of the peace conference. But therefore, it means that I can be with you today and I think the global development commons is so important that I wanted just to kick it off; and I wish I could stay with you the whole day but I cannot; but I know you will have very, very good and interesting sessions. I wanted to be here because I think that the breadth of experience and expertise, and the new ways of thinking that you will bring to this are part of what we need for a global development commons. So I want to be sure that you are thinking with innovation and creativity about the world that lies ahead; not the world which is, but the world that will be. I am hoping that this forum will be the first step towards building the commons that will be populated with a network of partners that will open and strengthen and make more purposeful the lines of communication in the development community around the world. Our greatest challenge in the development community is filling knowledge gaps: knowledge of world's best practices, knowledge of a marketplace of ideas, of what is at work in each country; knowledge on goods and services, knowledge of donors and projects, knowledge of who is at work in each country, with which partners and with what results. And we need a good dialogue to understand the country in the development context so that knowledge is vibrant and relevant. We need better communication that can enhance the clarity of action of thousands and thousands of people and organizations, governments and donors around the world. And I appeal to you this morning, as well as to the larger development community, a community of experts and partners, to join me and to join USAID in a new quest to create a knowledge-centered commons, a place where knowledge management and networking will allow all of our partners throughout the world to connect and collaborate with one another, and to do it in real time. We will continue to build on our past accomplishments, but this is not enough. The number of people and organizations of corporations and governments, and the complexity of the issues that we face demand that build a more comprehensive and efficient resource network to enhance our knowledge and information exchange. We must relinquish the idea of commanded control; instead, we must cooperate and collaborate and communicate. The global development commons will rely on interconnections, on information institutions and businesses and organizations and governments. It will rely on all of us. We must join as citizens within a country, within a region and around the globe to create a truly global development commons. Genuine consultation and increased collaboration efforts within our own development community, with civil society and with governments, will ultimately make our shared commitment, and the network that supports it, much stronger. To start this conversation, there is a principle that I would like to offer. While many of us are devoted to our own businesses and our own organizations and our agencies, I believe we are most successful when we put the host country at the center of our thinking: its priorities, its capacities, its norms; and that local design is placed at the center of our collective action. We are here to envision and begin to build a resource that will help us further this end. We are at the beginning of a great new era of partnerships, with an explosion of new actors and ideas and solutions and participants, hailing from a wide variety of sectors throughout the world. In this era, we need to seek new understanding of many, many ways to approach and get results in international development to improve our knowledge of development so that together, we can help the people most in need. I wish all of you good luck in your noble endeavor. We have with us today a world-class development and information set of technology partners, and I am excited and I'm sure that you are too, to hear about innovations that are taking place on web-based development solutions, connectivity and information-sharing practices. I want to strengthen our existing partnerships and I would, together, like to create an even stronger set of partnerships so that together we will create a global development commons. Thank you all very much. (Applause.) |
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