In June 2012, the Training for Peace Programme at ACCORD (TfP/ACCORD) established a Civilian Capacity Network of civil society organisations, which then facilitated a consultation on Civilian Capacity Matching (CapMatch) in collaboration with the United Nations (UN) Civilian Capacity (CivCap) Team. The consultation focused on the UN CivCap Team’s proposal on establishing a self-service online platform called Capacity Matching (CapMatch), which aims to better match the demand and supply of specialised civilian capacities for deployment in peacekeeping operations within countries emerging from conflict.
The Civilian Capacity Network of civil society organisations was established with the aim of producing knowledge on and momentum for the mobilisation of civilian capacity available in the Global South for peacekeeping and peacebuilding operations. The network consists of civil society organisations including Igarapé Social (Brazil), United Services Institute (India), Centre for Strategic and International Studies-Jakarta (Indonesia), Norwegian Institute for International Affairs (Norway) and ACCORD (South Africa). TfP/ACCORD was represented by Mr Zinurine Alghali, Peacekeeping Unit Coordinator, who also participated in the CapMatch consultation that took place from 13-14 June 2012, in New York. The consultation, hosted in collaboration with the Civilian Capacity Network, consisted of interactive sessions by the UN CivCap Team, utilising a question-and-answer approach to gather feedback on how to make the online CapMatch platform as user-friendly and productive as possible, and the overall utility of the mechanism in improving the matching of demand and supply of civilian capacities to post-conflict countries.
The consultation displayed the efforts undertaken to implement the recommendations of the Civilian Capacity Report published by the UN Secretary General’s Senior Advisory Group, and has also paved the way for further understanding of the CapMatch concept and approach. It was also an opportunity for TfP/ACCORD to consult on the practical details of what capacities Member States can provide and how best they can be engaged in their region, in preparation of the South Africa Civilian Capacity Project currently underway as part of the Civilian Capacity Network which encourages the Global South in providing more effective civilian capacity support. Such initiatives contributing to the implementation of the civilian capacities processes are in line with the core goals of the Training for Peace in Africa Programme at ACCORD, which seeks to significantly improve the civilian capacity of organisational structures within the Regional Economic Communities (RECs), African Union (AU) and UN, in preparing, managing and monitoring multidimensional peacekeeping and peacebuilding operations in Africa.
ACCORD’s work on strengthening civilian capacities is conducted through its Training for Peace Programme, an initiative funded by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
