All focus will be on Harare next week as delegates from all over the continent are expected to converge in the country for the Africa Factbook Stakeholders Consultative Conference set for March 5 at the Harare International Conference Centre.
The conference which shall touch on useful facts about Africa and its people for purposes of information dissemination, education, entertainment, reference, statistics and documentation is being implemented by local publishing company, the Book of African Records on the strength of a Memorandum of Understanding with the Africa Union.
“All is set for the Africa Factbook Stakeholders Consultative Conference which is going to be one of the biggest gatherings in the country with at least 120 delegates who includes diplomats, business people, philanthropists, potential funders, academics and researchers, publishers and statisticians are expected to attend the event,” said Book of African Records founder, Kwame Muzawazi.
So far The African Union, The Southern African Development Community, The Economic Community of West African States, The East African Community, The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, International Monetary Fund, World Bank have confirmed their attendance.
Continued Muzawazi: “This conference seeks to sensitise key stakeholders on the importance and process of compiling the Africa Factbook, map, understand and acknowledge existing initiatives and processes on the continent that can feed into this multi-stakeholder process of compiling a home-grown Africa Factbook.”
The conference shall also serve as a marketing platform for the project and its products to ensure the Factbook will be widely used. Through the process, BAR seeks to identify the possible collaborations throughout the Factbook compilation process from research, verification, editing, publishing, printing to marketing and distribution.
