The Government of Egypt (GoE) has enacted major reforms and strategies to improve its public governance and foster inclusive and sustainable economic growth. In particular, the GoE launched the “Sustainable Development Strategy: Egypt Vision 2030” (SDS) to attain its key strategic development objectives by 2030 and pursue the United Nations 2030 Agenda. To achieve this, the GoE has adapted its institutional landscape, tailoring different agencies and institutes to be fit-for-purpose and building analytical, research and implementation capacities to reach these goals.
This Review focuses on the role of the National Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development (NIGSD), previously known as the National Management Institute, in achieving Egypt’s sustainable development and public governance objectives. Since 2020, the NIGSD has evolved into a public economic organisation with advisory, training and research functions, working at the intersection of good governance, competitiveness and sustainable development. In this context, the GoE has partnered with the OECD to enhance the NIGSD’s internal governance structures and practices, as well as advise on the expertise and tools that the NIGSD could use to mainstream better governance practices and build capacities for sustainable development across the public administration.
The Review consists of a thorough analysis of the NIGSD that has two main goals:
Improve the internal governance of the NIGSD to strengthen its capacity to fulfil its new mandate effectively. The Review assesses internal governance practices and provides recommendations to strengthen transparency, public integrity, co-ordination, accountability, budget autonomy, effective and transparent communications, and effective use of resources to achieve greater impact.
Improve service provision to its client organisations by building capacity to focus its client and project selection on areas of governance and sustainable development that reflect the institute’s mandate and strategic objectives. The Review analyses partnerships between the NIGSD and client organisations and offers recommendations to expand domestic and international stakeholder relationships in areas of strategic importance.
The Review also shares best practices from institutes in OECD countries working on governance and sustainable development to improve both its internal governance and service delivery to client organisations, particularly from the KDZ Centre for Public Administration Research, CIFAL Flanders, the Institute for Research on Public Policy in Canada, the Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations in France, and the National Institute of Public Administration in Spain.
The Review is part of the Governance and Anti-corruption Pillar 3 from the OECD Egypt Country Programme. It constitutes a key priority of the MENA-OECD Governance Programme in the Programme of Work 2023-2024 of the OECD Public Governance Committee. This work is pursued in complementarity with the EU-funded project “Support to Enhanced Administrative and Public Economic Governance in Egypt” to incentivise and support ongoing structural reforms. The Review draws upon the evidence and good practices gathered by the OECD Public Governance Committee, the working groups and networks of the MENA-OECD Governance Programme, and OECD Recommendations.