Working Better Together in a Team Europe Approach

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Joint programming is a voluntary, flexible, and tailored process designed and driven by actors following a Team Europe approach, along with its like-minded partners when relevant, in consultation with partner country counterparts. It can be adapted to different contexts, including countries experiencing conflict and fragility as well as least developed countries. That means that the timeline, scope of the exercise and the length of the strategy is predominantly determined by the participating actors following a Team Europe approach.

Therefore, the joint programming process has also taken very different shapes in different countries, depending on the situation of the partner country and the specific coordination needs of the involved JP participants.

In a number of country cases, for example, joint mapping combined with regular dedicated meetings has offered sufficient level of coordination and was seen as the best way to implement joint programming. In other countries actors following a Team Europe approach have starting with some ‘low-hanging fruits’, e.g. a concrete set joint actions which would showcase the added value of the a Team Europe approach, before progressively moving towards a more comprehensive JP exercise. Starting with implementing the TEIs and then building on that work to move towards JP was another approach taken by a number of countries (e.g. Zimbabwe) when the TEIs came into being.

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In 2019, the TE approach group in Mozambique decided to first elaborate a “Joint Action Plan 2019-2020” around a set of concrete proposed actions (e.g. joint knowledge management, joint implementation and joint visibility actions) in support of a practical and pragmatic Working Better Together (WBT) approach – instead of developing a full-fledged strategy document. Back at the time, this approach was justified in the following manner: “Currently the necessary conditions are not met for having an overarching joint strategy of the EU and the Member States, though this should remain the long-term goal”.

In certain fragile and conflict-affected states, it was decided that a continuously updated, joint conflict analysis would be sufficient to kick-start the process – by however keeping the option open of evolving towards a more comprehensive JP exercise once the country situation permits (see country examples on this under Chapter 2.7 of the core guidance.

The following, proposed template based on country practices and experiences. It is not to be seen as a prescriptive instruction, but rather as inspirational guidance. JP participants groups may decide on different document outlines or to adapt or use only part of the template examples or to introduce context-specific components/ elements to them in light of their specific partner country context, can be applied.

Table 6: Joint programming process and document.

Full Joint Programming Process and Document:

1. Executive Summary and Introduction (Max. 4 Pages)
   • 1.1 Executive Summary
   • 1.2 Introduction
     • Political, Economic and Development Relations between actors following a Team Europe approach and the partner country – Beyond Aid priorities.
     • OECD DAC CRS funding overview of actors following a Team Europe approach, over the last 10 years
     • Table on actors following a Team Europe programming cycles
     • WBT, JP and TEIs in the partner country (state of play)
2. Joint Analysis of the Development Context (Max. 10 Pages)
   • 2.1 National Development Plan and Country SDG Progress Analisis
   • 2.2 Political Situation and Human Rights (Peace Pillar Of The 2030 Agenda)
     • 2.2.1 Political situation (incl. security, conflict and crisis, where applicable), democracy and the rule of law, institutional transparency
     • 2.2.2 Decentralization
     • 2.2.3 Human Rights
     • 2.2.4 Civil society (links with CSO Roadmap)
     • 2.2.5 Gender equality, women’s rights and violence (link with EU GAP III/CLIP)
   • 2.3 Economic Situation (Prosperity Pillar Of The 2030 Agenda)
   • 2.4 Social Situation: Poverty & Inequalities, Employment, Health, Education, Social Protection, Migration (People Pillar of the 2030 Agenda)
   • 2.5 Management of Natural Resources, Biodiversity and Climate Change (Planet Pillar of the 2030 Agenda)
3. Joint Response
   • 3.1. Specific objective 1
     • 3.1.1 Government response: National Development Plan
     • 3.1.2 Response of the European donor group, alignment, added value and leader(s) Short description of TEI key objectives + pillars and link to Joint Programming Objectives.
     • 3.1.3 Joint implementation: Short description of ongoing/planned joint implementation (joint financing, missions, TAIEX/ Twinning, joint dialogue….)
   • 3.2-3.3 Specific objective 2, 3......
   • 3.4 Human rights, gender equality and other cross-cutting themes
   • 3.5 Monitoring & Evaluation
   • 3.6 Joint policy dialogue, communication & Visibility

ANNEXES:

1. Joint Results Framework, incl. TEI intervention logic. Short narrative to explain JRF and JIL logic and linkages.
2. Full financial allocations table (2021-2027) + TEI mapping
3. Other annexes: TEI concept notes; Gender CLIP; CSO roadmap, Conflict Analysis (where available and shareable).