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lated and, therefore, a lower priority or less importance than a po- 

 litical issue or economic issue. Whereas, the point we are all trying 

 to get across here is that it's a seamless piece of cloth. And I think 

 that when we do get the administration, and the Bank and USAID, 

 all three, to see that it is all one issue with many facets, I will be 

 more satisfied with our progress. 



Mr. Gejdenson. Ms. Vedder, you indicated that there is — I think 

 it was you — there is still not a lot of NGO's doing environmental 

 work in Africa. We sit here sometimes and think there is nothing 

 but NGO's out there — tripping over one another, and fighting to 

 deal with the ability to be concerned. Is the real story here that 

 we're not calculating these agencies? 



Ms. Vedder. Yes. What actually I was referring to were African 

 NGO's. I am sorry, it may not have been clear. There are extremely 

 few African NGO s with a conservation emphasis. 



Mr. Gejdenson. So the assumption is that national activities are 

 there? 



Ms. Vedder. I think we can certainly use more. There are a lot 

 of areas unattended to right now. We do tend to trip up each other 

 once in awhile in the field, however. 



Mr. Gejdenson. The kinds of participation, is everybody now fo- 

 cused on, and where there is a function there, others are there? 



Ms. Vedder. Yes. Well, we hear about it before it hits the pa- 

 pers. But I think that there could be more collaboration among 

 NGO's — international NGO's that are working out there. And I do 

 think that there should be meetings that will bring NGO's together 

 with U.S. agencies to begin this kind of roundtable discussion. 



Mr. Gejdenson. But there are no kinds of conferences or all 

 NGO's doing development activity in Africa that come together 

 with the State Department folks, with U.N. folks, with the French, 

 the English, Germans and the Japanese? 



Ms. Vedder. There are bits and pieces that take place at dif- 

 ferent levels. Often in a country, you will find different donor agen- 

 cies or NGO's getting together. What resembles that to some extent 

 here in the States is the Biodiversity Support Program, which has 

 actually taken very big strides in trying to coordinate some NGO 

 activity. But it is not done on a consistent, programmatic basis and 

 it is not done with other branches of other agencies. 



Mr. Gejdenson. Mr. Nsanjama, you are from where? 



Mr. Nsanjama. Malawi. 



Mr. Gejdenson. Where? 



Mr. Nsanjama. Malawi. 



Mr. Gejdenson. And what is the response in Africa to these 

 international NGO's? Are they generally well-received? What is 

 their sense? 



Mr. Nsanjama. In Africa, subject to instability, you know, be- 

 cause they brought their particular lots toward Africa. In the last 

 5 years, we have seen tremendous change, where we are all on the 

 ground, meaning from point zero and saying yes, there is a crisis 

 here. Let's find solutions to this crisis. We far believe those solu- 

 tions are African-based. During the past few years, these commit- 

 ted people are giving better attention. 



Mr. Gejdenson. And is there a sense in the population that this 

 challenge is an important thing to do? 



