Community Development:Korea Shares Experience With Cameroon

By Victorine BIY, Cameroon Tribune

The KOICA Alumni Association Cameroon, KAAC, within the framework of the implementation of its 2015-2017 development agenda has organised a conference in Yaounde to train stakeholders on development.

The association is laying emphasis on community development, with emphasis on projects that have an economic and social bearing on the population. Members of the
association, 99 per cent of whom are civil servants, gathered at the Bastos office of the Korea International Cooperation Agency, KOICA, to learn development best practices.

The conference, organised in partnership with KOICA, stressed on the “Saemaul Undong” Movement, a “typical social and popular movement which played a key role in the remarkable development of the Republic of Kor
ea” it was revealed. KAAC President Amina Abdul, described the “Saemaul Undong” model as one which shaped Korea, transformed the country in the 1970s to rise from “rags to riches”. KOICA’s Resident representative to Cameroon, Kim Tae Young, on behalf of his country’s Ambassador to Cameroon, was confident that Cameroon could achieve its development agenda it completely embrace the “Saemaul Undong” model which hinges on diligence at work, self help (self-sufficiency) and cooperation (cohesion).

The theme of the conference was; “KAAC and Community Development in Cameroon”. Partcipants exchanged knowledge based on achievements and experiences acquired from various trainings in Korea on community development. This was in an effort to establish a network between the different actors involved in community development. They equally viewed presentations illustrating Korean development from 1960 to 1990 using the “Saemaul Undong” approach, its applications, challenges and achievements with reference to Cameroon. The approach, resource persons stressed, could best suit councils and localities.

The development experts, corporate managers, business persons and decision-makers, who took part in the conference, are expected to like in other developing countries currently practicing the development model, help reshape Cameroon.