Programme HIRDA's 15th Anniversary

The Way Forward: Innovating Diaspora engagement

The 17th of May, HIRDA celebrates its 15 years of existence, looking back with pride on what it has achieved in those years. To commemorate this important milestone HIRDA organises the conference ‘Innovating diaspora engagement: The Way Forward’. This conference focuses on HIRDA’s past accomplishments and its plans for the future in Somalia. HIRDA aims for NGOs and government to become aware of the opportunities that migration offers to the development of Somalia.

Objective of this conference:
To define and further develop innovative ways to engage Diaspora in general, and the Diaspora from the Horn of Africa specifically, to the development of their home country.

Speakers and panel members:
Farah Karimi, Abdiweli Mohamed Ali (former Prime Minister Somalia), Ministry of Foreign Affairs DCM/MO, Jan Nico Scholten (Association European Parliaments for Africa), Thierry Sanders (Director BiD Network)

The conference consists of two parts:

Part I: HIRDA’s 15 years of existence – accomplishments and challenges and panel discussion.

Part II: Workshops and plenary discussions


In the afternoon the participants are able to subscribe for one of the four workshops and plenary discussions. A mix of participants from the Somali Diaspora, representatives from other Diaspora communities, co-financing organisations, major civil society formations, academic and policy institutions are invited to ensure a lively, pluralist, yet synergistic examination of the social remittance paradigm and its applications.

There are four series of workshops:


• Workshop 1: Social investment and the diaspora by Thierry Sanders (Director BiD Network)

• Workshop 2: Gender and SRHR by Oxfam Novib, HIRDA and Butterfly Works

• Workshop 3: Institutional-capacity-building by Jan Nico Scholten (The Association of European Parliamentarians for Africa -AWEPA)

• Workshop 4: Migration and development after 2015 by Paul Asquitch (African Foundation for Development -AFFORD)
Please not to subscribe before May 1 as places are limited.

Join us for a day full of inspiration in which we celebrate the past and future of HIRDA and share the vision for a better future of Somalia.

More information and to register (before May 1) click here.