With aims of aligning strategies in order to increase engagement at a municipal level and meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in Bahia, the State held the 1st Participative Governance Forum and 5th Program Workshop: the Public Prosecutor’s Office (MP) and the Millennium Goals, both under the coordination of the Bahia State Public Prosecutor’s Office (MP-BA). The target publics of the discussions held on April 18 and 19 were prosecutors and representatives from local institutions and the government.

The event also included lectures by specialists on the topic. Ieva Lazareviciute, Program Analyst for the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) Strategic Planning and Capacity Development Unit in Brazil, pointed out that “the MDG are tools that help develop and formalize the agenda of fundamental demands, as well as their implementation and monitoring.” Wagner Caetano, Brazilian National Secretary of Political-Social Relations for the Presidency of the Republic, promoted a reflection on the priorities of the cities and residents. “We have to engage the municipalities in debates of this nature so that people have the conditions to maintain dialogue with members of government, strengthening their sense of citizenship,” said Caetano.

The programming also featured a lecture by the Executive Chair of the Odebrecht Foundation, Mauricio Medeiros, who talked about the experiences of the Development and Integrated Growth Program with Sustainability for the Southern Bahia Lowlands Environmental Protection Areas Mosaic (PDCIS) – an initiative focused on and oriented toward meeting the eight goals in the region. “We encourage the organization of the family units into cooperatives, train the new generation to find work and income, add value to the farmers’ crops and seek partnerships to help sell the products,” said Medeiros. “This is the logic of the PDCIS,” he said.

Clodoaldo da Anunciação, Public Prosecutor and creator of the program The Public Prosecutor’s Office (MP) and Millennium Development Goals, described the challenges of the MP: “As a priority, we want to offer what is basic and considered the population’s right,” said Medeiros. Romualdo Santos, from the Office of the Controller General (CGU), Saulo Mattos, Public Prosecutor, and the government workers from the Bahia Public Prosecutor’s Office, Nanci Sakaki and Rita Andrade, completed the forum panels.

In order to close the event, a letter of intent was elaborated, designed to propose an agenda that would make it possible to meet the MDGs in the State of Bahia, primarily in the Southern Lowlands. Prioritizing actions focused on quality public education and health and maintaining close, qualified communication between institutions are some of the topics highlighted in the document.

Present at the event were representatives from the General Department of the Presidency of the Republic, UNDP, CGU, Odebrecht Foundation, Association of Bahia Southern Lowlands Municipalities (AMUBS), Intermunicipal Consortium of the Pratigi Environmental Protection Area (CIAPRA), National Commercial Learning Service (Bahia branch), Santa Cruz State University, National Movement for Citizenship and Solidarity and the bank Banco Nacional do Nordeste.

Cooperation Agreement

The Odebrecht Foundation and MP-BA signed a Technical Cooperation Agreement and defined an agenda of events to be promoted during the year 2013.

The 1st Participative Governance Forum was a joint action by the institutions. The proposal is to strengthen the relationship between the Public Prosecutor’s Office and Odebrecht Foundation with the society of the Bahia Southern Lowlands by discovering the problems in the areas of cooperation and answering the population’s questions about their basic given rights.