The Institute of Public Administration “BIPA” concluded on Thursday, the first conference of the Middle East and North Africa Public Administration Research ” MENAPAR ” group, which was hosted by the Kingdom of Bahrain over a period of two days (23-24 April, 2014) with a wide internal and external participation, during the press conference that was held at the conclusion of the sessions, it was officially announced the establishment of the Middle East and North Africa Public Administration Research “MENAPAR” group, taking Manama as its headquarters, and to be a Centre for Public Administration Research and development of administration and government practices, which is reflected positively on citizens' daily life in the Middle East and North Africa region.
The Director General of BIPA Dr. Raed Mohammed bin Shams stated that the new organization will play a major and vital role in the continuity and sustainability of interests in the scientific research in public administration and building policies and official appropriate decision-making, in the sense that contributing to the development of government work and performance on scientific grounds and through building a comprehensive information base in this area, stressing that BIPA seeks – in accordance to what was stated by the decree of its establishment – to raise the level of public administration and support plans for economic and social development through training, consultations and research, and with the participation of international institutions involved in this field, namely: United Nations Development Program (UNDP), International Institute of Administrative Sciences (IIAS) and the International Association of Schools and Institutes of Administration (IASIA), as strategic partners in addition to a number of institutions in the Arab region.
Dr. Sufyan Sahrawi also stated at the press conference that the Board of directors of MENAPAR is initially consisting of membership from Morocco, Tunisia, Lebanon, Palestine and Kuwait, and the Board will work to carry out a comprehensive survey of all the institutions of common interest in the region, to be included in the MENAPAR membership, and a project will be assigned on identifying research program in the region in order to identify common research needs in the region and combine them to determine the most prominent research priorities.
The “MENAPAR” conference has continued its session for the second day by holding six parallel sessions on the following topics: public finance, e-government, academic education of public administration in the Arab region, performance management, public governance, the creation of research networks of public administration in the region.