Why partnerships and capacity building matter
Sustainable change must be owned by national actors. Working in partnerships is a fundamental principle of Helvetas’ work. We strive to build evolving, reliable, and strong partnerships to secure lasting impact, increase the legitimacy of development interventions, and ensure sustainable change beyond the scope of individual project durations.
What we do
Strong, self-determined local actors guarantee that development steps are locally anchored and designed to last. Capacity development is an integral part of all our work. For us, capacity development is a mutual learning process. It enables individuals, organizations, sectors and societies to manage development change processes. Capacity encompasses specific technical knowledge and know-how, “soft skills” such as networking, leadership and change management, as well as financial resources and infrastructure. Capacity development is a core element in our partnerships with government actors, the private sector and civil society organizations. Helvetas is convinced that different actors with their specific capacities contribute to successful development processes.
In order to mainstream partnership and capacity development in our work, we have defined its main principles in our Helvetas Partnership Policy. Download it in English, Spanish, French or Russian .
