Foreign Affairs committee  Bill C-41 is an important bill for looking at ensuring that humanitarian assistance can get to populations that need it, even if they're in places where terrorist activities do happen. That's the extent to which I wish to pronounce on it here because we're not responsible for that piece of—

Foreign Affairs committee  We can speak to overall official development assistance—including all channels—to Africa. The reason that we often speak about sub-Saharan Africa is just the way we're organized administratively, but for the purposes of this committee, this covers all of Africa. Sixty-four per cent of ODA is going to multilateral organizations, 26% to Canadian organizations and 10% to foreign organizations, which are local CSOs, governments trusted to do that kind of work or other organizations such as that global green growth initiative I mentioned.

Foreign Affairs committee  I was going to say that. There are some really exciting new tools that are available to governments to work government to government and to work with the private sector. We have a new development financing institute, FinDev, which has some really interesting tools in its tool belt to work with the African private sector, along with the Canadian private sector, to advance economic growth on the African continent.

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you for your question. The member has put her finger on a very important element of the rise of pan-Africanism—not 1970s pan-Africanism but a new pan-Africanism through the auspices of the African Union. That is why the Canadian government is paying so much attention to the African Union right now.

Foreign Affairs committee  I think one of the most interesting trends and most remarkable things happening on the African continent is an increasing unity, partly driven by the African Union itself, partly driven by the dream of having an African continental free trade area and partly because of the increasing ability of African states to work with each other to solve African problems.

Foreign Affairs committee  Our first dedicated, permanent observer to the African Union is Ambassador Ben Marc Diendéré. He's doing an excellent job for us. For the last 15 years, we have had a permanent observer to the African Union. This is the first time we've had a dedicated permanent observer. Before, it was double-headed with the ambassador to Ethiopia.

Foreign Affairs committee  One of the things I think is key to our engagement now and for the very near future is our newish and bolstered relationship with the African Union and the African Union Commission. We had a high-level dialogue in October 2022 that brought a large delegation from the African Union Commission—including the chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki—to Canada to meet with our Prime Minister.