DED is no more...

I used to work for DED. Now DED is no more. Am I unemployed? Fortunately not ;-) ! But my organisation has been merged in to its bigger brother: GTZ. We’re all one big family now, we’re the GIZ („Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit“ which unofficially translates somehow into “German Organisation for International cooperation”).

Before this merger, there were three German government organisations busy with providing technical cooperation to developing countries:

GTZ, by far the largest organisation, worked in a business-like style, receiving concrete work assignments from the German Ministry for International Cooperation with strict and contractual obligation to be fulfilled. GTZ usually funded large projects in cooperation with local governments (e.g. rural electrification, water and sanitation infrastructure, or financial sector development projects). I.e. they usually came with lots of money and few expatriate staff, setting up offices in the capital, hiring local administration staff and experts, and worked towards reaching their indicators and achieving their project goals.


DED provided almost nothing but German (and European) technical experts relocating abroad and supporting a very wide variety of local organisations, associations, ministries, companies, etc. DED also funded the salary of local (e.g. Ugandan) experts. DED also worked mostly at “grassroots level”, i.e. outside of the large cities in rural areas, trying to create a direct impact and working with individuals or through organisations that directly impact on individuals’ livelihood.


INWENT has an extensive network of branch offices in Germany where they deliver all kinds of intercultural, preparatory and introductory trainings. They also have offices in developing countries focussing mainly on training related issues and projects.


And now, all of us have merged into one singular and large body of organisation called GIZ. Cool thing! It was hard enough to grasp this thicket of organisations myself - explaining it to someone else without extensive background in international cooperation and development was next to impossible ;-)

So, now what? On Monday I'm reporting back to work... what will change? Hehe, of course the first thing to change are the business cards and the email address, the rest is yet to come, but I'm excited about this merger and I am convinced we'll all do a better job if we act in concert. Stay tuned!