Synergy International Systems, Inc. (Synergy) is proud to announce that it has won the tender to create the Development Projects Management Information System (DevProMIS) for the Ministry of Finance and Economic Development of Zimbabwe.

With development of DevProMIS underway, Synergy is providing the complete set of technology, knowledge, expertise and services to design, develop and deliver an integrated system that is user-friendly, scalable, and sustainable. It is envisaged that the system will provide the Government of Zimbabwe an end-to-end framework to automate business processes, manage workflows, and attain an increased capability in managing relations with Development Partners.

Vienna, Virginia, USA, 15 December, 2016 – The Government of Albania has selected Synergy International Systems to develop an External Assistance Management Information System (EAMIS) as part of its broader effort of strengthening public financial management. Synergy was awarded the project through an international competitive bidding by the World Bank.

EAMIS will help the Government plan, manage, and monitor development aid to Albania. Powered by Synergy’s Development Assistance Database (DAD)—the leading country-level, country-led aid information management system (AIMS)—EAMIS will serve as the single source of information on development flows and projects. It will be a vital management information system within the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO), and will be overseen by the Department for Development Programming, Financing and Foreign Aid (DPFFA) of the PMO.

Vienna, Virginia, USA – 04 August, 2014 – Rwanda’s process for coordinating the many international NGOs working in the country is about to get a major overhaul. Rwanda’s Directorate General of Immigration and Emigration (DGIE) has engaged Synergy International Systems, Inc., a leading Washington, D.C. area software firm, to develop an Integrated INGO Database in order to better manage efforts to fight poverty and foster socioeconomic development.

The Development Assistance Database (DAD) Community of Practice (CoP) is a global forum of practitioners who share a common commitment to advancing development effectiveness through the smart and sustainable application of Synergy’s Development Assistance Database (DAD)— a web-based software platform that governments use to track aid flows and monitor development projects.

The major event of the DAD CoP is a biennial conference that brings together a diverse array of participants representing governments, aid agencies, civil society organizations, think-tanks, and the private sector. The conference centers on a workshop that features case studies in implementing DAD to improve government management of development data. The DAD CoP currently has over 80 members from about 20 countries, including Afghanistan, Armenia, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Comoros, India, Iraq, Kenya, Lesotho, Mauritania, Moldova, Mozambique, Namibia, Pakistan, Sierra Leone, Solomon Islands, Somalia, Sri Lanka, Tajikistan, and Yemen. The International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) also participates in the DAD CoP.

The development journey of Comoros has not been easy. Formally known as the Union of Comoros, this predominantly Muslim nation of four main islands has endured decades of political instability following its independence from French colonial power in 1975. Located at the northern mouth of the Mozambique Channel between Tanzania and Madagascar, Comoros is regularly exposed to natural disasters such as volcanic eruptions and flash floods. Also, most of its food and fuel must be imported.

With approximately 45 percent of its population living below the poverty line, Comoros is now beginning to systematically track its foreign assistance funds via the Development Assistance Database (DAD). The DAD Comoros officially launched 19 March, 2013 with funding from UNDP and the European Union.

DAD Comoros empowers the General Planning Commission of Comoros to track and analyze aid information from donors, ministries, and civil society organizations on Synergy’s integrated aid management information system. Ultimately, Comoros hopes to prepare the nation’s first foreign aid report in 2013.

The General Planning Commission of Comoros discovered the capabilities of the DAD during the DAD Community of Practice conference at Synergy’s Global Learning Center in 2011. Together with participants from around the world, they learned how DAD systems were implemented in other countries to manage aid information and progress toward national development goals.

“Despite facing many development challenges, Comoros shows not only a strong capacity to absorb knowledge, but also initiative in making aid data reporting a systematic endeavor,” remarks Synergy Project Manager, Rudolph Saint Jean.

The Development Assistance Database (DAD) Community of Practice (CoP) is happy to announce the completion of the 2011 Global Conference & Training, which took place from 20-24 June in Synergy International Systems’ Global Learning Center in Yerevan, Armenia. This year’s event brought together about 40 practitioners from 16 countries, including Armenia, Cameroon, Iraq, Kenya, Lesotho, Mauritania, Moldova, Mozambique, Sierra Leone, the Solomon Islands, Somalia and Somaliland, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Tajikistan, and the United States.
The week-long conference consisted of a three-day workshop and a two-day training program. The workshop gave the participants an opportunity to present their country experiences in establishing the DAD or other Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) information systems. In particular, the participants discussed and brainstormed common challenges related to timely and reliable data reporting, challenges to and opportunities for linking M&E systems to decision-making processes, and the sustainability of government management information systems.

The two-day training program, which included ten sessions, was led by senior Synergy staff and covered a wide range of topics such as M&E Data Collection and Quality Assessment, M&E Analytics and Reporting, and the DAD Implementation Process.

The conference also offered an exciting cultural program. The roundtables of the third day of the workshop were held in a scenic location overlooking the 1st century A.D. temple of Garni. The participants also visited a number of historic sites, including the ancient Cathedral of Etchmiadzin and the architectural splendor of the Geghard monastery. The participants also enjoyed the lively and moving sounds of the “Little Singers of Armenia,” a world-famous children’s ensemble that performs traditional Armenian music.

The evaluation survey completed after the conference clearly showed that the event was highly successful in meeting the participants’ expectations. And the participants were unanimously excited about being part of a vibrant community of professionals who can benefit from one another’s experience and knowledge. As Mr. Christopher Oisebe, Chief Economist of Kenya’s Ministry of Finance and the Manager of the Electronic Projects Monitoring Information System (ePro-MIS), put it, “DAD is now a family of practitioners. Let us all continue to strengthen our ties in order to advance our knowledge and skills and to improve our development efforts.”

On June 14, 2011, the Government of Sri Lanka launched the Integrated National Development Information System (INDIS), a web-based application developed by Synergy for the Ministry of Finance and Planning to manage the entire portfolio of development projects, be they financed by domestic or external resources. The launch was attended by senior government officials, including Dr. P. B. Jayasundera, the Secretary of the Treasury, and Mrs. Malanie Gamage, the Director General of Foreign Aid and Budget Monitoring. Synergy has been working with the Government of Sri Lanka, in close collaboration with UNDP, since the 2004 Asian Tsunami, which heavily affected the country.

In 2005, the Ministry of Planning established the Development Assistance Database (DAD) Sri Lanka to track the thousands of post-tsunami assistance projects. From 2005-2010, the system went through successive stages of evolution, from initially tracking only post-tsunami reconstruction to eventually covering the entire external assistance portfolio. But the existence of multiple related but disconnected information systems imposed a serious management burden on the Sri Lankan government. Therefore, the government decided to establish a truly integrated enterprise Monitoring and Evaluation information system that would provide a complete picture of government performance and national development. Indeed, INDIS goes beyond project monitoring; it also helps assess the performance of ministries and sectoral developments, as well as being a searchable e-registry of all project evaluations.

The INDIS is, at its core, a decision-support tool designed to enable policymakers to assess project performance and results in real-time and take decisions on corrective actions and resource allocation. And its establishment comes at the right time, as the government has recently rolled out a number of key capital investment projects in water resources, energy, and road development.

A major part of the INDIS project was to integrate various government information systems into one unified system to achieve efficient information management, coupled with advanced analytical and reporting capabilities. In his remarks during the launch ceremony, Dr. Fredrick Abeyratne, Senior Programme Analyst of UNDP, thanked Synergy “for doing a wonderful job of integrating systems…and adding new features.”

On June 16, 2011, the Government of Iraq launched the Iraq Development Management System (IDMS) at a high-level ceremony in Baghdad. The event was sponsored by the Iraqi Prime Minister Mr. Nouri Al-Maliki and attended by ministers, governors, and deputy ministers, as well as over ten ambassadors.

The IDMS is a comprehensive bilingual (Arabic/English) web-based application that manages the whole cycle of government and donor-funded development projects in Iraq. It allows ministries to plan, manage, and monitor the full lifecycle of capital investment projects from start to finish in an online environment. It is designed to help monitor the implementation of Iraq’s National Development Plan (NDP) 2010-2014, which envisages about 3000 development projects with a total value of $100 billion over five years.

At a deeper level, this innovative government tool marks a break with paper-based forms of capital investment planning and monitoring used to date, which tended to be burdensome and vulnerable to misuse of public funds. By contrast, the IDMS is an electronic tool that allows real-time collection, analysis, and reporting of development data. Also, by being publicly accessible on the Internet, it can advance government transparency and accountability by showing how public resources are being spent and what development results are being achieved.

According to Christine McNab, the Deputy Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Iraq, “the IDMS is a major reform of part of the public sector and an ambitious e-governance application,” and it would not have been possible without “the technical prowess of Synergy International Systems.” It was designed and developed by Synergy for the Ministry of Planning in 2010, with assistance and funding from USAID/Tatweer, UNDP, UNOPS, the EU, and the Government of Spain.

The IDMS builds upon the highly successful Development Assistance Database (DAD), which Synergy developed in 2005 for the Ministry of Planning to manage external assistance for Iraq’s post-conflict reconstruction. Following the successful federal-regional arrangement adopted for the DAD, IDMS will be accompanied by a regional application for the Kurdistan Regional Government, and the two applications will be fully synchronized.

Synergy will continue to work closely with the Ministry of Planning to ensure that all Ministries, Governorates, and donor organizations use the system effectively so as to perform their functions and meet their information needs.