Moncton-Kaladougou Partnership

In the spring of 2008, the FCM (Federation of Canadian Municipalities) began searching for a Canadian city offering French services to establish a partnership with the Commune of Kaladougou, Mali.

With the support of City Council and various community organizations, the City of Moncton’s Corporate Communications department took on the challenge.

As a result, in October 2008, three City of Moncton representatives travelled to Kaladougou, Mali, to take the first steps towards a knowledge sharing partnership regarding communications.

In March 2009, two representatives of the Commune of Kaladougou discovered the Canadian winter during their mission to Moncton to ensure the partnership’s progress. Meanwhile, members of the team kept things moving via telephone and e-mail.

This project is a collaboration between the FCM and the AMM (Association des municipalités du Mali).

What are communications?

Several definitions can apply to the term communication. In the context of this partnership, stakeholders emphasize the exchange of information between key audiences, for example residents, municipal representatives, etc. And although each community must deal with specific challenges, many communications tools and strategies can be applied to any number of themes.

Project summary

As the participants recognize, efficient communications are an essential to the social and economic development of any municipality. As such, the team will work together to create a communications plan template, which will be used in various situations. For its implementation, we will use one of the priorities chosen by an ad hoc committee formed in November 2008 in Kaladougou.

Key Steps

• Create a communications committee
• Establish a process to develop a communications plan
• Develop a communications plan
• Implement and evaluate the communications plan
• Institutionalisation (integration of the process in the commune’s work methods, with the approval of common council)