Cyclical nature of the APRM

The APRM is envisaged as a cyclical process, which begins with a review of a country's governance standards and practices, the development of a plan of action to improve on these standards, the implementation of this plan of action and finally an assessment of the successes and failures of the process, which brings a country back to a review of its governance practices and the process begins again. After an initial assessment of a country's governance practices, the government commits itself to a plan of action based on the country's self-assessment report (CSAR) and comments by the APR Panel. The government is then responsible for implementing the Program of Action (PoA) over a period of 5 years, after which time, the country will conduct a follow-up review of progress made and the extent to which the PoA objectives need to be revised. In this way, the APRM is intended to foster a virtuous circle of ever more efficient and beneficial governance practices within a participating state and draw on the experience of other participating African states as they also review and implement governance reforms in their respective countries.

• Preparation This phase includes: an APRM country support mission to assess the country's preparedness for review, conducting a CSAR; and submitting the draft CSAR to the APR Secretariat, at which point the Secretariat begins to constitute an APRM Country Review Mission to visit the country.
• Review This phase includes: The APRM Country Review Mission to gather additional information which is submitted along with a country's CSAR to the APR Panel for further consideration; the adoption of the CSAR and the PoA by the APR Forum; and government making preparations for implementing the PoA and any other recommendations made to it by the APR Panel or APR Forum.
• Implementation This phase includes: allocating resources towards individual issues outlined in the PoA, implementing strategies aimed at achieving stated outputs in the PoA; and monitoring progress towards achieving these ouputs.
• Preparation for follow-up review This phase includes any necessary activities by the government and national APRM agencies to prepare for a review of the country's progress in achieving outputs outlined in the PoA and conducting a fresh review of the country's governance practices.