Last week we meet with the DGG LG advisor to discuss ways in which we could work together. The NTF of the meeting is here. The new focus of UNDP’s approach to local governance will be urban environments but not just large cities. With resilience in mind, the idea is to target fast growing cities…

I received an informal request from UNDP’s post-2015 team to submit a short proposal on ICTs and governance. While it is not yet clear what kind of activities the post-2015 UNDG project will be funding,  one of the ideas that have been floating around is to support concrete on the ground projects  -but hopefully not…

Last week we had a follow-up meeting with Telefónica. We are basically working on three distinct tracks while trying to build a partnership with the company. They are: 1. Global events; 2. MyWorld support in LAC where input to the survey  has been very limited; and 3. Building a regional programme where Telefónica can contribute…

A week on Monday we were asked by the Director of the Practice to prepare a short and sharp text on the work we do so she can make a push for it before her departure. Here is what we prepared with inputs from the egov team. Cheers, Raúl

UNDP Kenya is launching  a new project called Digital Information Centres for Innovation and Development. The prodoc is here. Here are the comments we shared back with the CO, with inputs for egov team members.

Following on a previous request from KSA, I received a follow-up question from the Project Manager in Riyadh. The question was: how to prepare structures to support OSS development industry in the Kingdom?” Here is what I sent back to the Kingdom.

Building on the momentum generated by the Open Government Partnership, the Omidyar Foundation announce last last December the launching of a 45 milliom USD fund to “Make all Voices Count”.  The idea is to provide people, citizens and stakeholders with innovative tools and methods to engage more effectively with governments, both local and national. In…

It seems that DGG, in addition to help draft UNDP’s corporate Youth Strategy, is also planning to launch a complementary virtual platform to give additional voice to the youth. As I understand it, the platform will essentially use multi-media channels to capture the voices of young people (under 25 years of age, in case you…

UNDP Administrator will be participating in this annual meeting (http://www.guardian.co.uk/media-network/activate) and we got a request for speaking points on governance and privacy. Below is what I submitted. Role of ICTs in building open and responsive institutions

Yesterday I met with a colleague from UNITAR who provided an update on the relation between them and Microsoft. UNITAR and MS signed a collaoration agreement in 2007/8 and are now planning to expand their joint work supporting Microsoft’s own 4Afrika initiative (http://www.microsoft.com/africa/4afrika/. UNITAR has already explored the possibility of working with UNDP in a…

BDP has recently appointed a focal point for the above who is part of the Poverty Group. We have had a couple of meetings with the team working on SSTC including one with the UNDP Bangladesh advisor for the Access to Information Programme. While the relationship between this group and the UN South-South unit which…

I have  been in contact with the UNDP office in Tripoli discussing ways to support the completion of e-gov strategy and subsequent implementation. The effort is lead by the Ministry of Telecommunications who in turn has already hired PWCs to assist with the completion of the exercise. An initial presentation from the Ministry has bee…

A result from the mission I did to Ukraine last year was an agreement with the CO to support with a small grant activities related to Open Government and the Ukraine National Action Plan. The CO continued the engagement they had with the National E-governance Center and developed this proposal which calls for the creation…

I was supposed to travel to Bishkek to attend an ICTD/e-governance meeting on 5 June which included the participation of the Primer Minister but was unable to travel thanks to my foot injury (the latest agenda of the meeting is here:  Agenda e-leadership).  Instead, the CO asked to prepare a draft speech to be delivered…

Since the dawn of the new Millennium we have seen rapid changes in the ICT environment where mobiles and mobility are clear trend setters. The same can be said about the use and deployment of ICTs in the public sector. We started with e-government and then moved to e-governance a few year later -we can…