The following are the outputs of the captioning taken during an IGF intervention. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
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>> MODERATOR: All right. Welcome you all to this session, session Number 266 on empowering Civil Society: Bridging gaps in policy influence. Organized by the Civil Society alliances for digital empowerment, which is an EU cofounded project with nine partners listed below there. We have diploe found DiploFoundation, foundation Karisma, forus, KICTANet, fusion, and SMEX. Let me welcome you to this session which we hope to be a very interactive session. We conducted a similar session at the ICANN in the general meeting. The idea was to present key insights from from our currently mapping study.
We're right now doing a baseline study where we're trying to understand issues to do with knowledge [?] engaging in Internet Governance processes.
So this afternoon before we kick start our discussions, I'll present some of the key insights from that particular mapping study, and then I'll request my two colleagues, Stephan wow. Oh, okay. Maybe it's this. Can you hear me now? All right. My apologies. I'm supposed to hold these ones together.
All right. Yeah, so they will provide some reactions to a few questions that I'll pose to them. But to also indicate that KICTANet is doing a study. So they will share some insights from that particular study.
So in terms of how, as kind of project we understand the role of CSOs, we do believe they marginalize voices. This is the role that CSOs actually occupying at the moment. Through this we're able to bring to the floor the various perspectives and concerns of the people that we represent.
CSOs are also promoting digital inclusion. They champion human rights. They also drive innovation and connectivity. They do foster transparency and accountability.
This is an overview of the Internet ecosystem. I may not need to go deeper into this. I think we probably are aware of the key bodies. So quickly going to some of the Internet Governance forums, starting with ICANN.
So under ICANN, there are quite a number of mechanisms where CSOs can actually engage. For example, the noncommission stakeholder group, the constituency, that large community, not for profit operation constituency, these are some of the avenues that (broken audio) in ICANN.
Good, we learn about the processes, challenges and opportunities. The first one is issue to do with insufficient inclusivity where, for example, CSOs do account for a meager 12% of the roles within ICANN's leadership structure.
ICANN processes do require continuous engagement. There's nothing like, you know, one time engagement and then you attend some wins. You need to engage over time, and that requires a lot of resources to sustain.
Influence disparity. We see that within ICANN, the large tech corporations and government are dominate compared to CSOs.
Opportunities, ICANN has a fellowship which has an active activist to understand ICANN. And we see that as a good opportunity.
And then the CSO constituency from the global south which is an opportunity. With respect to IETF, this particular border seems to be a little bit closed from the CSOs and deliverable engagement from CSO [?] this IETF has been on the law side.
One, the use of technical language or the technical jargon also of CSOs issues to do with financial conference and this is linked to the venues where these meetings are held and also, you know, for CSOs to continuously engage in these processes, it's quite prohibited.
And just to point out that, you know, in terms of inclusion, no IETF meeting has taken place in Africa, for example.
There are also concerns about, you know, dominating (lost audio).
Hello. Okay. My apologies.
Then the issue of language barrier. English is only language in the discussions. So an opportunity, IETF is addressing some of the challenges highlighted. For example, there's an onboarding support for newcomers, a similar process happening at ICANN. That's a good opportunity.
There's a dedicated mentoring program for newcomers which you also see as an opportunity.
With respect to ITU, in terms of entry points, there's the CSO conservative status, contributions and divisions. That is ITU study groups, regional and national presence. These are some of the mechanisms for CSO engagement. But we also note that, you know, there is [?] so therefore CSOs has to be linked to national delegations. And where, for example, CSOs are not speaking the same language with their governments, it's difficult for them to actually be part of the national delegations.
There is also, you know, (lost audio). My hand? All right. Okay.
So because of those financial commitments or constraints linked to being part of delegations from the group itself, CSOs from the Global South make their way to these conferences compared to CSOs from the Global North.
Prohibitive costs associated with participation, fees and venues for meetings. The venues usually the venue is Geneva, which is quite expensive.
The Internet Governance Forum, I think so many positives in terms of Internet Governance Forum. CSOs see this as a very much stakeholder platform as compared to ITU, which is much [?]. So that's a very big plus.
One, open considerations and input, that's an area where CSOs can also get involved. Workshops and panels, network and collaborations. Initiatives. Then in terms of opportunities, gaps, and barriers, resource constraints (lost audio).
Can you hear me? All right. Yeah.
So one, I was saying resource constraints is still features under barriers to CSO participation.
Lack of technical capacity to engage effectively on certain topics is also an issue.
The English dominance is still palpable and thus has to be addressed. Nonbinding nature of the discussion sometimes can put off CSOs because they feel like their discussions have gone unheard. Dominance of large tech companies.
But in terms of opportunities, we continue to see that IGF is setting aside funds to support the participation of activists through trouble support, special activist from the Global South, which a good thing. Support for remote hubs, especially for activist from the Global South is also a good opportunity.
So wanted to highlight, but in terms of fracturing the issues that we're talking about, one could look at financial issues to do with capacities, issues to do with shifting the power from the dominant players to Civil Society organizations.
And then, you know, looking at now what are the issues in terms of emerging issues and how best CSOs can actually, you know, engage in those.
So we structure discussion based on the issues that I've highlighted, but we'll be looking at your personal experiences with these and how we can best address some of the challenges that we'll are talking about.
So to kick start the discussion, I'll pose a few questions to with KICTANet. Based on your study, what practical lessons can we learn about meaningful cooperation among CSOs, government, and other stakeholders?
>> I thought I was loud enough just my normal voice. Anyway, can you hear me? Great.
I think the lesson is the maintenance of the multi stakeholder approach. I think the key issue is to have real traction in these sessions in order to have real policy interventions, in order to have real practical outcomes from the sessions, there's a need to have all stakeholders within a room.
I think for me that's one of the key lessons. How then do you engage if it's subject matter experts, academia from it's government, how then do you become a convener?
And it's actually the key skill there becomes a convener that can be trusted, a convener that is able to go several miles ahead in order to build an ecosystem that then creates a flow of information that is useful, right from the grassroots level up to the global level.
I think for me the key thing is really look at how to you do convening and not just at say country level, then moving forward, the issues that you get at the country level, how then do you move them to the regional level.
And to have real policy traction that responds to the needs of the stakeholders. We come to these meetings to find solutions. So for any one step to be targeted. How are you convening for the stakeholders that are there?
Thank you.
>> Thank you so much. What key trainings have you made from the study and based on your own experiment in digital government processes would you actually point out?
>> STEPHANIE BORG PSAILA: Thank you, Ken, pleasure to be here and to the online participants. Regarding the key trends, I'll focus a little bit on some of the findings that you highlighted in the very beginning, right? Because the mapping study that is a part of the project that we're undertaking, it resulted in quite a few important findings. And I would say trends.
So with regard to the main findings, I think we can start off, let's say, basics, right? For instance, the reconfirmation from previous findings that CSOs are still the least influential stakeholder, multi stakeholder Internet Governance despite the equal billing in the WSIS definition. The WSIS definition might place everyone around the table.
But the reality is there are power imbalances that still prevent Civil Society to get around that same table. So that emerged very, very clearly in the mapping that was undertaken as part of the project and in the baseline survey and interviews with with experts.
Obviously, there is a limited participation in CSOs, especially from the Global South. And as a result, the policies that are being shaped, they do not account, do not take into account the needs of the Global South in as much way as they should.
Now, in our study, we focused mostly on standard is setting organizations with a particular focus on, as Kenneth was saying, three standard setting organizations.
So when you look at the barriers for Civil Society engagement, in these three standard setting organizations, here I'm referring to the IETF, ITU, and ICANN, the main trend is that there are few trends, actually, that come out of the of the modalities in which Civil Society engages in each of the fora.
In fact, there is a mix of barriers that is inviting us to go beyond the generalization of barriers of issues that CSOs face. And I'll zoom into the specifics and I'll explain.
Little bit of I'll repeat some of the emphasize some of the things that Kenneth said, just to bring out these specificities and the barriers that CSOs face in these fora. Right.
So let me start off with ICANN, and I think it's also ICANN, IETF and ITU, so no preferences there.
So within the ICANN structure, if you look at the leadership, there is at least half of the leadership roles are taken up by the private sector. Right? So this is a problem, obviously. But not only that, the the baseline study that we carried out, the interviews with the experts, the respondents also felt that there are silos within the ICANN structure that is a recurring problem.
And this is mainly due to the insufficient cross community engagement. This is quite specific to quite specific to ICANN. As we have technical discussions, here is where maybe not as specific to ICANN but quite, let's say, across the board between ICANN, IETF is that it's typical with technical discussions they often neglect broader policy implications.
And because the global Global South perspectives are not heard as much as they should, the priorities and needs of the subregional levels, so here we're going beyond the region, not just talking in terms of the needs of Latin America or the need of Africa, they are often not heard or not heard well, let's say.
So we can see here a mix of barriers, some relate together substance of the discussions and here when we're talking about the substance there is where some trends emerge between the in the barriers that CSOs face in the standard setting organizations. And some relate to structural issues. And I would say the structural issues which are the most specific to these fora.
At the IETF, we had to zoom into the IETF, one of the biggest barriers is language. Why? Because the discussions are held exclusively in English, right? And we're not saying here, hey, let us not use English, far from it. But there are so many tools, so many, you know, interpretations, translation tools that can be a little bit discussions. All right.
Today's technology, it enables this in a very easy way.
Another example is the fact that the meetings, the IETF meetings, the three main meetings every year, they take place in North America, Europe, Asia, right? It's always the same regions.
What about having meetings in Africa, in Latin America, right? We know for a fact that if we had to compare, for instance, meetings of the global IGF, that took place in Africa, in Latin America, the number of CSOs from the region was much, much higher, right, than whenever events were in the Global North.
So this is it's a, let's say, a structural issue I would say particular to the IETF. IGF, the meetings take place all over and ICANN as well.
Again, not saying that the face to face meetings are, you know, the most important way of engaging. For from it, because we know that a lot of work takes place in between meetings. And those that work takes place online.
In terms of the trends, if we look at the ITU, the problems are, again, of a different type because it's we have to reflect on the way that governments and Civil Society work together at the local level, right?
For Civil Society, we'll able to participate at the ITU, they need to be part of a delegation. And here, unfortunately, we see that delegations from the Global South and fewer CSOs are actually part of the delegations than those in the Global North.
Not generalizing, we know that, for instance, delegations from Brazil, Mexico, to take a couple of examples, they do welcome CSOs more broadly as part of the delegations. And then
>> KENNETH HARRY MSISKA: One minute, Stephanie.
>> STEPHANIE BORG PSAILA: Sure.
While it comes to the IT, there's the big question of accreditation, right, that's a very big barrier specific to the ITU. There's been a lot of discussions about and I think there are a few policies also on the waiving of those fees. But why are we still talking about the waiver of fees?
Should we start the discussion on not being there not being any fees at all.
So in terms of trends, the conclusion is that we need to go granular and not just the general level. I would say that the main takeaway of the mapping and the work that we want to do in the coming months and years is specifically on along these along these lines.
Over to back to you, Kenneth, thank you.
>> KENNETH HARRY MSISKA: I see that Rose Mary is adding to add a few things. Before you attempt to add on what Stephanie is saying, you should also respond to this question.
You talked about being able to convene or being a convener. What successful strategies have been implemented that you know at regional level to enhance inclusion of CSOs and to ensure that they're able to play a critical role and able to influence the digital policies?
Over to you.
>> ROSE MARY: Thank you very much for that question. The key successful thing has been being a participate that's able to share knowledge and bridge the gap.
For example, Africans find ourselves in a very unique place. We don't manufacture technology too much. We don't manufacture a lot of legislation.
You look at it, America, China, a lot of manufacturing happens there. Europe manufactures a lot of legislation. Africans, we get the aftereffects, so on and so forth. So we get to become very keen observes of it all.
And what happens is that now through the CSOs and the IGF process and all the processes, we then get a unique position of offering the next best practice.
Because you're keen observers, you act as partners to legislators at the local level. You become a source of honesty and become the true north in terms of what is the next best policy for you as an African perspective.
And we find ourselves in the middle putting everyone to task, putting private sector to task, government to task, and academia to task.
We have a whole page on publications that we do on various topical issues. If today AI is hot, we will figure it out. If it's election and how the Internet affects it, we'll figure it out.
If it's low technologies, vis a vis the old spectrum, we'll figure it out. You then get to participate in making legislations. The data production act in Kenya, the computer and cyber crimes act, any time there's a legislation, there's an element in our constituation. You called it least influential, I think we're just the most broke, yeah? But the influence is there. We're trusted by governments, we're trusted by private sector, and we are to be the middle ground to make sure there's a true north that what is the best experience we get as Africans on the ground.
And a reflection from when you were speaking in terms of what you could do better, I think it's a reflection of what can have we done with the little that we have so far and then what is the work that has been done for several years that's been part of the whole track, over the years they built particular skills. So what then should happen to capacity build those entities in order to help them make greater influence moving forward.
Because at the end of the day, private sector has got what they want. Government has its own interest. CSOs come to create a balance and a lot of support is required at that level, yeah?
Because he who pays the piper calls the tune. So we need to make sure that we have to maintain that element of balance and to build the next best practice as Africans.
>> KENNETH HARRY MSISKA: All right. Thank you so much, Rose Mary. Just to encourage our colleagues who are following us online, you can keep on sending your comments, questions via the chat. My apologies, you may not be able to speak during this session, but we will accommodate your comments and questions through the chat.
Imad is asking, I'll pause this and you can reflect on this, I'll come back to you later on, you two. Besides course and language barriers, isn't there an additional barrier for cooperation which is the diversity of interests of CSOs?
He thinks this is also a barrier, for example, he's saying priorities would be, for example, in other countries basic human rights or corruption. So these differences do also affect, you know, the participation.
Now, to the audience, I have two questions that we should think about. How do you see the stakeholder processes evolving to better integrate Civil Society voices? Particularly those from the underrepresented regions or the Global South.
And two, from a policy perspective, what concrete actions can stakeholders take to lower barriers and enhance Civil Society participation in digital governance processes? Those are my two questions.
You are free to react to anything that's been discussed, but just bear in mind, I need answers to these two questions.
So who wants to who wants to speak?
>> Good morning or good afternoon. Regarding the lowering of barriers, one thing that has stood out consistently in all the conversations I've been in for the past couple of days has been about the technical capacity of Civil Society organizations to engage in very highly technical conversations around digital governance, Internet Governance.
And I was wondering, the primary source of financial sustainance for Civil Society organizations is funded from donors, right?
And more often than not, what is most common is that those funds are tied to particular projects. Right? So we might have diversity of interest, but donors have diversity of interest as well. Right?
And to be able to engage in research, for instance, you have to have money for research. To be able to engage in capacity building, you have to have money for that to happen.
And I was wondering, is it is there a space for Civil Society organizations to unify and requesting for unrestricted funding for the core issues, for research, for upskilling?
There's a lot of buzz currently around artificial intelligence. And as usual, like other emerging technologies, right, that come up, the conversation is focusing on one aspect. A lot of people focus on generative AI, which is like a dot, a blob. And I have sensed from all of these conversations that focus often is driven rather by capacity to engage.
Civil Society is the least positioned to hire expertise. Look at the big money that organizations are paying. In my country, I'm Nigerian. There are people who offer CSOs will offer you maybe a hundred dollars a month as salary, not because they want to short change you, but because that is the capacity, that's the amount they can offer you.
Now, compare that to other people in the private sector are paying. So is it possible that we start when we say we want to fund Civil Society organizations, when we say we want to do projects, is it possible that there's a space to engage with the donor to say, look, if you are really focused on this, there has to be money for research. We need to build in funding for research into projects, right?
We build in money for evaluation. We build in money for baseline studies. But there are other forms of research that's not just evaluating the project that's very critical. It's understanding the key principles, it's understanding the fundamental aspects that relate to what you want to work on.
So that, in my opinion, is something that might be helpful to start moving the needle a little bit.
Thank you.
>> Thank you for those points. Those are really valid points I think not only in African continent, but also of Global South that has been discussed.
I want to reflect upon one point that that like generally on your discussion that Civil Society organizations do the most impactful work, but the regulation is very less. To the fact that we are bringing out the [?] from the grassroots. We're the ones bringing out what the big tech wants in terms of products and policies, the change that they want, the demand they look forward to. But when it comes to monetary gains or losses, we are the once who are losing it, right?
We are the ones who are being put in a corner, okay, you have done this small job for us, okay, there's some small amount of money for you. The process that these organizations have to go through is enormous. The amount of documentation they have to give to prove that you are a Civil Society organization, the amount of documentation that you have to give to prove the world that you have done is enormous that it also takes another six months to get evaluated and then, oh, sorry, you don't get that grant.
The whole process is so challenging coming from a developing nation especially that need to be recognized. Then again, I get back on the point that recognition is missing. Though the impact for the work has been done by the stakeholder organizations. I don't want to understand state civil societies in the U.S. or the UK or Canada, but also again in Africa and India, Sri Lanka, in all the countries, they're putting their heart and soul, working 24/7 around the clock, they're running health lines, doing enormous work, but then what are we losing?
Is that recognition. Thank you.
>> KENNETH HARRY MSISKA: Just say your name.
>> I'm from India.
>> Thank you, that's been an interesting conversation just on the first one which is the question, I suppose. It's more on I think this was touched on earlier but regional collaborations and bringing together certain segments. Africa's a large continent. So whether that would increase capacity to influence policy on an international level. But more practical considerations, one of the organizations that we have worked with is the digital natives academy which is a multirun organization in New Zealand. And what they did was really emphasize the importance of local knowledge and building principles and policy.
So what we have as mentioned earlier by Rose, we have to accept this effect and GDPR as they have formulated it. But it's local knowledge and community based perspectives that can frame it as well.
In the Maui context, what they did was not only ask how data is important, but how would the Maui do it. And they have less of an individualistic approach, which is what is in GDPR and more of a community based thing. Culture being a common good of the people of that culture. How do we protect the data involved in the cultures of these different societies. That's one of the things that perhaps is worth noting. Those are just my thoughts. Would be keen to hear as well.
>> Thank you. I think that looking at the global Internet Governance platform, and I can speak particularly about ICANN, which has already been mentioned, I note speaking in any capacity of ICANN, I'm from Malawi, so I participate in ICANN activity and IGF activity at both the national and global level.
I think that one of the problems that I see with Civil Society participation at these levels is how Civil Society is defined. If you look at ICANN, there's the government constituency, everything is based around constituency. There's the constituency in which I participate, the country [?] the genetic organizations, the IP addresses and so forth.
But if you look at the definition of the ICANN level, it's not there. You have organizations like @large, noncommercial, we cannot properly define as Civil Society. Academia is in there. And so the Civil Society constituency is not there. It's not well defined.
And at ICANN level, if you're not well defined as a constituency, then your level of participation is very low. Basically you can run around the ICANN infrastructure or [?] but your voice will not be heard because you don't belong defined constituency.
So I think that is the one thing that needs to be taken care of for Civil Society empowered and participation at ICANN or global levels. There need to be a properly defined constituency for the participation of Civil Society where they can be heard.
Right now, there isn't one.
>> KENNETH HARRY MSISKA: All right. Anyone who wants to okay. I come back to our two speakers. There is an additional one from Michael from OHCHR. First of all, I think he's congratulating the alliance for the studies and also the presentation. But he's also looking ahead in terms of the Global Digital Compact. And he's saying this is the next thing that CSOs need to participate as well as the WSIS+20 review. What lessons could be learned from this study to help Civil Society participate and follow these processes?
What would be the minimum in terms of Civil Society participation in these processes?
So you can give it the best shot and then I'll also pass it around for others to reply.
>> As I said earlier, if Civil Society views itself the way traditionally it's been positioned as a true north, then they need to take the lead. In finding out what are the key initiatives and outcomes. And then being the ones who hold the creative tensions between all stakeholders and helping to manage that.
I think it's a very short answer, but that's basically it. Civil Society play a role in these systems. The same way we have built and I keep calling. Multi stakeholder DNA sits in CSOs. To tap into that in the next problem and the next problem and the next problem. They've already built the muscle for this. They know how to convene. They know how to analyse issues.
So whether today it's Global Digital Compact, next time it will be AI something, something, something. These are the people with the skills. Let's build their capacity.
Because they're the only teams that can give you a true feeling of what is it that happens on the ground, and then reflect that into a truly global perspective. That is my short response to that.
>> KENNETH HARRY MSISKA: Stephany.
>> STEPHANIE BORG PSAILA thanks, Kenny. I'll reflect on a few comments that our colleagues have made, and I'll start with Michelle from OCTHR. Something basic that CSOs need to engage is to understand what is really going on, especially with the parallel processes that we see in terms of GDC, WSIS, and all the bodies that are being created, the new processes.
So there's a lot going non 2025. So at the least basic understanding of what these processes about. It's a big thing to understand why, because there's a lot of confusion. And not many people are able to really see what this you know, what is happening and what the aim is and whether things will run in parallel or will converge at some point. But at least following and using tools out there to understand that is a, I would say, a basic premise.
I'm going in reverse order. To the gentleman from Malawi, you made [?] regarding definition of CSOs. I would say definitions even of the technical community has changed, right? Because in the past, the so called techies were, you know, the guys with the ponytails. Today, who is the technical community, right?
Swallowed up by the private sector. At the same time, we see a lot of members from the technical communities that are fall under the CSO headings. There's a lot of change, there's a lot of movement.
So this is the landscape where we are operating. And probably the, you know, so strict of a definition, it's probably not the right way to look at it, right? We have to be a little bit more not flexible, but seeing what the agendas are, right? And it's basically what those agendas are that tell us, you know, which stakeholder you belong to.
So I would invite to see I would invite to see things from this perspective.
And the lady mentioned the good point regarding recognition. This is precisely the aim of the work that we are doing. At the end of the work here and now this is in the context of the project, this is what I can talk about, what we want is for Civil Society to be recognized as the valuable player that it is. Right? Especially from the Global South.
And in terms of the funding, I can only talk insofar as the funding for this project. It's cofunded by the European Union, and the reason why there was a mapping was precisely to understand the landscape. What was the definition of CSO? Do we need a definition there? What is the landscape, right?
I can, you know, complement the EU for the way that it has, let's say, put the call for proposals together, because in reality they with the help of the EU, we the partners are able to do more than just the mapping. The mapping is the starting point, and next two years we will be developing capacity building programs but targeting the issues that I mentioned, right?
So we're going granular. And this is, you know, let's say the key aspect of this project. This is what I think it will differentiate it from other projects. Right?
We don't want to tack on issues at the general level. It's not just about funding. It's so much more nuanced than that. And what we are developing for, this specific camp, let's say the standards, I think, will probably be the same for other areas.
Just one final comment. Imad, last but not least although you asked and were the first, are diverse issues a barrier?
No, because the competition is not between CSOs as such, right in the competition to be heard, because if we can frame it as a competition, it's between private sector and the government. Right? It's as Rose Mary said, balancing the two. It's holding both accountable.
The fact that there are various needs, that adds to the strength of Civil Society, because they can come together, understand that there are needs, but also understand what their bottom line is. Right?
So from that perspective, it is I feel it's certainly not a barrier. And I'll stop there. And I think you want to would like to intervene.
>> Yes, especially the question on is it a barrier.
I think the CSOs if they all came to us with the same issues, they'd not be doing their work. So let CSO respond to the technical nuances, the local nuances of whatever they are in order for them to give meaningful feedback to the global and regional issues.
So it would be there's no script in this. It's not like a play. Everybody gives awe then authenticity of what they feel on the ground. They're doing their jobs in covering issues. One country it could be Internet shutdowns. Another country it could be technology, emerging technology and the impact. On another one we operate on different playing fields. But the next one is sharing the next best practice for ourselves. Our democracy is a bit more advanced, this is how we have Internet shutdowns, here's a playbook.
If technology you're caught in between tech and regulatory issues, this is how we dealt with our legislators. For example, I'll give an example of a current initiative.
A very positive impact from regional CSO collaboration from the Kenya IGF to the East Africa IGF. We're having technical challenges in terms of cross border transfer challenges on business, for example.
So the issue has been how then do we convene legislators? And we came together. We did a training. We trained our legislators on the need of harmonization of data protection laws so maybe we can have a unified law one day in Africa. This was a positive impact. They probably weren't prepared for it but they came with their passion and are solving the problems. That's the kind of opposition that needs to come up today.
>> KENNETH HARRY MSISKA: All right.
>> One more presentation?
>> KENNETH HARRY MSISKA: We only have five minutes. We're under five minutes, I'll give you two and a half.
>> Do I get a screen?
>> KENNETH HARRY MSISKA: No, that had to be done in advance. You can only
>> Okay. I'll speak to it. Some has been mentioned, a bit has not.
What is the face of African participation look like? It looks like complexity.
And that is very honest. You mentioned it, we mentioned it, but you realize that we there's a complex interplay of both opportunities, challenges, and outcomes.
And the research actually showed a few things. First and foremost there's an uneven playing field. For example, as an African, try apply for a visa if you're going physically go somewhere compared to somebody in the states who wakes up and the next day they can book a flight. It's not like that in my country. For example, if it's in Spain need a few months to plan. I can't go to Spain unless I had a change of visa before. Those are the complexity, that.
It's actually an uneven playing field both in terms of best practice forums, policy networks, economic coalitions. But we have shown significant engagement. Especially in regional and national initiatives that is six national and seven regional initiatives that exist across Africa. I think kudos, yeah.
But global participation remains at even, and yeah, accessibility is a key issue. However, there's some light at the end of the tunnel. I guess post COVID, we learned to work with what we have, hybrid. Today some of us are here, many of us are online. That has been a great win hi, guys, yeah. We're in the same meeting.
Post COVID that's been good.
We also learned lessons on youth initiatives. For example, we had youth presentations from east Africa at the Africa IGF where we sponsored young people to come and put them in buses, they couldn't do flights but we put them in buses and you accommodate one thing. They're so excited to participate. We engaged in sideline meetings teaching them about the IGF process, what it means for them.
And an amazing thing is that we've seen that the best tech policy talent comes from the CSOs. Whether they work for GAZ access Kenya, sometimes we will feel like we're a pipeline for talent. Our biggest issue is retention. Because after two years we can't afford them, yeah.
Even in private sector. The heads of data protection in the largest corporation, where did they come from? They're CSOs. Yeah?
We're building my two minutes are done. Almost done, yeah. 30 seconds.
And of course, post COVID is hybrid and then of course I mentioned the barriers. And of course participation is necessary. So what are the recommendations?
We need to strengthen institutional support, increase funding for them. Capacity, if it's travel, if it's digital, whatever. Enhance capacity building.
Expand youth initiative and inclusivity and leverage tools. A challenge back, how much investigate spent some happening to build the capacity of these CSOs to respond to the future?
They came in in very low economies, and the imbalance is increasing. As big tech grows strong in those markets and governments become more powerful, there's a need to support those CSOs. There's only so far passion can take you. And we need to build frameworks. And we can't have it where we have new entities coming into the IGF space and receiving most of the funding and you explain that these CSOs are still who they are. They've done this for 20 plus years. They have the DNA. Let's support them and let's grow them.
>> KENNETH HARRY MSISKA: Thank you. All right. Just a quick recap that I've been shown the time, we have two minutes.
So we I think things that actually got traction here, we need to use the convening power. There's need for research and also for the funders to actually accommodate them so that our advocacy is evidence based.
Then also we need to strengthen regional collaborations among CSOs. But there's also a need to define CSOs within these platforms that we engage with, especially at ICANN. DNA resides in the CSOs, and there's need to actually make sure that we maximize this. But we must also, as CSOs, we must also be proactive to invite ourselves to the table when we're not invited.
I think that's are some of the issues that I can quickly summarize.
But in terms of continuing to hear from you, you can actually, you know, scan that QR code and give us feedback in terms of the mapping study or the discussions that we may not have covered today.
Once again, I would like to thank you all for joining us both online as well as in this room. Thank you to our speaks, Stephanie and Rose Mary are supported by Patricia, and then our online moderator. Thank you so much. Thank you.
(Applause)