Launch of the Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) Community of Practice in Latin America and the…

Launch of the Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) Community of Practice in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC)

Why a Community of Practice on DPI?

Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) is becoming increasingly relevant in the digital transformation agendas of countries across Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). Systems such as digital identity, digital payments, and data exchange platforms have the potential to improve public service delivery, facilitate inclusion, and strengthen the State’s capacity to respond to people’s needs.

However, the development of DPI also poses significant challenges regarding governance, rights protection, inclusion, security, transparency, accountability, and the meaningful participation of diverse stakeholders. In a diverse region with varying levels of maturity in the design, implementation, and adoption of these systems, it is crucial to have spaces that allow for sharing lessons learned, identifying best practices, building capacity, and promoting people-centered approaches.

In this context, the consortium composed of Cepei, ILDA, and ODC, with the support of Co-Develop, held the first session of the Digital Public Infrastructure Community of Practice (CoP) in Latin America and the Caribbean. This community aims to facilitate collective learning and the exchange of applied knowledge on DPI in the region.

The main lines of work of the Community of Practice are:

  • Knowledge exchange and collective learning on DPI: Promote the adoption of localized knowledge on DPI and its core digital systems, including digital identity, digital payments, and data exchange platforms.
  • Visibility and socialisation of DPI resources, research, and initiatives: Facilitate the exchange of research, tools, experiences, documents, and recommendations produced by organizations and stakeholders linked to the DPI ecosystem.
  • Connecting actors and spaces related to DPI: Connect formal and informal multistakeholder governance spaces and actors to facilitate collective learning, collaboration, and advocacy by civil society and other stakeholders in the DPI ecosystem.
  • Promotion of the UN Digital Public Infrastructure Safeguards Framework: Foster knowledge and use of this framework as a tool to promote human rights-based, inclusive, protective, and participatory approaches in the development of DPI in the region.

Launch Session

The first session of the Community of Practice took place on June 10 and consisted of a dialogue among representatives from different sectors working on the DPI agenda in the region. The meeting featured Juan Ignacio Echevarría from IUGO; Kareen Schramm from the Digital Government of Chile; and Juan de Brigard from Co-Develop. The conversation was moderated by Mercedes de los Santos from ODC.

The dialogue focused on the importance of multistakeholder spaces as fundamental mechanisms to strengthen the regional DPI ecosystem. In particular, participants reflected on the opportunities these spaces offer to advance a regional agenda that integrates different perspectives, capacities, experiences, and best practices.

Multistakeholder spaces allow complex DPI challenges to be addressed through a collaborative lens. Furthermore, they facilitate the meaningful participation of civil society and other ecosystem stakeholders, strengthening transparency, accountability, and consensus-building in DPI design, implementation, and governance processes.

In a region as diverse as Latin America and the Caribbean, where varying levels of maturity exist in DPI development and adoption, these spaces help close capacity gaps, promote collective learning, and foster the creation of more inclusive, sustainable, and people-centered solutions.

Regarding incentives for participation, the panelists highlighted that multistakeholder spaces offer opportunities to access specialized knowledge and best practices, strengthen technical and institutional capacities, exchange DPI-related experiences and standards, expand collaboration networks, and build strategic alliances.

In addition, these spaces help strengthen advocacy in decision-making processes, identify cooperation opportunities, and contribute to building shared agendas, principles, and solutions that respond to the region’s challenges and priorities.

During the conversation, the importance of ensuring the sustainability of multistakeholder spaces was also emphasized, so they can consolidate as bodies capable of supporting DPI governance processes in Latin America and the Caribbean. In this regard, the need to identify concrete and measurable outcomes to track the contributions of these spaces to the regional DPI ecosystem was highlighted.

The launch saw the participation of civil society organizations, public institutions from various LAC countries, private sector representatives, including startups and entrepreneurs, and academic stakeholders.

Finally, the participants of the Community of Practice shared their main motivations for joining this space, as well as the topics they would like to delve into, share, and discuss in upcoming sessions.

Among the main motivations identified were fostering collaborative learning, strengthening regional coordination, seeking solutions to common challenges, and identifying advocacy opportunities.

The main contribution of the Community of Practice to the regional DPI agenda will be to help connect fragmented agendas, generate public policy recommendations, strengthen peer-to-peer exchange, and give visibility to best practices and experiences, considering the different levels of maturity of these systems in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Among the topics of greatest interest to participants were data governance and digital sovereignty; DPI use cases in sectors such as health and environment; digital rights and access to information; and security and data protection.

Next Steps

The Community of Practice will hold three additional sessions aimed at facilitating peer-to-peer learning, presenting regional case studies and experiences, hosting discussion roundtables, and exchanging DPI resources.

If you are interested in joining the Community of Practice, you can contact us and learn more on our website:https://dpi-lac.ilda.la/

This is a translation ofan articleoriginally written in Spanish and published on ILDA’s website.