NRI Main Session: Evolving Role of NRIs in Multistakeholder Digital Governance

Summary

This discussion focused on the role and impact of National and Regional Internet Governance Initiatives (NRIs) in shaping internet governance and the multi-stakeholder model. Panelists from various regions shared their experiences and challenges in implementing NRIs. Key themes included the importance of capacity building, inclusivity, and addressing region-specific issues.

Speakers highlighted the diversity of NRIs across regions, from the MENA region’s focus on basic infrastructure to Europe’s emphasis on consensus-building. The African continent was noted for its vibrant youth engagement and capacity-building efforts. The Asia-Pacific region stressed the need for inclusivity and representation of diverse stakeholders.

Challenges discussed included financial sustainability, government engagement, and adapting to local contexts. The importance of multilingualism and addressing the needs of small island developing states was emphasized. Participants also noted the role of NRIs in informing national policies and contributing to global discussions.

The discussion touched on the upcoming WSIS+20 review and the Global Digital Compact, with many emphasizing the need to strengthen the multi-stakeholder model and secure a longer-term mandate for the IGF. Speakers stressed the importance of NRIs in localizing global principles and providing grassroots input to international processes.

Overall, the session underscored the critical role of NRIs in fostering inclusive dialogue, building capacity, and addressing local and regional internet governance challenges while contributing to the global internet governance ecosystem.

Keypoints

Major discussion points:

– The importance of national and regional Internet Governance Forum (IGF) initiatives in bringing local issues and perspectives to the global level

– Challenges faced by IGF initiatives, including funding, sustainability, and engaging all stakeholders (especially governments)

– The role of IGFs in capacity building, especially for youth and underrepresented groups

– How IGFs can contribute to the Global Digital Compact and WSIS+20 review process

– The need to strengthen and evolve the multi-stakeholder model of Internet governance

The overall purpose of this discussion was to highlight the crucial role that national, regional and youth IGF initiatives play in the Internet governance ecosystem. It aimed to showcase the diversity of these initiatives around the world and how they contribute to shaping Internet policy discussions at all levels.

The tone of the discussion was largely positive and collaborative, with participants enthusiastically sharing their experiences and achievements. There was also a sense of urgency in addressing challenges and strengthening the IGF model for the future. The tone became more forward-looking towards the end, with calls to action for the upcoming WSIS+20 review process.

Speakers

– Jennifer Chung: Secretary of the Forum of Asia and Africa, Moderator

– Chafic Chaya: Chair of the Lebanon IGF, part of Arab IGF

– Giacomo Mazzone: Part of European Dialogue on Internet Governance (EuroDIG) and Italian IGF, Secretary General of Eurovision

– Lillian Nalwoga: From the African IGF

– Amrita Choudhury: Part of India IGF, Chair of APR IGF Multistakeholder Steering Group

– Charles Noir: From CIRA and part of Canada IGF

– Lilian Chamorro Rojas: From IGF (region not specified)

– Pedro Lana: Online moderator

Additional speakers:

– Bertrand de La Chapelle: Executive Director of the Internet and Jurisdiction Policy Network, Co-initiator of EuroDIG and French IGF

– Phyo Thiri L.: Co-coordinator of YIGF Myanmar and South Asia YIGF

– Andrew Molivurae: Representing regulators office in Vanuatu, Chair of Pacific IGF

– Jasmine Ko: From Hong Kong YIGF

– Nigel Hickson: Member of the UK IGF

– Ahmed Farag: Chair of the North African IGF

– Mery Henrica: IGF fellow from Timor-Leste

– Nazar Nicholas Kirama: From Tanzania IGF

– Sumeet Bhoite: Online participant

– Annalise Williams: 2024 Chair of the Australian Internet Governance Forum

Revised Summary of National and Regional Internet Governance Forum (NRIs) Initiatives Discussion

Evolution of Internet Governance and Multi-stakeholder Model

The discussion highlighted the transformation of internet governance towards a multi-stakeholder model across various regions. Chafic Chaya noted this shift in the MENA region, while Giacomo Mazzone emphasized European institutions’ promotion of consensus-building and multi-stakeholder approaches. Lillian Nalwoga highlighted capacity building initiatives driving multi-stakeholder engagement in Africa. Amrita Choudhury stressed the need for diverse stakeholder inclusion in the Asia-Pacific region, given its vast diversity. Charles Noir underscored the model’s crucial role in the internet’s technical operation, while Lilian Chamorro Rojas emphasized local and regional IGFs’ contributions to global internet governance.

Challenges and Opportunities for NRIs

Several challenges and opportunities for NRIs were identified:

1. Financial Sustainability: Ahmed Farag highlighted significant financial obstacles in sustaining NRI operations.

2. Stakeholder Engagement: Jasmine Ko reported difficulties in engaging government stakeholders, contrasting with Charles Noir’s perspective on NRIs’ value in informing national policymaking.

3. Regional Specific Challenges: Andrew Molivurae emphasized the need for disaster response policy frameworks, while the Phyo Thiri L. noted challenges in fostering youth collaboration across South Asia.

4. Outcome Tracking: Lillian Nalwoga stressed the importance of tracking outcomes from NRI meetings to demonstrate their impact.

5. Multilingualism: Amrita Choudhury highlighted the challenge of addressing multiple languages in internet governance discussions.

Regional Perspectives

The discussion showcased diverse regional perspectives:

1. MENA Region: Chafic Chaya noted the establishment of the Saudi Arabia IGF as a new initiative.

2. Africa: Lillian Nalwoga emphasized the importance of involving legislators and parliamentarians in discussions.

3. Asia-Pacific: Amrita Choudhury highlighted the region’s vast diversity and its impact on internet governance approaches.

4. Pacific Islands: Andrew Molivurae discussed the Pacific IGF’s theme of “strengthening digital governance, resilience and resilience” and the use of Starlink technology in disaster response.

5. Europe: Giacomo Mazzone highlighted the promotion of consensus-building and multi-stakeholder approaches by European institutions.

Capacity Building and Schools of Internet Governance

Multiple speakers emphasized the importance of capacity building initiatives and schools of internet governance in fostering understanding and participation in internet governance processes. These efforts were seen as crucial for developing informed stakeholders and promoting inclusive dialogue across regions.

Future of the IGF and Internet Governance

The discussion looked towards the future of the IGF and internet governance:

1. Global Digital Compact: Giacomo Mazzone suggested that the IGF should support its implementation.

2. WSIS+20 Review: Speakers viewed this as an opportunity to strengthen the IGF mandate and renew commitment to multi-stakeholderism. The Australian IGF’s position statement on WSIS+20 was highlighted as an example of NRI input.

3. IGF Mandate: Nigel Hickson called for a longer mandate for the UN IGF, beyond 10-20 years.

4. Role of IGF: The IGF was highlighted as a key platform for discussing digital policy issues beyond WSIS.

5. NRI Formalization: Andrew Molivurae suggested formalizing NRIs to align with the global IGF.

Key Takeaways and Action Items

1. Strengthen the multi-stakeholder model for effective internet governance.

2. Better integrate NRIs into global processes.

3. Address capacity building and inclusivity challenges, especially in developing regions.

4. Tackle financial sustainability concerns for NRI initiatives.

5. Leverage the WSIS+20 review to reinforce commitment to multi-stakeholderism and the IGF.

6. Engage NRIs in consultation on the future institutional structure of the IGF.

7. Recognize and formalize NRIs in the WSIS+20 resolution.

8. Develop mechanisms to track outcomes from NRI meetings.

9. Increase support for policy frameworks on disaster response in Pacific islands.

10. Improve the capacity of the IGF secretariat, as suggested by Wisdom Donkor.

11. Address the challenge of multilingualism in internet governance discussions.

Conclusion

The discussion underscored the crucial role of NRIs in the internet governance ecosystem, highlighting their importance in bringing local perspectives to global discussions, building capacity, and informing policy. While challenges remain, particularly in terms of financial sustainability and stakeholder engagement, there is a strong consensus on the value of the multi-stakeholder model and the need to strengthen and evolve it for the future of internet governance. The diverse regional perspectives and experiences shared during the discussion demonstrate the richness and complexity of the global internet governance landscape, emphasizing the need for continued dialogue and collaboration across all stakeholder groups.

Jennifer Chung: Hello and welcome everyone. Here is the latest initiative on youth, the growing role of the IRN. My name is Jennifer Chung. I am the secretary of the Forum of Asia and Africa. I have the honor of moderating this session, the development and evolution of Internet governance and the multiparty model has been marked by important processes and initiatives such as the World Net and the World Digital Pact. All these efforts have played a crucial role in the definition of Internet and digital governance in general, by promoting collaboration between the various parties and by promoting the multiparty model. At the local level, our essential for the overall effectiveness and continuous adaptation and improvement and evolution in the multistakeholder practices as we know it. Through exchanges in the community, we have gathered over 174 national regional initiatives. This panel will address the pivotal discourse that happen at these local grassroots level and how this has shaped the evolution of Internet governance and the multistakeholder model. We have with us here an illustrious panel and more online and in the room as well who will bring you through all of the good discourses by each region, by each initiative. A little bit of housekeeping. Of course, with the diversity of our panelists and also speakers, please do remember to use your headset. I will now turn to our first esteemed speaker. I will give you a moment to put on your headset. From the home region that we are here, in the MENA region, I am honored to introduce Mr. Chafic Chaya, chair of the Lebanon IGF and also part of Arab IGF. In the 20 years of WSIS, where do we stand with respect to Internet governance processes and the multistakeholder approach?

Chafic Chaya: Thank you, Jennifer. Thank you. Good afternoon. So, I speak in Arabic. Peace be upon you. I’m honored to be part of this discussion today and to share with you the important role played by the National Regional Initiatives, NRIs, in discussing intergovernance in the MENA region. This is not just a narrative about governance. It is a transformational story and development story, while the MENA region is witnessing a notable transformation from conventional governance into multi-stakeholder governance model should focus on the conclusiveness and flexibility and cooperation. The global OASIS has laid the foundation through the governance principles of multi-stakeholder and the different national initiatives and regional initiatives has localized these principles and harmonized it to fit with the needs of the region. This region is not just atop these frameworks, rather it has innovated to cope and to amend it according to the needs of our communities. What really inspires us today is that how this dealing between the conventional models and the multi-stakeholder model became a major feature of such transformation, such increasing momentum within these governance processes and the United Nations to achieve the balance between two approaches, encourage the stakeholders to adopt innovative governance models with such powers that are not competing anymore. They are integrating and complementing each other. These national initiatives and regional initiatives became major pillars in this process, whereby it plays the bridge which links between the different dialogues. multi-stakeholder dialogues and the high-level decision-making process. This initiative contributes to empower the stakeholders, including the governments, technical community, private sector, academia, civil society, to work effectively to address the national priorities and regional priorities and to achieve the joint and the common goals. The increasing amount of these national and regional initiatives in this region, such as Lebanon Internet Governance Forum and the Arab Governance Forum, or North Africa Internet Governance Forum, and many others, reflects the concern by the stakeholders to promote comprehensive and cooperative governance. Today they will come, including the Saudi Internet Governance Forum, as a new national initiative, which gives more momentum to these different initiatives and promote and push forward the common regional priorities forward. However, such initiatives, national initiatives and regional initiatives, do not work in isolation or in silos. They are complementing initiatives from different stakeholders, such as the activities by the tech community, which is represented by the RICC, ICANN and ISOC. For example, a group of network operators in the MENOC, and we have the Middle East School for MESEC, and we have meetings, roundtable meetings, government roundtable meetings, and the programs designed for the countries according to their needs, and many other initiatives. All brings together the stakeholders to build the capacities through providing the technical expertise and exchange of knowledge. Such activities ensures the integration of technical aspects and personal aspects of the Internet within the global… the global wide discussion about the Internet Governance which promote the ecosystem of the Internet. At the end, while we are looking forward within the 20 years since the organization of the first OASIS, we can today see the progress achieved so far. However, we are still at the beginning of the road to build a framework for the Internet Governance that will be flexible, resilient, inclusive, and ready for the requirements of our digital future. Thank you so much, Jennifer.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you so much, Shafiq. It is so heartening to know that we have now the Saudi Arabia IGF and so much more coming in this MENA region. I think it’s doing a lot to bring the discourse together, bringing the framework together collaboratively, and of course, congratulations again for that. It’s so important for us to remember this is a region that has a lot to offer, a lot of knowledge, a lot of expertise, and the issues crucial to this region can be solved with all these discussions in a multi-stakeholder manner, and going forward inside that kind of framework as well. I’d like to turn now to the Europe region. It’s my honour to introduce Mr Giacomo Mazzone, part of the European Dialogue on Internet Governance, EuroDIG, and also Italian IGF. I know currently we have an ongoing targeted consultation on internet governance targeted by the European Commission. In that context, do you think that the multi-stakeholder approach can pave the way for inclusiveness and internet resilience in times of crisis?

Giacomo Mazzone: Thank you for giving me the floor. I’m a member of the board of EuroDIG, I’m collaborating with the Italian IGF, and I’m Secretary General of Eurovision. All roles that are part of this dialogue that we are constantly doing in Europe. In Europe, after the lesson of the war, we have understood that we cannot go by a single nation, but we need to go through a permanent dialogue. And so we have created two institutions that are pivotal for us. One is the European Union that embraces 27 countries, the other one is the Council of Europe that covers all of Europe. through these two institutions we have learned in the last 60 years that we have to go through consensus and trying to reach common positions. This started in a multilateral way but then since 40 years this has been enlarged by both institutions to civil society, to academia, to industry, to all the components of society because most of the process need to be built on consensus. Thanks to that we are trying to tackle as was the question that how we can, if this help to build internet resilience in time of crisis, for instance we had the European elections in June this year and we were all afraid that could have an impact for the use of the artificial intelligence as a support for disinformation and trying to undermine the credibility of the elections. Then has been put in place a certain number of actions that have been able to give us the possibility to go through this election without so much impact. For instance there is a regulation that says that the platform need to enforce as soon as possible the things when they are signaled that there is something going wrong. So hard regulation is in place. Then there is moral suasion regulation and co-regulation that is the code of practice has been put in place with the platform signed with the European Commission that means that the platform even if there is not a crime that is going on on the platform but there is something that could be harmful they have to behave and cooperate and then there are this is not made by a ministry of truth. but is made in cooperation with fact-checkers that are grassroots organizations and the traditional media that signal when there is a problem and the problem then could be solved. This proved to be an efficient way to work and in fact the attack, there has been many attacks, but there’s been under control and they didn’t harm too much the election. This now currently just to show you one of the model, how it works, the model, we have now to decide as European what will be the European position and the nation that are part of the European Union and the nation that are part of the Council of Europe position in the UN next year for the renewal of the mandate of the IGF and the WSS forum. So, what the Commission has made, there was an initial position of the Council that says we need to have a common position and this principle need to be defended, the multi-stakeholderism, the integration, the cooperation, the non-fragmentation of the Internet, etc. Then a consultation has been launched just three weeks ago and will end mid of January. This consultation is open to all society, all components of society. So at the end of this consultation, the position of the stakeholders will be integrated in a background paper. This paper will be brought to the attention of the institution and then it will be the basis for what the European Union and the single members will vote in the General Assembly. This is the best way we are trying to do in order to be multi-stakeholder and to embrace all voices of the society.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you so much, Giacomo, for giving us the overview. of what the European Commission and also the European community is trying to do, I really like that your emphasis really is to go for consensus and common positions to defend multistakeholderism in the really crucial year ahead when we’re looking towards WSIS plus 20 review. Now I’d like to turn over to the Africa region, always a young and vibrant region. It’s my pleasure to introduce Ms Lillian Nalwoga from the African IGF. With the continent’s point of view, how can internet governance be more useful to all stakeholders so that they identify national regional spaces as a key venue for advocacy? Lillian.

Lillian Nalwoga: Thank you so much Jennifer, it’s a pleasure to be here and to speak about our vibrant continent. Just what I would like to first highlight is, yes the vibrancy comes in the number of initiatives that the continent has been able to achieve. To date we have approximately 36 national initiatives and we have five regional initiatives representing the north, the east, the west, central and south. In all these processes we are seeing the vibrancy of the community, we are seeing the multistakeholder approach coming into play. We are also seeing capacity building. So when we are looking at how can we make stakeholders, how can we utilise internet governance as a space for NRIs to be doing advocacy, I would say this comes from the vibrancy that we are seeing in the communities. But the one thing that has been able to be identified is the need for capacity building. building, and what we’ve seen is we’ve seen quite a number of regional schools, national schools, and continental schools. I think at the regional level, every regional IGF within Africa has a school on internet governance, and if we’re, that is the beginning point. At the continental level, we do have the Africa school on internet governance, and this has used, has been a space for building capacity of different stakeholders, and it’s not limiting to, say, civil society or academia or private sector or government. It is inclusive, and it follows a bottom-up approach, and what I can say, I’m a beneficiary of the Africa, of the AFRICIC, when it launched in 2013, so you can see where I am today, and we’ve seen quite a number of different stakeholders from government. So, for us to say how can we use this space, first we are looking at capacity building, but the most recent initiative where we saw a gap was in how do we get our legislators to pass inclusive policies and understand, you know, issues on internet governance, and hence the Africa Parliamentary Network on Internet Governance was introduced, and I’m sure there’s quite a big delegation from members of parliament from Africa who have benefited from this. So the approach here we are taking is we need to look at this at all, you know, from different angles. If we are to say that internet governance, the entire ecosystem, how do we start with policy, we build the capacity of the stakeholders, the legislators, but also try to open it up in 4D. different actors. The other thing that I would like to mention is we need to be able to develop and track outcomes. Because when we started many years ago, the internet governance space was looked at as a talk shop where we come and talk things. But recently, we’ve been able to, every meeting produces a key outcome document. I think the next step right now is to be able to track and see how these are being implemented at country level, at regional level. And this will be able to use this space as a key place for advocacy for the different stakeholders in the NRIs. Thank you.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you so much, Lillian. I think you’re doing my job for me, because it’s a beautiful, perfect segue. I really like your emphasis on capacity building. Africa as a continent is young and vibrant. And we need to bring the young people with us. We need to bring other stakeholders who need to be in this space, in the internet governance discussion spaces, digital process discussion spaces, to be able to understand, first, the concerns and the issues from the community, and also what internet governance is all about. Now I’d like to turn over to my home region, Asia Pacific. It’s my honor to introduce Ms. Amrita Choudhury, part of the India IGF and also chair of the APR IGF, Multistakeholder Steering Group. In the APAC context, which voices should be in the model at the national, regional, and I guess local level as well? And how can they be effectively brought in?

Amrita Choudhury: Thank you, Jennifer. And APAC is very huge and diverse, not only in terms of countries, cultures, languages, economies, but also the level of adoption of technology. So if you ask me the question, my first response would be everyone but if I drill it down a bit more I would say every relevant stakeholder who matters for that discussion. So you know I’ll just take a step back and I’ll talk about what APR IGF has been doing is one not just working as the focal point for regional IGF but also to build capacity. For example bringing in more youth. Our fellowship is such that we try to have a better gender balance wherein we have more women coming in because we want and especially from economies which are unrepresented. It could be the Pacifics it could be many many countries from where we can bring. Do note that some countries like Afghanistan we do try to bring out but it’s difficult because of sanctions. We do have some more countries of that kind. We also try the other thing which is important is to assist the national IGFs or youth IGFs in the country and that’s something which we feel is important because you could not only have the discussions at a national level but also get some essence of what is important for that region which can feed in when we decide things especially in APAC in our APR IGFs themes and sub themes and also drill down the important things because for example many times the national IGF for example may not know what the contemporary internet governance discussions globally are which for example the Asia-Pacific regional IGF can know like what’s happening in the GDC which edition of the text is going on what is concerning so we try to demystify those pass it on to the community members who are already involved because we believe the more information you pass on to the communities they would be in a better position to decide. We ask them for inputs. We also, you know, it is also important to encourage the schools of internet governance because that is where people can build their capacity. It’s important that people understand the various nuances. Many times you’ll find the, especially the younger generation, take everything for granted because they’ve got internet technologies on their platter. But what goes behind it is something which they need to know and once people know that why it matters, they start raising their voices. So I think those things are important to increase the reach, create opportunities where they can come and participate, like, for example, giving them the young voices a chance to come and participate and share their views with people who may have been in the community for long without any prejudice or hesitation. I think that’s important. And also disseminating information, just like Lillian was saying, we have, you know, the outcome document which comes out from APRIG, the synthesis document, which we try to circulate to all the economies, hopefully if some regulator, etc., kind of pick it up, and also to build capacity amongst different groups, like it could be parliamentarians, it could be others who actually need to build capacity on these things. So I’ll stop at this. Thanks, Jen.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you so much, Amrita. I think Lillian has started and Amrita has also emphasised the crucial role that schools of Internet governance play as well in order to bring information, build up capacity, impart knowledge, particularly I think I’m going to go back to one small point that’s actually not a small point, a very important point, that Lillian has raised about bringing in the legislators, the parliamentarians, and I know there was a parliamentarian legislator’s track here in Riyadh as well, to have those who are creating policy, making legislation, to make sure that they create inclusive policies, inclusive legislations. And of course, imparting with what Amrita has also… mentioned to create opportunities for every voice that needs to be here at the table. Now I’m going to move to another region, the North America region. It’s my honor to introduce Mr. Charles Noir, CIRA and also part of Canada IGF. How is Internet governance and the multi-stakeholder model evolving from your regional point of view? Charles, please.

Charles Noir: Thank you, Jennifer. First of all, great to be here and with you all in Saudi Arabia and thank you to the hosts for a wonderful meeting. CIRA, for those of you that don’t know, is the Canadian Internet Registration Authority and we’re best known for running the cctld.ca. We do other things, but I won’t get into it. And we have been the main sponsor and secretariat for the Canadian IGF since its beginning in 2019. So I’m sitting on this stage today and coming to you from a technical operator perspective, but talking about the IGF in Canada, of course, it’s multi-stakeholder and that’s where I want to start. It’s really about a community engagement in Canada as it is elsewhere and we’re hearing on the stage. We focus on critical issues that affect the Internet or that the Internet is producing and generally we do that to identify, hopefully, some shared policy positions that we might take away from and at times to understand where different points of view are coming from. There’s very critical discussions going on in Canada as well as in other countries, of course, around the world and globally. We speak about a number of those, cybersecurity, for example, online harms was this year’s focus as well, misinformation, connectivity, all of the topics that we’re covering here, including artificial intelligence, were certainly points that we cover within the IGF space in Canada. And we believe that we’re at an inflection point more generally within the… global internet governance space because of the WSIS Plus 20, because of GDC. Also within Canada, we’re seeing for the first time a whole suite of regulation that will affect the internet. And so we’re really engaging the community across the country from every stakeholder group to try to bring us together to inform and support our policymakers in their decision-making, both within the domestic space but also globally in meetings like this, but also in negotiations like the WSIS Plus 20 and what we’re seeing in GDC. So Canada’s been a proud, huge supporter of the multi-stakeholder model, both as an internet community, collectively all stakeholders, and I believe in our government. We see the WSIS Plus 20 as an opportunity to reinforce and dedicate for the next, hopefully, next 10 years, a commitment to multi-stakeholderism, including, obviously, the IGF. Sure, there’s room for improvement. We want to recognize that the multi-stakeholder governance model today, and the IGF, CIGF being part of that, is the reason why we have an internet that works like it does today from a technical operating perspective. Yes, there are difficulties, we’re encountering them, we’re discussing them, we need to address them, but the reason why I can call someone on the other side of the world and instantaneously connect is because we have the multi-stakeholder model in action governing the technical layer of the internet. We see the CIGF and regional NRIs as really important in terms of supporting governments, national governments. When we see governments engage in internet policy, we believe that the Canadian IGF, for example, will be a source of information, a source of advice and guidance for policymakers making decisions about… these important and crucial next steps in the phase of the Internet and how it’s governed. And from that we really see an opportunity to develop unified policy positions where we can all agree as all stakeholders, academic, private sector, technical community, etc. coming together so that we can focus on what we believe our priorities should be and what our government’s priorities should be in these spaces, particularly within the context of UN decision-making and domestic legislation. I would also like to add that we also see an opportunity within the technical community to organize as a community. The technical community, for example, like all stakeholder communities, is very diverse and we’ve worked with about 29 other technical operators around the world in every continent in coming together in a coalition called the Technical Community Coalition for Multistakeholderism, TCCM, and again we see that as an opportunity to coordinate globally and it brings roots out of the IGF spirit and out of the notion that we’re coming together as a stakeholder group to represent common positions that we believe should be considered in global negotiations. Some of that was exemplified in our input within the GDC context and we will be very active in the WSIS context as well as we move into the WSIS plus 20. In terms, again, I’d like to just focus on the idea that multistakeholderism, the IGF, the regional initiatives really have contributed, I want to leave with this note, really have contributed and are the reason why we have the internet we have today. Again, we have issues, we’re exploring them, we’re discussing them, but fundamentally as a base idea and a base form of governance, this is what we want to see continue, this is what we want to see evolve. The Canadian IGF is committed. that, and certainly we are as a TCCM, as a technical operator.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you so much, Charles. Thank you for also highlighting the crucial role that the technical community plays in actually keeping the Internet on so we can have these discussions. It’s the foundation where we build on all of these myriad of issues when we talk about Internet governance without the Internet actually working. I don’t think we have so much to talk about, right, at this point. For the technical community as well, it is really crucial for them to focus on keeping that the Internet remains open and free, global and secure, resilient, and interoperable, so we can have all of these discussions that we are having right now. And last but not least, I’d like to go to our region, GRULAC region. It’s my honor to introduce Ms. Lillian Chamorro from the IGF. I’ll give everybody a little moment to put on their headsets. So Lillian, what is the impact of NetMundial Plus 10, WSIS Plus 20, and the global digital compact process on Internet governance and the multi-stakeholder model, and how can we use all these principles to advance them?

Lilian Chamorro Rojas: Hola. Bueno, muchas gracias. Thank you. I’m going to speak in Spanish. Thank you so much for the invitation. Thanks Jennifer. Thanks to the Secretariat and all my colleagues present here. We see that WSIS is something we have been talking about lately. Next year in this space, we will define the mandate for the IGF in the next years to come, and we believe that from our point of view in Latin America, we see a real opportunity in front of us because the IGF is a platform that’s allowing us to do follow-ups and a review of all the objectives of the GDC and the action items of the WSIS. And we consider that these two, together with the structures that are being created for the Internet governance in the next few years, can be leveraged to discuss and assess the implementation of the agreements, both in the national and the regional context, as well as global. Having all this clear structure of all the initiatives of governance, right? So we also want to share this experience, this very valuable experience of inviting all the stakeholders to the conversation. The GDC has presented some actionable steps that we can see in the local realities, in the regional and national levels, and when we talk about youth and other communities that are also having the dialogue regarding governance and always focus on the needs of certain communities. And so we are looking at the NRIs, and we’ve seen an increase in the activity in these NRIs, in terms of number of initiatives and number of people who are participating, and we’ve seen this going up and increasing a lot. And we already mentioned this before, and my colleagues also mentioned this, that these contribute for the capacity building, but also in the creation of forums for dialogue and conversation, and also to localize and see what are the needs in every different space, according to different needs and contexts. We think that these spaces contribute also to the deployment. of technologies, because this is when we can see how these technologies are implemented, how they are transformed, how they influence the lives of people, both in a regional and national level, and, of course, also with the focus of the multi-stakeholder approach. We’re not having a bias from one point of view, but we see different points of view. The diversity of initiatives, I think, is something that is very beautiful to see. I see this group of people here in front of me, and all the people who have been sharing space in this IGF, and I really see the beauty in these encounters, in all of us talking about all these transcendental topics, that it’s not only the NRIs, but also having youth as being part of it, the Portuguese speakers, the forum in the Caribbean, that is one of the forums that has been working for the longest, and the commitments to follow the GDC initiatives like in data governance or AI, and other topics related to environment, migration, and other topics that are very related to our context, and these structures are shaped according to the diversity of territories and different communities, so we should appreciate them and leverage them as they are, as a diversity they present. IGFs are a valuable space to have common dialogue, like the WCs and the GDC. We were invited to be creative and find new frameworks, so I want to talk about new world dialogues that are inviting us to have new governance. models and taking this multi-stakeholder models and then having a dialogue so that we create the open collaborative open Internet that we want. These dialogues can be the basis for experimental collaboration and also have this governance framework that can allow us to have a better decision-making, make more concrete proposals and create action steps to advance to the Internet we want and we can overcome the current challenges we face.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you very much Lillian, I think your ending was actually very perfect. To have common dialogue and to celebrate the diversity of inputs we bring from across the entire globe with all of the regions included. Now I started off the session by saying this network, this NRI network is 174 initiatives and counting. There are many in this room, there are many online. We would love to hear from you. So I think we have actually roaming mics in the room, technical persons please indicate if that’s possible, but we would like to open the floor to people who have reactions and also can share what their region, their national initiative is actually doing right now. The impacts of multi-stakeholder processes, dialogue is happening at the local and grassroots level, what they are hoping to achieve especially in terms of input into the WSIS plus 20 review process next year. I think we heard in every single session almost in this Riyadh meeting that there is need to have dialogue, there’s need to have common positions to defend multi-stakeholder processes when we’re talking about internet governance, when we’re talking about digital governance as well. I would like to also introduce, we have our online moderator, Pedro Llana. Pedro will be the person who will be looking at all of our online participants who are probably very involved with the national, regional, and youth initiatives in their home economies as well. So please, Pedro, let me know if there is anything online as well from this NRI network from the greater communities that go to these different meetings, go to these initiatives, or even just tuning in remotely all across the globe to this meeting here in Riyadh. Are we able to hear Pedro? If we’re not able to hear Pedro, I will come back to him, and I’ll actually drill down a little more on what we’ve heard so far on our panelists. Maybe this will inspire more input from those who are actually thinking about what their meetings in their home countries, in their home economies, are actually having. I think that there’s a lot of local issues, a lot of regional issues that are discussed in NRI meetings that sometimes do not make their way all the way to the global IGF at the annual meeting. Of course, it’s always competitive when you’re looking at the scheduling, but is there something that is very unique to your region, perhaps, that you think is very important to bring up to the global level that hasn’t had an opportunity quite yet, especially when we’re looking into WSIS 20 review next year, and also impacting the evolution of how we’re discussing? I don’t know if any of our panelists up here would like to take a stab. Chafic, please.

Chafic Chaya: Thank you, Jennifer. First, thank you for Saudi Arabia and for hosting this IGF in Riyadh. in this region, this is a very important step and this very important initiative to get the IGF to our region to share with the global IGF what the challenges we are facing. As you know, each region has its own challenge. And while the European or the Western countries, they are now looking after AI and looking after in terms of things and smart cities, we are still having some countries in this region, they don’t have the basic infrastructure to connect people. So our priority is to give the connectivity to these people to connect. We know from the ITU that there is still 2.6 billion unconnected people, and most of them are in Africa, which is the region nearby. So the importance of having these events in this region is to get the voices of these countries up to the global level so they can be taken in consideration. Because once again, our challenges is totally different from other countries or other region challenges. Thank you.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, Chafic. I know that you’ve highlighted that there is still 2.6 billion unconnected. That is a sheer number that, of course, is really also central to the Africa region and also Asia-Pacific region. I don’t know if Amrita would like to expand a little more on that challenge as well when we’re looking at Asia-Pacific.

Amrita Choudhury: Yes, thank you, Jen. I think one beauty of the NRIs is that while there are many issues which may be very endemic to a country or region, but there are challenges in most of the region in some context or form of those. For example, as Shafiq mentioned, access is one. Basic infrastructure, for example, there are countries even, as I mentioned in my initial remark, Asia-Pacific is very diverse. You have extremely developed countries and you have countries where the networks have still not Are not working or cannot work due to sanctions, etc As in they are working but not, you know, and we have the Pacific Islands who have different challenges, you know Because of climate changes, etc. There’s water rising. There are other issues which are happening So it’s in there are different challenges people do bring in but again You know how you have that assimilated is difficult because every region has different issues Access is difficult Multilingualism is important as in if I look at the countries a country like India has 22 official languages Let alone unofficial similarly in many parts of Asia Pacific language is an issue, you know having everything in those languages Access, you know basic access is an issue for people Rights to even access it for example, I’ll come back to Afghanistan Women do not have any rights. Women do not even have right to an internet device That’s a challenge when we are talking about so many things achieving SDG goals. So those are diverse I think we try to bring it up and see what can be done Yeah, so, you know, there are higher level issues and there are deep-rooted issues which needs to be worked like anything

Jennifer Chung: Thank You, I’m Rita. I like that you brought up also Multilingualism as a challenge and also a strength in the diversity of the languages that we’re allowed to speak I know here we have translation in the six UN languages So you heard her speak in Arabic and you heard Lillian being able to speak in in Spanish and for myself I’m very lucky to be able to use my language to speak in Chinese I’m very lucky to be able to use my language Chinese to be able to speak to everyone But that is not the case for every single language that you see on you know that’s represented by the people you see here on the panel and I’m sure many, many more in the audience. I know that we probably in the audience because the light is now shining into my eyes and I cannot see your faces, but there must be many NRI and youth initiatives representatives from Francophonie countries who do have a lot to contribute and input on. And I urge you also to raise your hand if you have inputs that you would like to make during this national regional sub-regional youth initiative main session to share with us your issues and how internet governance and especially the multi-stakeholder process has evolved discussion in your home economies. And of course, we welcome you to speak in your language in French as well. I’d like to now go back again to see if we’re able to unmute Mr. Pedro Lana who is our online moderator.

Pedro Lana: Yes, Jennifer, can you hear me?

Jennifer Chung: Yes, we can hear you Pedro, please go ahead.

Pedro Lana: Perfect. We have two raised hands and one question in the chat in order to alternate between onsite and online questions. I think we can go with Dr. Jimson Olapunha who has his hand raised and then we’ll go to the other questions posed. If there is no onsite question or commenters. Can I go in that direction, Jennifer?

Jennifer Chung: Yes, we can take the online interventions. I see some hands up. So Pedro, I’ll allow you to unmute them or Tech can unmute them and please have your, you can moderate the online inputs, please.

Pedro Lana: Tech, can you unmute Dr. Jimson?

Jennifer Chung: Ah, I see Jimson actually in the room. So, yes, he is online and in the room, which is amazing. and we all are as well. Jimson, please go ahead.

Audience: Good evening, everybody. Good afternoon. And I want to first and foremost say I’m Jimson Olufoye, the Chair of the Advisory Council of Africa ICT Alliance. And I’m a private sector person and I run a private sector concern organization. I want to commend the MAG. The MAG have been doing fantastic work. We really appreciate all your work, all your effort across the world. We appreciate you very much. And Jennifer in particular, your work in IGF-SA, we appreciate it for the global community. I have two questions. The first one is connected with what you mentioned about the Net Mundia multistakeholder guidelines. I want to ask the panel how many of us have been using these guidelines because I believe it has the capacity to ensure that every stakeholder concern is brought to the table. And when we have all stakeholders on the table, we can easily tackle all our societal challenges together. And I’m very happy that the IGF has been very successful in bringing all these together because there will be ownership. Secondly, you also talk about the global digital compact. There are two outcomes of the WSIS 2005 agenda. The first one is the digital compact. The second one is the multistakeholder guidelines. And the third one is the multistakeholder guidelines. And the third one is the multistakeholder that. So, that’s the twin part, AIRS Corporation was only just came to fruition since 2025, since 2005, just September last year, when the global community, the world leaders agreed to the Pact for the Future, wherein we have the Global Data Compact. Excellent. So now, going forward, the question is, from your experiences across the continent, what do you think about how we will proceed to implement the Global Data Compact in our respective regions and countries? Should it be integrated into IGF, because IGF has been successful, or should we create another stream of engagement for that? Thank you very much.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, Jimson. I’ll allow my panelists to give it a little bit of thought. I’ll go straight, actually, to our French intervention, I think, I believe, online. So I’ll go to Pedro first, and then we can go back to the panelists.

Pedro Lana: We have chat as well, but we will leave that for after Nina make her contribution.

Audience: Thank you. Can everyone hear me? Yes. Great. I will speak in French, so I’m giving half a second for people to grab their headsets. Hello, I’m Nina. I come from the internet. I am in Abidjan, in Ivory Coast. I would like to raise the attention on sustainability of the secretariat of the IGF in our country. In our country, we have this multi-stakeholder approach, but after two years… We are tired. And when we have this problem, the secretariat, the government, social society, the private sector, speak all at the same time. So here, it would be good to share what is the experience that we have when we talk about secretariat of the forum, when we talk about regional initiatives and national initiatives. I’m talking about that because I’m in West Africa. We have different experiences. We get different international aid, financial aid, but that cannot go in the pocket of a government. So we have been recommended to have a secretariat. But taking into account the forum agility, do we have to ask the social society to get this finance, this money on our account? So it’s not easy to manage. So I would like to ask to the panelists, what is your experience? What do you recommend us to have a sustainable secretariat? And also, to have a body who could get this aid, this monetary aid to support our activities in the framework of the different capacities of the secretariat, in the framework of the forum. Thank you very much.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, Nena. I think I speak for, well, I will presume to use my moderator prerogative to say that those of us sitting on the stage are no more experts than those of you here in the room. I already hear questions about how regionals or even nationals will look into implementing all of the different things recommended in the Global Digital Compact. I heard about the question about have we used the Sao Paulo guidelines coming out of NetMundial Plus 10 and how have we done so? And then finally, from Nena, we heard the importance of the sustainability, monetary, the financial sustainability of the IGF Secretariat. I see there is a line at the podium, so I’ll go straight to our next speaker. Please introduce yourself.

Audience: Thank you very much. My name is Nigel Castamere from the Caribbean Telecommunications Union. We’ve coordinated the Caribbean IGF since 2005, and basically, Jennifer, to respond to what you asked about getting experiences from around the world, the Caribbean is part of the GRULAC, and Lilian did mention the CIGF in her presentation. Basically, just to say the challenge we have is the Caribbean, whereas the AP is large and diverse, the Caribbean is small and diverse. Lots of small countries, restricted resources, and so on. But just within the Caribbean, there are four different language groups. I myself am from more the English-speaking language group, and notwithstanding, we have a Caribbean internet governance forum. We have had participation from some of the other language groups, but it has been to date in English. In 2025, we plan to have our 21st CIGF in Cuba, which would be a stretch for us, and we’d be learning, but it would be a more inclusive type of an approach. So we’d probably have a bilingual CIGF for the first time. And then beyond, say, regional communities of interest, we’ve also reached out to other communities of interest, like we are all small island developing states, and we have started a liaison with small island developing states around the world. The Pacific in particular has been our most reliable partner to create a small island developing states CIGF, and we’ve had two sittings of that so far. Of course, that has tended to be more virtual than in person, but it helps us to share our experience with small island developing states around the world who maybe don’t have all the resources to investigate all of these internet governance matters and so on. And one of the products of our CIGF, in fact, has been a policy framework that we have given to help inform our governments in terms of developing internet governance policies. So just to give you an idea of what has been happening, some of these challenges that we face in our region, and what we’ve been doing so far. Thank you.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you very much, Nigel. Especially in highlighting that there is a small island developing states CIGF, so SIDS IGF, looking at issues that are very unique to these states, and also congratulations for the next edition being in Cuba. I’m sure that it’s going to be very interesting and very rewarding. to have a regional meeting there or sub-regional meeting there as well. I’m going to pause to see if there’s any online interventions, I don’t see any hands, so I’ll go to our next speaker in the podium.

Audience: Thank you, Jennifer, and thank you for organising this important session. My name is Annalise Williams, I was the 2024 Chair of the Australian Internet Governance Forum, and just going back to your comment or question earlier about what NRIs are wanting in going into WSIS, we held the Australian IGF in October of this year, and for the first time we developed a position statement, like an output of the IGF. It was drafted by the committee, we put it out for input from stakeholders, and it was agreed, adopted by consensus at the IGF, and it is a position statement on what the Australian internet community wants from the WSIS process. We called on the WSIS review process to adopt meaningful multi-stakeholder processes consistent with the Sao Paolo multi-stakeholder guidelines. We called on the Australian government to ensure the full participation of Australia’s multi-stakeholder community in Australia’s national preparations for the WSIS, and in terms of the IGF, we called for its continuation of its mandate, and we also called on all stakeholders, particularly governments and the private sector, to fully participate in the IGF and commit to its ongoing financial sustainability, and to consider ways to strengthen and enhance the value and efficacy of the IGF, both as a discussion forum and as a key source of information on digital policy issues beyond WSIS. I just wanted to flag that we had done that in Australia. Thank you.

Jennifer Chung: I think it’s really important to highlight all of the different national meetings that have looked into this and it’s really good that the AUIGF has had this output document looking specifically at WSIS plus 20 inputs and also how the Zampala guidelines can be utilised and also how the GDC or implementation of parts of it can be looked at for the Australian community. I’d like to encourage also all of those participants in the Pacific IGF to also input as well. I know there are many, many issues near and dear to your region that are not reflected and are quite unique to the Pacific region as well. I’d like to take a look to see if we have any more online. I don’t believe there are any new hands up. I’d like to go to our next speaker at the podium. Bertrand, please go ahead.

Bertrand La Chapelle: Thank you. Good afternoon. My name is Bertrand La Chapelle. I’m the Executive Director of the Internet and Jurisdiction Policy Network and I’m happy to have been one of the co-initiators of both the European IGF, the EuroDIG and the French IGF. One, I find fascinating that from the bottom up, the IGF has transformed into what is today a network of IGF. And so the annual global IGF is actually the global gathering of the network of IGFs. And we should flip the thinking and not see the IGF as proliferating at national level, but we should consider that the global meeting is the moment where the input coming from the IGFs at the national and regional level can be clustered and analyzed together so that, like a respiration, it goes back to them afterwards. The second thing is, as I mentioned in the previous session, the IGF at the global level, but Nenad was mentioning that it is a problem. at the local level as well, is usually caught in a catch-22 situation between the lack of resources and the difficulty to articulate an ambitious vision, because if you don’t have the resources, it’s hard to have a vision and implement it. But if you don’t have the vision, you cannot muster the resources. And in that regard, as Charles was mentioning, I want to give credit to, in many parts of the world, the local country code level domain, CCTLD operators, who have been instrumental, not the only actors, but instrumental sometimes, in providing not only financial, but logistical and in large part substantial support to the local IGFs. And I would like just to put on the table the fact that ICANN is basically the global tax collector for the management of the domain name system and the global public resource. The more it can do to support the global IGF, the better. But the final point I want to make is, and I’m glad to have the opportunity to do it here, is that there’s one topic that we will all have to address next year, which is what is the expanded, renewed, but also revised mandate of the global IGF? And what is its further institutionalization? And for that, I suggest, and I would be happy to have the feedback from people on the panel if they are willing, I think having an engagement of the NRIs in a consultation during 2025 on what do they think should be the process to move beyond the question of reconduction or not, but to address really the question of what is the next institutional step for the IGF would be an amazing approach. I would be really looking forward to seeing what the local and regional IGFs have to say. have to contribute to this discussion.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, Bertrand. I’ll pause very quickly to see if there’s only two reactions from the panels from all the questions we’ve heard so far.

Giacomo Mazzone: Yes, thank you. I would like to answer to what has been said by Olufoye at the beginning and by Bertrand now. I think that we have to think the other way around. The GDC process needs us. At the moment, the process has been conducted in New York by the people that is following the United Nations General Assembly, that in most cases are not very well connected. I would not say more than that, but at least they are not very well connected with the reality in the world. And the only place where ideas can be tested, can be put on the reality, can be checked, is this. The IGF, during these 20 years, we have all together built something that is very valuable. Not only the NRI network, that is very important because it gives the possibility to consult directly in each country of the world, or mostly of the country of the world in the regional level, what can be done, what cannot be done. But also we have the dynamic coalitions. That means vested interest with a specific purpose that stress the specific aspect of the internet governance problematics. And we have also the policy network. Not only because I’m chair of one of the policy network, but the policy network is a place where you can grassroots collecting best practices that exist. And this best practice can be eventually used to contaminate the. rest of the world. So we have free tools that are the only ones that can bring down to earth the principles that are in the global digital compact. If this will not happen, then there will be another negotiation in New York about international treaties that are trying to regulate something. You remember Gulliver’s travels, the people that were up in the world, in the sky and they were not seeing the earth and they were deciding for the earth. They need us. We have just simple to remember them. Thank you.

Jennifer Chung: Thank You Giacomo. I think Amrita had a very quick response as well and then we’ll go to Pedro online.

Amrita Choudhury: Thank you so much Jim. Jimson, just to respond to your point while I don’t have your entire answer, is perhaps you could refer to a document which the MAG IGF working group on strategy has prepared as a vision document of what the IGF can do to support the various processes. Like for example be an effective coordination space for different follow-ups on digital policies. The policy network on AI is already having a lot of discussions so it could be further enhanced. So not only for Jimson, the others also could look at this document which talks about what the IGF could do and how it can strengthen and how it can help. That anyone can look at and it’s available in the IGF website.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you Amrita for stressing that publication, very recent publication of the working group on strategies document. I’d like to go to Pedro who has some interventions from online.

Pedro Lana: Thanks Jennifer. We have two questions and one comment that were made through the chat. The first one is from Julio Casaguenas from Columbia IGF. He is asking what recommendations will you highlight from your local experience to bring the results of your discussion to government? and decision makers. We also have a question from the IGF Ghana group. What strategies can NRIs use to involve underrepresented groups, such as women, youth, and marginalized communities in digital government? Then we have comments by Wisdom Donkor. He says, to resolve the capacity issues of the IGF secretariat, the force should focus on increasing financial resources through diversified funding and grants, enhancing staffing via recruitment and secondments, and strengthening operational capacity by upgrading infrastructure and outsourcing non-core functions. Staff capacity can be improved through training and knowledge-sharing programs, while community involvement can be boosted by leveraging volunteers, interns, and partnerships. Streamlined governance, stakeholder feedback mechanisms, and advocacy efforts to promote the IGF’s mission are essential to secure broader support and ensure the secretariat can make its growing demands effective. Then we have another two comments, but we will leave that after the on-site participations.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, Pedro. I think I do see a hand online, if we can actually get to the vocal intervention. If you can unmute our participant who has their hand up online.

Pedro Lana: I will ask tech to unmute, but it takes a few seconds. I think we can get on-site participation while this is happening.

Audience: Hello?

Jennifer Chung: Yes, please go ahead.

Audience: Hello, I am Sumit Bhutne. I am not income on-site. I am online participant, all event full. Fully participate in good webinars. So internally, problem. So I have only events participate text, and necessary event to participate in mention create event, STD and GDC. But he have no admin support on body in today, so I started to permanently delete in events. But I have to achieve to, I am create CRI, and I can register in members, in event and fields, to participate on good debates and unlikely is involvement much entered room is unlikely they favour in text, so I not participate in full line, but I go remark to all event and debates. Thank you all to introduce to myself, myself Sumit Bhutte, I am UN and UN membership, but I like to support. Thank you.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you very much. And I think we will now turn back to the participants on the floor. I do see that there is a line. Our next speaker, please.

Myanmar Youth IGF: Hello, everyone. Thank you, Jennifer, for giving a chance to speak. And also thank you all panelists for sharing your experiences. And anyway, this is Pyo from Myanmar, and I am the co-coordinator of the UIGF Myanmar and South Asia UIGF. I would like to share my experience why we are trying to create a better environment for all the participants. So I would like to start by saying that we have been trying to, you know, foster the collaboration and trying to sustain the youth initiative during this year, firstly. It has been challenging a lot to us at the local level to foster the collaboration because of our current situation and even it is difficult to do so because of the COVID-19 situation, so we have difficulty to define, we have a challenge to define the government statehood in this state but so far as YGF Myanmar, we mostly focus on the capacity building and also trying to get more input from the different regions and states or different regions, so we are trying to get more input from the different regions, so that was even though all of our, we started our youth initiative with 11 organizing committee members. It is getting, like, it’s likely to be many young people have their own challenges, like fulfilling the basic need and continuing their work, so we are trying to get more input from the different regions and also, we have only few people of the young professional, so we are facing the challenge and even within the team to collaborate and finding resources and also sharing the time among us to make this happen yearly. It has been always a challenge to devise design and both in terms of import SNF concept and to mandate in every regions in Thailand, so we recognize the inimity of the or find the final result as we are not registered under any, you know, any title at local. And also, when we try to initiate, like a self-region you initiated, the public is very clear that we already have Asia-Pacific YMGF. We wanted to put more concrete input and feed into related to the internet cases and issue what are happening at the self-regional level as well. For that purpose, we try to gather the organizing committee members, and this year we could make and establish a very first and foremost South Asia YMGF forum. Luckily, with the support of the United Nations IGF Secretaries and also South Asia IGF Secretaries as well as other supporters like IGFSA, we could smoothly organize our very first and foremost self-regional YMGF forum this year. But so far, they are still having the challenge for starting the collaboration among the youth community in the South Asia region, because maybe this is maybe because of this is our very first year, and we need to think about what would be the best way to approach the other countries like Malaysia, Laos, and also Vietnam to invite youth committee members on board in our committee. And that would be great if someone who are from this country also attending at the YMGF. and we will be happy to talk more about our collaboration for next year. Thank you.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, Pio, for bringing to light how difficult it is for many in many different parts of the world to even meet, to be able to meet, to be able to discuss these issues. Thank you for also highlighting that Youth IGF in Myanmar is still very vibrant and they have their meetings, and congratulations to the Southeast Asian Youth IGF for their initial meeting. I think both Jimson and several others, including Pio, has mentioned the IGF Support Association, which allows for some seed funding to give to initiatives just starting out to be able to meet, to be able to have platforms to meet. I am going to go to the next person in the floor, our next speaker, and then I will go to Pedro online. Please go ahead.

Audience: Thank you so much, the panellists, for your talk, and my name is Naza, Dr Naza Nicholas Kirama from the Tanzania IGF, and I would like to make about 7,000 girls on STEM. We have been able to connect about 800 citizens to affordable and meaningful Internet, and 10 schools have been connected to broadband Internet, and also with the same kind of project, we have been able to…

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, thank you Naza so much for telling us all the good work that Tanzania IGF is doing, and of course… your takeaway for that you know that it takes a village to raise a child, it takes multi-stakeholder model to make all of this work. I’d like now to turn to Pedro who has several comments online. Pedro, please.

Pedro Lana: Yes, I will read two of them. I also noticed that NetMundial and the Sao Paulo guidelines were mentioned and I believe that we have two people from that were involved in the work on site, on the line. I just mentioned that to Jennifer but first the comments that were made on the chat. The first one was from Peter Kinkoye, a convener for the Liberia IGF. He wanted to present a point on the progress of the Liberia IGF that has been hosted in this fifth edition this year with governments and all local stakeholders fully involved in a multi-stakeholder style and have increased their advocacy level to see this level of progress with policy and personal data and cybersecurity strategies that are currently being developed in their governments. This regulatory participation has led to the validation of the draft, the draft Personal Data Protection Act and they intend to sustain the advocacy and discussions on national issues with the collaboration being sustained with support of a vibrant national IGF secretariat supported by the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications. This collective effort has led to a very visible Liberia IGF and also Liberia hosting its first sub-regional consultative forum on the MIU region for the Liberia with support of the UN IGF and ICANN in the region. We also have a comment from Azeem Sajjad about the importance of internal governance at government level being realized in addition to efforts of individuals already recognized at the global level. The Pakistani School of Internal Governance is playing its role since 10 years in different cities of the country. There is an inventory of work related to Internet policies that has also been keeping the pace, in addition to planning, to restructure departments for enablement of effective digital governance ecosystems. There is a challenge to retain the talents of this space and it’s hard to ensure engagement of individuals after capacity building. Universal meaningful connection as well as Internet censorship for information fake news etc are big challenges nowadays. It has been extremely hard for especially governments to keep the balance in digital policies. AI has been the next big thing which is a big challenge for governments in terms of capacity building, development, deployment, management and issues of governance and oversight. So with those two questions I think we can go back on site. So back to you Jennifer.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you very much Pedro. As you can see there is so many good inputs and we have so little time together. I go back to the floor now. I see there still is a line. If you could please keep your intervention within a minute that would be very much appreciated. Next speaker please.

Pacific IGF: Hello. Thank you Jennifer. This is Andrew Molivare representing the regulators office in Vanuatu and also chair of Pacific IGF. The regulators office has been supporting Pacific IGF over the last years. That started in 2011 and I want to acknowledge my Pacific colleagues who have started this initiative in the Pacific back then. Today the Pacific IGF secretariat is with the Pacific Island chapter of the Internet Society. This year Pacific IGF was held in Wellington and our theme was strengthening digital governance, resilience and resilience in the Pacific Islands. And we were supported by the AUDA, the domain name Authority of Australia, and the .NZ, UNESCO and the European Union through the CAID project. And I think there’s some relevance in the theme that we had this year. As we speak now, I had disasters struck two days ago in my country and caused a total outage of communications for the last two days. And thankfully, we are thankful for the Leo technology that currently we have Starlink, some Starlink set up in the country, and also the government is in discussion with Starlink to set up public Internet access around the town. So it’s becoming a reality and resilience for us. There’s two things probably I want to highlight here before I finish. One is I think we need more support in policy frameworks for responses in times of disaster in the Pacific Islands. As you know, for the last few years, we have had a lot of disasters like the volcano eruptions in Tonga and other cyclones, and the disasters are so frequent. And I think we need the right policies in this direction. And the second and last point is I believe probably there’s room to formalize the NRIs to align with the global IGF and increase support as we look forward for the next 20 years. Just to let you know that Pacific IGF 2025 will be in Apia, Samoa, and feel free to join us. Thank you.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you very much. It’s good to hear from the Pacific IGF point of view and congratulations to Samoa for hosting the next edition. of the Pacific IGF. I know that we have two more here in the ground, and we also have one online. So we’ll take one more speaker here with us. Please keep your intervention very short, within a minute if you can. Thank you so much.

Hong Kong Youth IGF: Thank you very much, Jennifer, and everyone. This is Jasmine Emanco from Hong Kong YIGF. So we have been documenting our achievement on a report. So you can always go to HKYIGF.asia to see it. But then I wanted to share about the challenge that I find it very critical. And it’s not, I believe it’s not only the challenge that we face, it’s about to engage with the government. Despite that, this year, after several years of not having YIGF in Hong Kong, we make a theme called smart economy. We try to speak the language of government, but then we still find it difficult to get them engaged. So everything, you know, the multi-stakeholders that we engage in our HKYIGF, we have all the stakeholders except the government, which is a pity. So for me, I just want to share about this challenge, and hopefully we can get some insight and success case from the other regions. Thank you very much.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you very much, Jasmine. Thank you for giving the views from the Hong Kong Youth IGF. I’d like to go straight to online. Pedro, I believe we have an intervention.

Pedro Lana: Yes, we have an intervention from Nigel Hickson, from the UK. Nigo, I think that you already have permission to open your mic. There we go.

Nigel Hickson: Yes, thank you very much, and good afternoon. It’s an absolute pleasure to take part. I’m a member of the UK IGF. It’s just wonderful to hear so many in our eyes. I’ll be very brief. Three points. I think the Global Digital Compact has set us on the right track. on the right path as we go forward recognizing the immense value of the IGF. We need to build on that in the WSIS Plus 20 process, and we should take nothing for granted. It’s a new debate. Secondly, the UN IGF has done such immense work. I think it should be credited with a longer mandate, a mandate that extends beyond 10 or 20 years. It has so much to contribute to the internet debate. Thirdly, the NRIs need to be recognized in the WSIS Plus 20 resolution that’s adopted. The NRIs are the legitimacy of multi-stakeholder processes. The NRIs are an inspiration, and they need to be recognized for the tremendous work they do in bringing people together to have discussions and coordinate and contribute to the challenges and opportunities we have today. Thank you.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, Nigel. In the interest of time, our last speaker is here in the ground. Please keep your interventions within one minute. Thank you very much.

North African IGF: Thank you so much. I’m Ahmad Farak, chair of the North African IGF, and allow me to make my intervention in Arabic. Peace be upon you, ladies and gentlemen. I’m very proud today about two things here. We are an Arabic country that is actually hosting this IGF. This is the second time, if I remember very well. I think Egypt was there. It was in Egypt the first one in 2001 in the North African IGF. We have a very good position there. We are actually cooperating with a lot of entities in our countries and in the northern of Africa. The Arabic participation here that we see, that is an excellent one, in fact. It is very good, really, as I said, the good preparation, and that it is hosted here in an Arabic country. And so that, too, and all the works that we are doing to unify our efforts. My friends here, Dr. Shafik Misharik is a participant. We have organized a forum before this forum, in fact, to prepare for the Arabic participation. And the forum for the youth of Africa, we have challenges. We have dreams. We try all the time to enhance the people of concern. The most important thing is the programs of capacity building. We try all the time, the trainings all the time, at different times, like cyber security, and marine technology, and other technologies. And also bringing internet to school, and there will be also different other efforts. We also give trainings for women and youth. Also, we have an idea to give trainings also for the elderly, so that to make them aware of these new technologies, and to make them a part of this digital world. All these dreams that we are dreaming today, there is, we have an obstacle, big obstacle, that is the financial obstacle. I thank, let me thank everybody. I, and others, they are trying to help us through their programs. But all the time, with these dreams that we have here or elsewhere, it is the monetary issue all the time. Thank you very much.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you very much, and it’s very, very important. Our final speaker on the floor, if you can keep your intervention within one minute, that would be so much appreciated.

Audience: Okay, thank you so much. Before I start ask my question, let me introduce myself. I am Mary Henrica, I am from Timor-Leste, and I am one of the fellow IGF fellow. Before I start my question, here I also want to say thank you to the IGF to give me the opportunity to attend the IGF and to give the opportunity for the Timor-Leste people also to attend the IGF. Okay, this is my question. Timor-Leste right now doesn’t have a local IGF, so how can we establish an IGF in our country and what we need to prepare first to have our own local IGF in our country? Thank you.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you so much. Welcome from Timor-Leste, coming here to the Global IGF. If you need information on how to start an IGF, please contact the IGF secretariat, they will be more than happy. We would be more than happy to help you now that we are over time. I would like to remind everyone, we are still taking in all your inputs. Please send them to the IGF secretariat so all of your inputs can be captured for this session as well. I’m going to end with, of course, all our speakers in reverse order this time. So Lillian, the one key takeaway, 15 seconds each, please, Lillian.

Lilian Chamorro Rojas: Thank you very much, everybody, for sharing your experiences, your ideas. I just wanted to conclude with saying that this governance model that we have built all together and that we have all made our own is not just part of an international system, it’s also local. And this is an invitation to value diversity, experience, learnings, and to take advantage of the next year so that we can renovate ourselves, be creative, and propose new actions and ask the right questions for the GDC and the global community. I’m going to turn it over to Charles to talk a little bit more about the role of multi-stakeholderism and how it plays out in W3C’s.

Jennifer Chung: Charles?

Charles Noir: Thanks for a great discussion. This was fabulous. I think what I’m taking away from this is multi-stakeholderism is a practice. It needs to be practiced regularly. It needs to be strengthened and it needs to be evolved. We all have a role in that. And particularly coming from a stakeholder group, if you want to be a stakeholder, you need to have a sense of community.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, Charles. Amrita?

Amrita Choudhury: Thank you. I would say engage, build capacity, work together to create common dialogues, and to protect what we all cherish, the IGF.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, Amrita. Lillian?

Lillian Nalwoga: I would like to say there’s really no one-size-fits-all, and we’ve seen that happening in so many different ways, so we need to continue being innovative, creative, to have meaningful participation, whether you’re approaching from organising from a stakeholder aspect or from an issue perspective, we need to be able to be more creative and more innovative.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, Lillian. Giacomo?

Giacomo Mazzone: Yes, there was a French politician 100 years ago, that was saying the war is too serious to left it to the generals. I think that we need now to decline to the Internet. The Internet is too serious to be left only to the governments. I think that only through the richness of the contribution of all the stakeholders, we can get through. Thank you.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, Giacomo. Now, back to our home region, Chafic.

Chafic Chaya: Thank you so much, Jennifer. I’ll make my closing remarks in English. First, it’s really appreciated for all these NRIs who came from different regions to speak about their challenges and their opportunities and what they are facing. So on behalf of the Lebanon IGF, I’m happy to help these NRIs to speak about their challenges and their opportunities and what they are facing. to establish and start their NRIs because of the experience that we have during our establishment of the Lebanon IGF. Second, no doubt that the inclusive, open, multi-stakeholder approach is not an option. It’s foundational to build first a community with common vision and objectives that is reflected later in NRIs. And third, as we say as technical people, the internet is the network of networks. So here, the global IGF is the network of the NRIs networks and happy to help anyone that can take our experience and tailor it to their experiences at their national and regional level. Thank you.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, Shafik. What a perfect way to end this session. I hope it has given you just a small taste of all the really good work that the more than 174 NRIs across the globe do. Please engage with your local IGFs in your region, in your economy, in your home country. Can we give us all a round of applause, all for the work of the IGF and also the NRIs.

Agreement Points

Importance of multi-stakeholder model in internet governance

Chafic Chaya

Giacomo Mazzone

Charles Noir

Lilian Chamorro Rojas

Transformation from conventional to multi-stakeholder governance in MENA region

European institutions promoting consensus-building and multi-stakeholder approach

Multi-stakeholder model crucial for technical operation of internet

Local and regional IGFs contribute to global internet governance

Speakers agree on the crucial role of the multi-stakeholder model in shaping internet governance, emphasizing its importance for technical operations, policy-making, and regional development.

Value of National and Regional IGF Initiatives (NRIs)

Lillian Nalwoga

Amrita Choudhury

Charles Noir

Lilian Chamorro Rojas

Capacity building initiatives driving multi-stakeholder engagement in Africa

Diverse stakeholder inclusion needed in Asia-Pacific region

Value of NRIs in informing national policymaking

Local and regional IGFs contribute to global internet governance

Speakers highlight the importance of NRIs in promoting capacity building, stakeholder engagement, and informing national and regional internet governance policies.

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasize the need for capacity building and inclusive participation in their respective regions to strengthen internet governance processes.

Lillian Nalwoga

Amrita Choudhury

Capacity building initiatives driving multi-stakeholder engagement in Africa

Diverse stakeholder inclusion needed in Asia-Pacific region

Both speakers view the WSIS+20 process as an opportunity to strengthen and extend the IGF’s mandate, emphasizing the importance of recognizing and supporting NRIs.

Charles Noir

Nigel Hickson

Opportunity to renew commitment to multi-stakeholderism through WSIS+20

Need to strengthen IGF mandate beyond 10-20 years

Call for NRIs to be recognized in WSIS+20 resolution

Unexpected Consensus

Challenges faced by NRIs across different regions

Ahmed Farag

Jasmine Ko

Andrew Molivurae

Phyo Thiri L.

Financial sustainability challenges for NRI secretariats

Difficulty engaging government stakeholders in some regions

Need for policy frameworks on disaster response in Pacific islands

Challenges in fostering youth collaboration across South Asia

Despite coming from diverse regions, these speakers unexpectedly highlight similar challenges faced by NRIs, including financial constraints, stakeholder engagement difficulties, and the need for specialized policy frameworks.

Overall Assessment

Summary

The main areas of agreement include the importance of the multi-stakeholder model in internet governance, the value of NRIs in capacity building and policy-making, and the need to strengthen the IGF’s mandate through the WSIS+20 process. There is also consensus on the challenges faced by NRIs across different regions.

Consensus level

There is a high level of consensus among speakers on the fundamental principles of internet governance and the role of NRIs. This strong agreement suggests a unified vision for the future of internet governance, which could facilitate more effective collaboration and policy-making at both regional and global levels. However, the shared challenges identified by NRIs from different regions indicate that there are still significant obstacles to overcome in implementing these principles effectively across diverse contexts.

Different Viewpoints

Approach to engaging government stakeholders

Charles Noir

Jasmine Ko

National and Regional IGF Initiatives (NRIs) are seen as important sources of information and guidance for national policymakers. They provide a platform for engaging the community and informing decision-making on internet policy issues.

Some NRIs face challenges in engaging government stakeholders in their multi-stakeholder processes. This lack of government participation can hinder the effectiveness of internet governance discussions and outcomes.

While Charles Noir emphasizes the value of NRIs in informing national policymaking, Jasmine Ko highlights the difficulty in engaging government stakeholders in some regions.

Unexpected Differences

Financial sustainability of NRIs

Ahmed Farag

Charles Noir

NRIs face significant financial obstacles in sustaining their operations and achieving their goals. This financial challenge is a major barrier to realizing the full potential of NRIs in promoting internet governance discussions and capacity building.

The WSIS+20 review process is seen as an opportunity to reinforce and dedicate a commitment to multi-stakeholderism for the next decade. It is viewed as a chance to recognize the importance of the multi-stakeholder model in internet governance.

While the Ahmed Farag highlights financial sustainability as a major challenge for NRIs, Charles Noir focuses on the opportunity to reinforce multi-stakeholderism through WSIS+20 without addressing the financial concerns. This difference in focus on immediate operational challenges versus long-term policy opportunities is unexpected.

Overall Assessment

summary

The main areas of disagreement revolve around the challenges faced by different NRIs, particularly in engaging government stakeholders and ensuring financial sustainability. There are also differences in focus regarding the immediate operational needs of NRIs versus long-term policy opportunities.

difference_level

The level of disagreement among speakers is relatively low, with most differences stemming from varied regional experiences and priorities rather than fundamental disagreements on the value of multi-stakeholderism or the importance of NRIs. These differences highlight the diverse challenges faced by NRIs across different regions and underscore the need for flexible, context-specific approaches to internet governance.

Partial Agreements

Both speakers agree on the importance of inclusive participation in NRIs, but they differ in their focus. Lillian Nalwoga emphasizes tracking outcomes, while Amrita Choudhury focuses on increasing diverse stakeholder participation.

Lillian Nalwoga

Amrita Choudhury

There is a need to develop and track outcomes from NRI meetings to demonstrate their impact. This involves producing key outcome documents from meetings and tracking their implementation at country and regional levels.

The Asia-Pacific region requires the inclusion of diverse stakeholders in internet governance discussions due to its vast diversity in countries, cultures, languages, economies, and levels of technology adoption. Efforts are being made to increase participation from underrepresented groups and economies.

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers emphasize the need for capacity building and inclusive participation in their respective regions to strengthen internet governance processes.

Lillian Nalwoga

Amrita Choudhury

Capacity building initiatives driving multi-stakeholder engagement in Africa

Diverse stakeholder inclusion needed in Asia-Pacific region

Both speakers view the WSIS+20 process as an opportunity to strengthen and extend the IGF’s mandate, emphasizing the importance of recognizing and supporting NRIs.

Charles Noir

Nigel Hickson

Opportunity to renew commitment to multi-stakeholderism through WSIS+20

Need to strengthen IGF mandate beyond 10-20 years

Call for NRIs to be recognized in WSIS+20 resolution

Key Takeaways

The multi-stakeholder model is crucial for effective internet governance and should be strengthened

National and Regional Internet Governance Forum (NRI) initiatives play a vital role in shaping global internet governance

Capacity building and inclusivity are key challenges for many NRIs, especially in developing regions

Financial sustainability is a major concern for many NRI initiatives

The upcoming WSIS+20 review presents an opportunity to reinforce commitment to multi-stakeholderism and the IGF

There is a need to better integrate NRI inputs into global internet governance processes

Resolutions and Action Items

Engage NRIs in consultation during 2025 on the future institutional structure of the IGF

Recognize and formalize NRIs in the WSIS+20 resolution

Strengthen the IGF mandate beyond 10-20 years

Develop mechanisms to track outcomes from NRI meetings

Increase support for policy frameworks on disaster response in Pacific islands

Unresolved Issues

How to effectively engage government stakeholders in some regions

How to ensure financial sustainability for NRI initiatives

How to better integrate youth voices in internet governance processes

How to establish new national IGFs in countries that don’t yet have them

How to balance diverse regional needs and priorities in global internet governance

Suggested Compromises

Use the IGF as a platform to support implementation of the Global Digital Compact while maintaining its broader mandate

Balance between global coordination and local/regional autonomy for NRIs

Combine capacity building initiatives with policy discussions to address both immediate and long-term needs

The IGF at the global level, but Nenad was mentioning that it is a problem at the local level as well, is usually caught in a catch-22 situation between the lack of resources and the difficulty to articulate an ambitious vision, because if you don’t have the resources, it’s hard to have a vision and implement it. But if you don’t have the vision, you cannot muster the resources.

speaker

Bertrand de La Chapelle

reason

This comment insightfully identifies a core challenge facing IGFs at all levels – the interplay between vision and resources. It frames the issue in a way that highlights the complexity and interdependence of these factors.

impact

This comment shifted the discussion to focus more on the practical challenges of sustaining IGFs, leading to further comments about funding and support mechanisms. It added a layer of pragmatic analysis to the more abstract discussions of multi-stakeholder models.

The GDC process needs us. At the moment, the process has been conducted in New York by the people that is following the United Nations General Assembly, that in most cases are not very well connected… with the reality in the world. And the only place where ideas can be tested, can be put on the reality, can be checked, is this.

speaker

Giacomo Mazzone

reason

This comment provocatively challenges the top-down approach of global digital governance, asserting the crucial role of IGFs in grounding policy discussions in real-world realities. It highlights the unique value proposition of the IGF ecosystem.

impact

This comment reframed the relationship between IGFs and global governance processes, positioning IGFs as essential rather than peripheral. It sparked further discussion about how to strengthen the link between local/regional IGFs and global policy processes.

We have been able to connect about 800 citizens to affordable and meaningful Internet, and 10 schools have been connected to broadband Internet

speaker

Nazar Nicholas Kirama

reason

This comment provides concrete examples of the tangible impact that IGFs can have on digital inclusion. It moves the discussion from abstract principles to real-world outcomes.

impact

This comment grounded the discussion in practical achievements, leading to more sharing of specific initiatives and outcomes from different regions. It helped illustrate the real-world relevance of IGFs beyond policy discussions.

Timor-Leste right now doesn’t have a local IGF, so how can we establish an IGF in our country and what we need to prepare first to have our own local IGF in our country?

speaker

Mary Henrica

reason

This question from a participant highlights the ongoing process of expanding the IGF network and the interest from underrepresented regions. It brings attention to the practical steps needed to establish new IGFs.

impact

This comment shifted the discussion towards practical advice and support for establishing new IGFs, emphasizing the role of the IGF Secretariat and existing IGFs in supporting expansion. It highlighted the dynamic, growing nature of the IGF ecosystem.

Overall Assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by grounding abstract principles in practical realities, highlighting both challenges and achievements of IGFs at various levels. They shifted the conversation from describing the multi-stakeholder model to critically examining its implementation and impact. The discussion evolved to emphasize the bidirectional relationship between local/regional IGFs and global governance processes, the need for sustainable resources, and the tangible outcomes of IGF initiatives. Overall, these comments deepened the analysis of the IGF ecosystem’s role, challenges, and potential in shaping internet governance.

How can NRIs effectively implement the Global Digital Compact in their respective regions and countries?

speaker

Jimson Olufoye

explanation

This is important to ensure the principles of the Global Digital Compact are applied at local and regional levels.

How can the sustainability of IGF secretariats be improved, particularly in terms of financial resources?

speaker

Nina from Ivory Coast

explanation

Sustainable funding is crucial for the ongoing operations and effectiveness of IGF initiatives.

What strategies can be used to effectively engage governments in IGF processes, particularly in regions where government participation is lacking?

speaker

Jasmine Ko

explanation

Government engagement is crucial for comprehensive multi-stakeholder dialogue and policy impact.

How can the IGF and NRIs be more effectively used as key venues for advocacy?

speaker

Jennifer Chung (moderator)

explanation

Maximizing the impact of IGF initiatives for advocacy purposes can lead to more effective policy outcomes.

What policy frameworks are needed for disaster response in Pacific Islands, particularly related to internet and communication technologies?

speaker

Andrew Molivurae

explanation

Disaster preparedness and response are critical for maintaining connectivity in vulnerable island nations.

How can the IGF’s mandate be extended beyond the current timeframe, and what would be the implications of a longer-term mandate?

speaker

Nigel Hickson

explanation

A longer mandate could provide more stability and allow for long-term planning and impact.

What is the process for establishing a new national IGF, and what preparations are needed?

speaker

Mary Henrica from Timor-Leste

explanation

This information is crucial for expanding the IGF network to new countries and regions.

How can the multi-stakeholder model be further evolved and strengthened in practice?

speaker

Charles Noir

explanation

Continuous improvement of the multi-stakeholder approach is essential for effective internet governance.