The following are the outputs of the real-time captioning taken during the Fourteenth Annual Meeting of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) in Berlin, Germany, from 25 to 29 November 2019. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid to understanding the proceedings at the event, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
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>> ANJA GENGO: Hello, everyone. I ask you to take your seats, please. We will start in one minute from now. Thank you.
Dear colleagues, thank you very much for coming to the NRI Coordination Session. My name is Anja Gengo. I think the majority of you know me. And I think I know the majority of the faces here. But just for the record, I work at the IGF Secretariat. And my primary responsibility is to engage with the national, regional, sub regional and Youth IGFs and work on advancing the local processes and the integration into the Global IGF.
As you know, the coordination session represents an open work meeting between all the NRIs, all other community members interested in the NRI work, between our colleagues and the institutional home in the UN of the IGF. The chair of the MAG, and the IGF Secretariat.
I will not be moderating the session. I will be just the Rapporteur for this session. I think it's also very important for you, aside of knowing me as the contact person, on the daily basis that you know the rest of the team.
So the keepers and the training IGF Secretariat and of course other colleagues, senior management, and our director. And, of course, I believe the chair you know. So with that, I will hand over to the Moderator. I think the agenda was shared with all of you and has been built in a bottom up manner by all NRIs a few months ago. And hopefully we will have a good discussion. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much, Anja. Looking around the table, I think almost all of you know me. I don't see any new faces. So welcome and thank you to this meeting.
And I also would like to take this opportunity to thank Anja for her tireless work that she has done.
(Applause)
>> MODERATOR: Before she came, I think we had about 60 NRIs. And then when she came it just shot up in a short manner of time. So it just shows how hard she works. And she has actually lost her voice this week because she has been working so hard. Thank you very much.
(Off mic)
>> MODERATOR: Yes, yes. And, as you know, I mean we have, I think, a very good communication between us. There is the biweekly meetings that we have online with the NRI Coordinators.
And when we go to meetings we also meet. If we go to an ICANN meeting, we have an NRI meeting, et cetera so that is good. And the NRIs have also contributed to the work of the IGF Secretariat, the MAG work and stuff that we are producing for the Internet Governance Forum.
Now, I would also like -- Anja has introduced the panel. We do have Lynn St. Amour, whom you all know as the MAG Chair. And we also have the Director from UN DESA from the Department of Public Institutions and Digital Governance, Mr. Juwang Zhu, who is working with us. And he is supporting us and pushing us also to integrate and to communicate with the National and Regional Initiatives. And it is mostly because of his drive as well and his commitment to the National and Regional Initiatives and to capacity building at the local level as well that we have been able to do new things this year.
With that, I would like to show you these two in the corner here whom are also behind us and also work and contribute to the work. They are not really public to you, but with us we work together every single day. And we talk to each other and they help with all manner of things with the IGF Secretariat and also in the New York side pushing papers and making sure that things are done.
So this is Wyman and Dennis as well. Wave your hands. So this is the team. And also, if you feel that you need to talk to anybody, you don't have to just talk to Anja or myself. You can talk to them as well and you can talk to Juwang. He is very approachable. So we are here to help and communicate and help build a better internet governance structure and understanding. I would like to give the floor to the Director Juwang Zhu, to say a few words.
>> JUWANG ZHU: Thank you. I'm just looking around to see colleagues and this banner catches my attention. IGF's organized around the world, multi-stakeholder, open, transparent, inclusive, non-commercial, and bottom up.
No words can summarize what NRI is than these five words. So I don't know if it is Anja or somebody else who put these words together, but it is well done. That's probably something that I'm going just to outline in the next few minutes.
First of all, I want to thank everybody here. And in a way, I want to say that you are probably the heroes of the expansion of the IGF around the world. Because you know you -- most of you do not get any funding support from the UN. With your leadership and your initiative, you are becoming our closest allies, our biggest champions in advancing the cause of the IGF.
And I think as was mentioned earlier, the last time when I was able to attend a meeting like this, there were about 50-60 NRIs and a few years later more than doubled. And it does show that there is the desire across the globe to be part of the IGF process and also does show us that the trend for the broader participation from the grassroots is strong. And hopefully next time we meet the number will go up even higher. Let me say why we think the NRIs are extremely important.
Number one, it's a great education opportunity. And from our side, it's a great capacity building opportunity. Because through you the general public understands more why IGFs are important and what is at stake and how their lives, livelihoods are affected by the IGF.
So this is a great education opportunity. And that is why we are very much behind this. We get some funding support from the partners. And over the last -- this past year, I would just very quickly go through the list with the funding support from partners we are able to support.
The Asia Pacific Regional IGF. Gambia national IGF. Chad national IGF. African regional IGF. Haiti national IGF. Nepal national IGF. Zambia national IGF. Malawi national IGF, and Burkina Faso national IGF. I hope that some of the colleagues who organized these IGFs will be able to share the experience with us.
And I also want to assure our funding partners, the donors that these selection of the IGFs and the use of the funds went through a very rigorous review process at the UN headquarters in New York.
In New York, we had -- we continue to have this committee called the small grants committee. And the members, the committee review carefully the application and selection process and they came to a decision. And the grants is actually carried out through a written exchange of letters. So it is properly documented.
I hope that our donor partners who support the IGF and provide contributions to the IGF trust fund will be inspired by what you are doing and put more resources into your endeavors.
Now, so a few words on how we can support you. Of course, number one, we will work with MAG members, with our counterparts in the broader IGF community to continue to mobilize funds in support of you. It is probably no exaggeration to say without the small amount of support consideration $3,000 for the national IGF and $10,000 for the Asia Pacific IGF, without the small support some of the IGF may not have taken place. So that is the bottom line of the importance of this capacity building fund.
And number two, we will also make use of the efforts of the MAG members. Some of the MAG members we talk to, they indicated that they would be willing and to participate in your national IGF in the regional IGF to provide support and input into your work.
And on the part of the Secretariat, thanks to Anja, we are soon going to put out a companion of the national and regional IGF. And compendium relies on you for your input. Once we put out the compendium, it is easier for partners to see you and reach out to you and that will be a tool of outreach of mobilization of funds of support.
And finally, I also hope that while seeing your national regional uniqueness, there will be also a better alignment of your national regional IGF in terms of the IGF with issues to be discussed so that the outcome can be organically integrated into the global IGF.
So these are the few remarks I want to share with you. And I want to in closing emphasize again that we are very much behind you.
And as some of the champions, if national regional IGF are work of passion for you, they are the same to us. Thank you.
(Applause)
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much. Now I will give it to the MAG Chair, please. You have the floor.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: Thank you. I will be quite brief because we have a really full agenda, and I think it is really important that we hear from as many of you as possible.
I would just like to start off by thanking everybody for all of your efforts. Not only, of course, your very obvious local efforts, but also your efforts here with respect to the main session that was organized by the NRIs to the collaborative sessions and effort you give to various surveys and request for support and help and participation for all of the activities across the IGF.
I know sometimes it can be overwhelming and we talk about how much we should do. I think it is not appropriate for us not to ask because the decision ought to be yours with respect to which activities you participate in and which are important to you and which you find useful.
So I seriously hope you don't feel like you are kind of overtapped, if you will, for support and input. But that is primarily wanting it to be your decision which things you choose and you participate in and not some pre-filter that happens at the MAG level or at the Secretariat level. It certainly wouldn't support a bottom up focus.
You all know, this is my penultimate day as the IGF MAG. Tomorrow will me by last day. And Anriette is coming in from Civil Society.
And she is known to many of you. She actually had a conflict with this meeting which is why she is not here as well. But, I mean she will provide strong vibrant leadership, I'm sure. And I think only better and better things with respect to the NRIs and their relationship to the MAG and the Secretariat and all of the IGF activities.
So really just from the bottom of my heart like to thank everybody for everything you have done locally and to support the MAG and such a great activity here this year and past years as well. And turn it back so we can get your input and participation. Thank you very much.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much, Lynn.
Now, as you know, we have -- we I think at the Secretariat do receive about two or three inquiries a week actually of people trying to form the National Regional Initiatives, et cetera.
And Anja or myself, we go through the requirements. And I would just like to announce that we do have new ones coming on like the Honduras IGF and the Ivory Coast IGF. And here we would have the China IGF. And I think we have Xiaofeng here who would like to say a few words. Please go ahead.
>> XIAOFENG TAO: Thank you very much. Dear colleagues, my name is Xiaofeng Tao from the China Academy of Information and Communication, which is the CAICT of China.
It is my honor to participate in this NRI session. I would like to take this opportunity to update you on the China IGF. Today the rapid development of information technology has created a new ways of production, new space for people's life, open new horizons of governance and people's ability to understand and shape the world.
Meanwhile, in several space we also face a number of new issues and challenges such as security stability, digital divide, and cybercrime and terrorism. This is why we think the UN IGF is meaningful and why we start the China IGF processes and join the global IGF family. Which is a really honor. So in July, the CAICT and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of China, and the International Society of China joined to launch the IGF processes.
So the China IGF is aiming to serving as a platform for the government, private sectors, technical communities and other stakeholders through the way of bottom up multi-stakeholder open transparency and inclusiveness. China IGF encourage all stakeholders to play their role in internet governance to safeguard cybersecurity, upgrade the industrial development, and boost the vigorous development of the digital economy.
At the same time, we at the China IGF mission will also build a bridge for the Chinese community to participate in the UN IGF processes. The China IGF processes would like to strengthen its interaction in the UN IGF processes.
So to contribute a global internet governance and solving the global server issues. In June, this year, the UN panel on digital cooperation published the report putting forward suggestions for IGF improvement.
So the China IGF together with Chinese internet community will continually bring in various efforts to participate in IGF improvement. China will also enhance cooperation and to enhance the interaction with other countries and regions and economies around regions share China's improvements in the development of internet and maybe positive to the global network community and development to strive to achieve the goal of development outcome and responsibility. And to blaze at the path of mutual trust and co-governance.
What we call China Multi-stakeholder Steering Committee, MSC, will be established later on which is -- which will be composed of members from governments, private sector, academia, and the civil society.
Our official website has been preliminarily set up and on the track of continuous update and improvements. So, ladies and gentlemen, building a peaceful, secure, prosperous server space across joint efforts of all countries and all sectors of the society.
So let's create a peaceful secure open cooperative environment and build a community of shared future in server space to benefit people of the whole world. Thank you very much.
(Applause)
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much, Xiaofeng, we welcome you to the family and look forward to collaborating with you from now on. Thank you.
The fourth -- the third item on the agenda is the sustainability of the NRIs. As you know, one of the most important functions of the NRIs is capacity building, especially at home, at the national and regional levels.
And sometimes we do have summer schools and capacity building workshops attached to the NRI meetings. And there is always the difficult question of funding and funding mechanisms.
As you have just heard, at the IGF we have tried with our limited money, we have to help with that funding a little bit with the IGF grants and hopefully we can continue next year in doing that.
And also providing support such as use of our virtual meeting platform Zoom, mailing lists. And I think we have one or two websites that we are hosting as subdomains on the -- in the forum website at the IGF Secretariat.
So we try to -- but it is still a very big issue that we need to discuss and to see what we can do to provide more funding, whether it be international funding or even local funding for the IGF initiatives.
The second point is also what the outcomes of the NRI, how we can work together to publicize the outcomes of the NRIs because with the NRIs, which has the advantage from the global IGF, is that you can have your policy contributions at a local level and these can directly affect how laws are made at the local level which we don't at the global level. We act as a secondary order, people have to go home and do it in their institution.
But at the local level, you can have a direct effect which is one of the reasons we want to encourage the National Regional Initiatives and it also helps in policy coherence across the globe as the internet doesn't really respect borders.
So we have a question and answer session about these topics. Yes, please.
>> AUDIENCE: Thank you very much. I am (?), a member of the Bangladesh Internet Governance Forum. I have the privilege to have the process from 2006.
So very honored to speak here to some couple of point. First of all, I would like to introduce his Excellency, the Secretary IGF Bangladesh and also the Secretary General Bangladesh IGF. We are organized on 16 numbers.
So just a couple of minute. I will brief you regarding the session. So we accommodate or try to accommodate multi-stakeholder participant. 150 participant participated there. Government, media, civil society, academia and corporate sector participated there and (?) So from the AFRINIC side, one of the representative is also in there from AFRINIC.
And we have opening session, ministers, secretaries are in there. And Internet Governance (?) in the digital age. This is the offering (?) Our next session was emerging technology, especially IoT. We discussed that. And next was freedom of expression in digital transformation. Can common citizens make the voice heard and protecting rights. We dedicated the session.
Next session was shifting the politics. We invite a couple of politicians in the country in the session and very good discussion has internet -- since the political paradigm like this.
And last session was a good session called internet governance of the whole industrial revolution. That basically reorganized our Bangladesh IGF.
I would like to now fully endorse the Secretary General high level cooperation report. I think it is a very, very good report. And at the same time, there are room for the further improvement maybe because in recent years NRI according to the representative.
Thank you very much for your comments regarding NRI, have developed and expanded in organic ways.
That have helped strengthen and democratize at national and regional level. The idea for the model does not seem to address the role of NRI in any way.
We have question on how they would link with the help incubator and other aspects. I have some concern in this regard.
Three concern. One is what is the relations between NRI and IGF Secretariat. So we need to discuss or we need to look out some type of guideline like this. What is the relations between NRI and RI. So country now communicate with the regional IGF because we have to have some communication protocol like this.
Part one is IGF, what is IGF to us? We have local and crystal idea regarding IGF model. So I think a little some discussion regarding the what is IGF model and what is the component of the IGF model like this.
I would like to conclude here some impact expressing impact of the Bangladesh IGF. This is the impact of the Bangladesh IGF the last couple of years. (?) for top level domain in Bangla. Now we have a top level domain.
So this advocacy started by the Bangladesh IGF with ICANN and our chair person. Now we have a top level in Bangladesh. Second one is we get engaged and involved concerned stakeholder including government with ICANN new (?)
As a result, the environment of Bangladesh involved and negotiated for the development of new level generation. That is called LGR. Now Bangla has the document. So this is our two success in this area. Bangladesh Internet Governance Forum program also running school on Bangladesh Internet Governance Forum. So 100 -- 1,300, that means 1300 people basically joined the Bangladesh School on Internet Governance so far.
Bangladesh IGF get participation regularly and knowledge for regional to global IGF level and incorporate global knowledge to national and regional level through the Bangladesh Internet Governance Forum. This is some of the impact of the Bangladesh IGF. Thank you very much for listening me.
(Applause)
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much. That's a very great example. And I'd like to congratulate you, 13,000 people going through the school, I mean that's quite impressive. Thank you.
Before we answer the questions, is there anybody else who wants to take the floor? Yes, please.
>> AUDIENCE: Hello. This is (?) representing for Japan IGF. We do share the similar concern that our colleague from Bangladesh expressed.
We also want to know how the national and regional NRIs and global IGF are interrelated in the near -- in the future after the reformation of IGF will take place.
So this is one point. And another point is Japan IGF has a very what I call a thin model of running the national IGF. We do have extensive discussion on various ICT policy topics across the nation, but we do not -- it does not take place within the Japan IGF framework. So we just pick up notable figures from each title of discussion to the national Japan IGF platform. So that is what we are trying to do.
So if the reform of IGF processes will take place in the near future, how Japan IGF is -- how should Japan IGF connect ourselves to the global arena. So that's another concern that I have now. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Now, thank you very much. For the relationship between the national and regional IGFs and the global IGF, if we are to use that word, the national and regional IGF are independent of the global IGF. And we are still maintaining that.
We are just collaborating together, working with our synergies and also participating. We learn from you and you learn from us. So it is not a hierarchal relationship at all.
And the same goes for the regional IGFs and the national IGFs. It is not a hierarchal relationship. The discussion at the national level, of course, there is a difference between national discussions and regional discussions because of the effect.
But it is still trying to discuss these issues, build some national consensus around some issues so you know where you agree on and know where you disagree on and then also on the regional level. Then when we come to the global meeting, we are better placed to participate in the discussions. So I hope that answers these two questions.
And for what happens in the future, we don't know that because it is not set in stone. There is still a discussion going on. And we had the review of the report and we had the digital cooperation session on Tuesday. And this is still a discussion. So no -- nothing has come, and I don't -- I mean for my personal point of view, I don't think there will be something that says okay, from now on, you report to this and et cetera. I mean it is a cooperation.
So we discuss and we amend and we adapt as we go on, as we get new information and as our needs change. Does anybody -- no? Okay. Yes, please, Sondra.
>> AUDIENCE: To address the concerns of my fellow colleagues from Bangladesh and Japan.
We just had information gathering of regional IGFs and it became evident that some of those elements that are in particular described in Chapter 4 in recommendation A and B speaking about this incubator and accelerator and all these kind of things that some elements they have different names, of course, are kind of existing in some regions and in some nations already.
And therefore, I would personally recommend that when these roundtables are being set up now in the future when we discuss the digital cooperation for the future that national and regional IGFs should be on the roundtables because their experiences might be positive or negative and should definitely feed into the discussion. And you would have no better source than the national or regional IGFs to feed them into. This became evident today during the meeting.
Anja will remember it was even at the very end, and I think we should take it from there and address the concerns of the -- of my colleagues. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much, Sondra. It is an open process as far as I understand it. Yes?
>> I just want to echo what Sondra and (?) just said as well. Every time I have discussed about IGF plus and the various component pieces of it, I said that all of those exist or the ability to support those exist withiin the current IGF ecosystem.
They, of course, need additional resources and better funding. I also talked to the DNA that exists in terms of open transparent bottom up processes and how important that is. And I know the view is held by the MAG as well. So I mean I think from the MAG's perspective as the new MAG, and not future committee, but as the new MAG actually picks up some of this discussion, I'm sure they will share some -- share those same values and do what they can to continue to getting the messages in from their perspective.
And at the same time, it is important that the NRIs themself have their own voice and their own participation and thinking how you might do that so that you get effective representation into those processes and effective kind of representation back into your own activities here in the IGF system and national and regional and youth initiatives. It is critically important, and some of the pieces are already in place.
>> MODERATOR: Yes, please.
>> BARRACK OTIENO: Thank you. My name is Barrack Otieno from Kenya IGF.
I think the greatest challenge is sustainable. I just wanted to share a possible solution in which as IGF coordinators or conveners we could think of our processes as think tanks for providing solutions to the community. May I share maybe the case of Kenya IGF.
We worked closely with the Parliament, the Senate and National Assembly. They have come to us whenever they wanted to reach out to the public, test legislate, and in some cases they have withdrawn legislation that was not popular with the public because it was not well thought.
In some cases, we have had a Data Protection Act enacted after more than eight years in the computer misuse and cybercrimes act. And a lot of these activities are being done by participants from the School of Internet Governance which is in its fourth year.
So we are seeing there is more support coming because people feel that they are useful outcomes or outputs or this forum can be relied on. And so I would like to encourage the IGFs that we turn ourselves into think tanks.
And coming back to the Secretariat, now that we are thinking of the compendium, I'm thinking if we can find a way of showcasing good things by writing, not just here we are speaking and we have been in so many meetings, the memory is full. But now if we could be writing and applauding it on the website. Because I'm seeing, for example, in Kenya, we are having a challenge with legislative aspects around drones.
Now it is illegal to own and to fly a drone. And from the legal and regulatory angle. And as I sat through meetings, I wanted to really hear how have other countries done that. Practical things we request be able to share with our parliamentarians.
If we are talking about artificial intelligence and use cases, can we find documents in place on projects that I can refine for my village and go to the website and implement these. I think as we discuss, let's see if we can have a portal or something where we can upload all of these wonderful things happening in different countries and they can be used from the ground. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much, Barrack. It is true if the local IGFs somehow the value they will receive more support and the think tank and sharing of good practices is also good to learn from each other's experiences.
Very good points. Do I have anybody else? Who wants to take the floor? Yes, please.
>> AUDIENCE: Hello, everyone. I'm (?) from Azerbaijan. I'm a PhD candidate at Tibet University.
And I -- I listened to the speech of the Japan and Bangladesh representative. I think that they are lucky to have -- to have problems maybe to have concerns like this. At least they have platform, IGF platform in their country. Because we have no IGF youth platform and also counter platform in our country.
And it means that all of the citizens of our country and have not any chance to participate in this initiative, and maybe I think that most of the countries I can say here that they have not really.
And, first of all, I think that we have to create and establish the platforms in every country. It means that every country will have chance to participate. Every country's citizens will have the chance to participate in this process nearly. And after this, after that, maybe we can -- we will have so important and those conclusions on this issue.
And that's why I came to ask you support us to create a national maybe platform IGF in our country, in every country. It is so important for us. And after coming here and I heard that we have no national platform and it so big problem for me. And I think it is a big problem for our country and internet society. That's all. Thank you very much.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much for your input. Yes, I think we will try and we will also -- and we have put on our website like the NRI toolkit, et cetera and having the small grants to help countries come up and establish their national processes. And, of course, the -- the --
>> AUDIENCE: We are really -- I'm so sorry. And we are ready to do anything, to do everything on this issue. And if you have support on this issue to us, we are ready and I think that from today we have to start this process, from today.
>> MODERATOR: Sure. Yes. Thank you very much.
(Applause)
>> MODERATOR: We stand ready. Yes, Jennifer, please.
>> JENNIFER CHUNG: Thank you for giving me the floor. My name is Jennifer Chung, I'm part of the Secretariat of the Asia Pacific Regional IGF.
First of all, I would like to thank the IGF Secretariat very much for their gracious and generous grant they have given to AprIGF this year. Thank you for coming to Azerbaijan, somewhere that people don't usually think about when you think about Asia Pacific, but it is really on the far east of Russia.
So with that, you know, I really want to also welcome very much the new addition to our NRI family, China IGF. We look forward very much to their contributions. In the region it would be fruitful and hear developments especially from China.
A quick response to the colleague that just intervened on behalf of Azerbaijan. There is a youth internet forum that happened this year. I believe it might have been the first one organized by the Ministry of Transport Communication and UNDP. If you wanted more information, I'm sure Anja --
>> AUDIENCE: It was formed but there was not --
>> JENNIFER CHUNG: Okay.
>> AUDIENCE: I think that 2012 maybe there was an IGF forum, but the conclusion of the forum I cannot understand that why we did not -- we did not create platform there.
>> ANJA GENGO: Maybe for the record to note that yes, indeed there are a couple of colleagues are here from Azerbaijan. We will work and meet after this meeting or set up a meeting and chat briefly and connect you to the colleagues. Thank you.
>> LYNN ST. AMOUR: I think you mentioned Azerbaijan because there was a global as well. Taking that opportunity to say we would welcome any other expression of interest for future IGFs in your country.
So if you think there is a real possibility and a real interest, the you should contact the Secretariat or the incoming MAG Chair because we have done that successfully in a number of countries with the support of the NRIs.
>> MODERATOR: Jennifer finishing and then we have Liana and then we have Yulia.
>> JENNIFER CHUNG: I just wanted to highlight that the grant that we received from IGF really enabled us to bring under represented stakeholders from around the league because Asia Pacific is a very vast region. Very diverse and ranging from developing to small island states to a landlocked countries. And also, you know, developing states as well.
So without this grant we would not be able to bring under represented stakeholders to the actual forum. I think a lot of them do find the participation in person extremely valuable.
In fact, because we have to move host countries every year, it is a question of the sustainability and the ability to be able to fund stakeholders who have not been able to come to the forum is extremely, extremely important. So a big thank you to that.
And, of course, looking to the next edition in Nepal. Thank you very much for that.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you, Jennifer. Liana, please.
>> AUDIENCE: Thank you (?) Armenia IGF. So we are lucky to have the platform in the IGF in the National IGF. We do that for the fifth year.
And we do a lot of capacity building programs especially for the youth participants. And we had the School of Internet Governance which were run for three years and the success of it to me was the establishment of Youth IGF actually for this year.
So those participants of this internet governance the alumni can get together and they establish their own initiative and their own dialogue within the youth. So this is a great advancement of dialogue on internet governance that we have in the country.
And in terms of participation and different stakeholders we have been lucky also to engage the parliamentarians. And also they now account for the global IGF and this is for the first time that I heard from the Armenia parliament members are participating.
And this is thanks to the German government that they put the fund for this and invite and I hope that from now on they will be really engaged and do on the legislation and take into account the bottom up process from the society and all of the other stakeholders.
And taking now the opportunity and in my role as a committee member I would like to brief that we have a lot of capacity building programs there as well. So we run that for five years in turn. And we do have schools there as well.
And which is the regional one. And that brings another value that we bring participants from different countries and in which they do not have their own national IGFs as well. Bringing the youth and fellows into this regional IGF. Bringing the knowledge, raising the awareness, and then we faced actually the result.
So that these people will come and take in the knowledge in the school and the fellowship program. They go back to their countries and they create the IGFs. So this boosts the dialogue in the national IGFs. And I would like to thank the Secretariat for the support.
And you mentioned also in the platform the Zoom and the mailing and all that kind of technical support that is given Secretariat, this is very useful for bringing up the community.
Thank you for that support. And to Anja as well for the excellent coordination of the work that we are doing within the NRI. Thank you very much.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you, Liana. Yes, you are doing really great work, and I think I was at the Bucharest, right? And it was really amazing. Thank you.
>> AUDIENCE: Thank you, and good afternoon. My name is Ula Moranes (phonetic) from the youth IGF movement. As you know, when we shared this in 2011 the youth IGF actually together with the MAG members of the 2011 at this time, and now today we are like it is a kind of platform because you mentioned something very important.
The platform for the youth should be, you know, to have this all over through the year. And we are very happy to have more than 35 countries where we are helping and given this platform.
We discussed actually beforehand just in the early afternoon. So just to know, to make -- to give this information to the Secretariat as well. We will be happy in helping as well in bringing this knowledge and capacity in how to establish the platform and to work together because, indeed, the youth IGF has been organized already but this is another about the tangible sustainable platform as well. So happy to for other countries as well. If there is an interest, happy in delivering this knowledge and methodology. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: It is important, the youth are the future. So it is very important to engage them. And also I was going to say something about the parliamentarians.
Many thanks to the German government for establishing the parliamentary track. And hopefully within the national and regional initiatives we can also invite the parliamentarians in as well because they are in charge of passing the legal instruments, the policy instruments in the countries.
So it is important that they are made aware of the debates going on and get involved in the debates as well. Quickly, and then get there and then right at the end. So we'll do that in that order. Very quickly.
>> AUDIENCE: Thank you very much for this opportunity.
I would like just to share now the practice that we do have in SEEDIG which I think maybe many colleagues will take that into account. We have the election of the executive committee which we brought up by the community.
So that we do have an election committee taking up from the community, and we put in there election of candidates so this is an open process.
And we have that in the rotation. So just like on those days when we are here, we finished the election process and we have to two members of the executive committee to step in. This is an open process and we have this established two years back and those colleagues who would be interested we can share and interest the open process for everyone.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much. And sir, please.
>> AUDIENCE: Thank you. My name is (?), I'm from Brazil and I'm a board member of the Youth Observatory which is the youth special interest group for internet society.
I would like to share a few remarks from our Youth Latin IGF Initiative. This year we had our fourth event. The Youth Latin IGF is an event held specially particularly as a day's year event from the Latin IGF which is the Latin America original meeting.
And we seek to create an open space for a new commerce and also to engage the young leaders from our region. And when it comes to our sustainability, funding isn't an issue at first. And we rely on support from many organizations in the region especially. Because we don't have the regular fund every year is a challenge for us to held the event.
Especially with the fellowship program, which is aimed to bring new leaders. And, however, over the four years over, the past years we had almost 40 fellows from our fellowship program from 15 countries in the region.
And we still are trying to bring new people and new leaders from countries that we know that still do not have many representation.
And, unfortunately, we have never been supported by the Internet Governance Association. But we are still trying to bring -- to expand the event. It is a one-day event. We have the perspective like the bottom up perspective which means outcome event especially we have breakout groups. So we are trying to bring the voices to the community, the Latin American community, but it is a challenge to keep it every year.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much for that. Yes, it is very important to encourage newcomers to come in. Makane, please.
>> MAKANE FAYE: Thank you. My name is Makane Faye from African IGF and the West African IGF.
So I wear three hats, and I thank the IGF Secretariat and UN DESA, the IGF SA because all of them have been funding the three elements I'm referring to. We are also very honored to have Anja and the rest of IGF meeting in July.
Last year we had Marcus with us in the regional IGF. And this year we had funding from UN DESA. As it was stated earlier.
I just want to say that this year funding we received bring certain ability to our activities. They will tell you the place to put it right away, sometimes the places that you did not think of like the grant which many tell you to go and make sure you bring 100 represented groups. And we are forced to do so and then, of course, that would bring a deeper opportunity for the people for those people also for the forum itself.
To answer some of the question -- trying to answer some of the questions giving the African example. We tried to make sure that there is a process as our regional IGFs and tried to make sure when you have a general idea of the older countries or the region take part. And they present and so tried that method from the original IGF, we go to the continental one, the African IGF where people are represented. In fact, at African IGF the representatives are from the regions. The regions are the ones who are coming up.
So we try to have not the -- but the logical operation. And make sure that the national IGFs followed by the original and then the continental IGF which will come before.
And you have people all sort manner, all manner for the development of the international IGF in Africa where we have put information assist countries to set up their national and regional IGF and give them enough information to be able to move forward.
That most of the information in that toolkit was based in the global toolkit and NRI toolkit, but we had some specificities and NRI toolkit has been here for quite long.
We looked at it properly and we built from it and took what we needed from it and added information to our one to the African continent. The toolkit is being used and is really helping our countries to set up. And one national IGF which have been created the input to the promotion doing at the African level. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much, Makane. And that also underscores the importance of coordination and cooperation among the national and regional initiatives. And thank you.
I have been told that I have to move on to the next topic. So --
>> There was a comment there.
>> MODERATOR: Is there one more comment? Yes, please.
>> PHILLIP JOHNSON: I'm Phillip Johnson from Nigeria. I thank for the excellent coordination and to the funder for getting me here in building.
As -- in Berlin. As you know, the IGF has been down for a long time and inactive. Me and my organization are now taking the initiative to all of the stakeholders and reactivating the IGF in Liberia.
And we have this opportunity to meet some people from our region, experienced individuals in the West African and African region. And also continue here to advise and assist us in reactivating our IGF, the Liberia national IGF. Thank you very much.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much for your comments. So the next topic is why are the NRI -- why fund the NRIs?
In the crowd, we also have funders of the national and regional initiatives because we can only fund very few, and we started this year. National and region IGFs are also funded by the IGFSA and other organizations like ICANN and ISOC.
And here we have a few of them. So I would like to start off with AFRINIC if you have a few words to say, please. A representative from AFRINIC.
Okay. They didn't come, but they are great supporters, and we do appreciate the support that they do for the national and regional initiatives. And they support the IGF as well through the combined RIR contribution that they give every single year. And then we have somebody from AFILIAS? Yes, please.
>> MELINDA KLEMM: Good afternoon. Thank you. I'm Melinda Klemm, I'm with IGF U.S.A. but I will speak as a donor from the Domain Registry AFILIAS.
The first is that we see IGF as a place that helps us achieve our mission of providing secure, stable and reliable internet services.
You know, the way that the internet operates and is managed is bigger than any one company or one country or line of code.
And we have a responsibility to think beyond our immediate tangible roles and the work that we do, and to share that knowledge and experience because we do fully endorse the multi-stakeholder model of internet governance. The IGF is an ideal forum to secure one open internet. It is also a grounding experience as a commercial entity. A place to see that that the work that we do every day.
We all get caught up in our daily lives. I come here and participate in meetings and see how important the work is and how maintaining a stable internet infrastructure helps maintain so many SGGs we talk about.
As a multinational company, we understand the unique distinctions of operating across the world while respecting local laws and customs and strategic objectives.
Affiliates to advance the local and regional goals. I was honored this year at the beginning of the year to assume a leadership role at IGF U.S.A. and I'm proud of the work we have done. The diverse participant base and success of our annual meeting.
The NRIs provide a path to maximizing advantages of the internet and technology at a local level and meeting strategic public sector goals. Finally, I would like to close with what I think is just an amazing side benefit.
Meeting so many passionate people and smart and technical folks that work so hard to achieve really great things. And I'm grateful and thankful for that.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much. AFILIAS has been a long standing donor to the IGF trust fund as well. So thank you. ISOC.
>> AUDIENCE: Hello, everyone. I'm Alejandra from the Internet Society.
The first thing that I want to say is that we are at the Internet Society, we really need local action to have a global change. So without the NRI, this local action would never be possible. So we need to start from a bottom up approach, going to where the decisions are actually made. Get all the information and share the best practices and listen to everyone in the room. Everyone in the room. Exactly everyone in the room. And only sometimes a local level or the national level regional level we can have everyone.
Once we are there, you can move forward and go to the global IGFs and make your voice heard.
I also want to say that the Internet Society we are not only providing funds like sponsorships, we do. But there are other things that we can also do and we are actually doing.
I mean that, for example, we have fellowships. We can identify people that are talented and capacity building in the global IGFs but in the national and regional IGFs. We support these people that we know that they are powerful and we can empower and they go there and make an action. Also we have capacity building.
Training. Liana mentioned the training. So Internet Society is also training people in the local and the national IGFs. Of course, in the global I guess you know that we have a very big group of powerful youth people here that have been trained. But it is not the only thing we are doing. We are actually training people locally.
Other things that I would like to highlight here is that we -- sometimes we actually at the internet side do want to support, for example, being speakers on site. This is something that support is not just money but it costs sometimes.
So with this, I want to say that we believe that the multi-stakeholder is needed, is needed. We are not just giving money, we are empowering our community because at the end those are the ones making the decisions and changing the world. The impact we need is global, but it has to start locally. Thank you very much.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you. And we also would like to thank you for the multiple levels of support that you have for the IGF ecosystem. We met, I think everywhere we have been there has always been an ISOC representative there so thank you.
Next we have ICANN. Andre, please.
>> AUDIENCE: Thank you all for this interesting session so far.
So ICANN has been a long-standing, I don't know if you call it friend or lover of the NRIs. Sometimes even mother or father of NRIs. We have a multilayer relationship.
At the global level, as you know well, the regional level, at the national level, and sometimes our support goes from direct funding to institutional support. Sometimes really bootstrap, they start learning about the national mission of IGF and the countries do that. And we do that across the five continents.
I believe that in ICANN is probably the largest budget line of sponsorship. And I hope and believe that we continue to do so.
What I will probably share with the rest of you also is that what we see along the years is that the commitment of the technical community has been there and during. But despite our efforts, we see that the rest of the industry is not as supportive as we believe they should.
There is more -- well, not that there is more but we try often to involve the rest of the DNA industry so registry and registrars in the national and they do participate and do sponsor. But the rest of the internet ecosystem gets quite different challenge.
And that is something that I think it is upon us to reflect how to get the business sector and the private sector in the internet beyond at the local level also participate because that will be something with the situation at the global level.
We do use the NRI toolkit as a guiding line for our sponsoring of the local IGFs. Since now there is such a mushrooming that we cannot go and meet sometimes and see if that is a proper IGF. We do rely a lot on this document and commend the work done. And I hope that you continue doing so. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much. And you made some good points.
And we do try -- we should try and think more about how we can involve the others that do not participate or donate to the IGF. Thank you. The next I have NCC.
>> CHRIS BUCKRIDGE: Thanks. I'm Chris Buckridge and a member of the association board. I'm speaking more about why we are supportive and has been supportive of NRIs. Thank you for the session.
I think this is not really anything I can say about why we support NRIs that hasn't been said by others and probably more eloquently. So I will do a very succinct summarization.
This week and some of the workshops highlighted one of the reasons that we so strongly support it. And that is the -- that a lot of the activity and the sort of practical implementation has to happen at the national and sort of regional level.
I have been in workshops this week on human rights related things where essentially the outcome was we need to build the national networks and work to implement these things operationally at that level.
So and even the colleague from the Kenyan IGF before gave a really good example of how that national discussion really contributes to making better policy at the national level. I mean I think we see value in building the community through those kinds of activities. And I think as an organization that is committed to engaging and communicating with all of the stakeholders in the service region, which is quite a big service region. It is absolutely true that the countries where there is stronger national community, a strong community that pulls together all stakeholders. You can have so much more productive a relationship and communication and cooperation there and national IGFs can really serve to build that community. So we very much see the value there.
I think to speak as a funder here, I think I'm not -- I wouldn't be telling anyone around this table to say that setting up or managing and running an IGF, any IGF is not straightforward. There are challenges in terms of bringing parts of the community together and defining and sticking to a multi-stakeholder ethos when building that.
One stakeholder takes the reins and suddenly you don't have a multi-stakeholder process. We are committed to funding the stakeholder processes. And so when there are the challenges, it can be a problem for the national IGF. And I think that is one reason that coming together like this and developing those best practices, developing the communication to say where it has been difficult to maintain or how strategies that people have successfully used to develop and maintain an IGF national model, that is important. And Andrea mentioned the IGF toolkit, and that is one of the best practices billing process.
I think you heard me talk earlier today probably in the IGF Support Association discuss about the need to sort of synchronize the different work going on between funding for IGFs at the various levels and making sure there is communication and coordination going on.
Which is not to say there hasn't been that, but to say these are all dynamic changing shifting models and environments and needs to be an ongoing effort to make sure that the coordination happens and happens productively. So thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much, Chris. Well heard. Last, but not least, we have the IGF SA. Marcus, please.
>> AUDIENCE: Thank you. Good evening, everyone. It is interesting session. And the IGF SA is obviously very committed to supporting the NRIs.
We were set up in 2014 with the scope, with the objective to support the IGF in all its appearances, be that at the global level, but also the national, regional IGF. We have provided support to the IGF trust fund which is managed by UN DESA. But over the years have shifted gradually to prioritize the NRIs because we have felt there is really a need in the growth.
And Anja is to blame for it. She has led with dynamicism that which we felt needed to be followed in order to encourage this growth and the spread of NRIs. And also we have an excellent collaboration with the IGF Secretariat.
We leave it to the IGF Secretariat to validate when we receive a request to say whether the IGF or the NRI who asks for some support has actually fulfilled all of the conditions, has filed reports and lives up to the standards of the IGF. And then once Anja gives the green light, then we go ahead with supporting an NRI.
And we support NRIs in developing countries and in economies in transition not industrial countries. We do make an exception with EuroDIG because they provide some funding for fellowships from economies in transition.
We have this year, for instance, if I look at the figures. We have supported 31 national initiatives and nine regional and subregional IGFs and spent a total of $97,000 U.S. dollars on NRIs.
And over the years we have spent more than $400,000 in support of the NRIs. Obviously there is more money needed. And we see our contribution, it is relatively modest of $2,000 for a national and 3,500 for a regional or subregional IGF. Less than what you were able to provide as IGF Secretariat. But nevertheless, I think the feedback we get, it is kind of seed money that helps many of them to get started.
One that Chris pointed out we have the discussion in the General Assembly today. And also felt that maybe we should be better at documenting the impact. And I think Barrack had an excellent example of what impact you can have at the national level.
And that might also help to attract donors when we can actually show how good it is. And there we have to get better and we encourage you all to send us stories of impact, pictures, videos, people like videos on the whole. If you can tell us a good story.
I used to say good internet governance begins at home and the NRIs here are, indeed, where the good internet governance begins. And many speakers pointed it out how you can have a direct impact at the national level. Once again, thank you for the session. Very interesting discussion.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much, Marcus. And thank you very much to the IGF SA. They actually filled a hole that we had on how people could make small donations towards the IGF. And with our UN Trust Fund the process was rather complicated. So donating $20 wouldn't be worth it in the end because of the costs involved.
And so they filled that particular hole. And there is no such thing as a small donation. And $2,000 towards an NRI is very, very helpful. It can provide a room, facilities for the day or two days, and also helping people come from odd of the city to come to the national meeting or even the regional meeting. Thank you.
The next part of the agenda is we are still continuing on the theme of the funding. This year, as I said, this is the first year that we had started the small grants that we were able to give to the national and regional initiatives.
And one of the problems that we realized is that most of the national and regional initiatives tonight have a legal structure. And since we could not just give -- we could only give money to some place that had a legal structure, bank accounts and et cetera.
This is also the same thing with the other donors that we do have to have NRIs have to start forming legal structures. And this is also compounded by the fact that different countries have different rules and regulations for setting up not-for-profit bank accounts and et cetera.
So it is rather a complex problem, especially for small organizations who cannot have lawyers, you know, come in and advise them on the legal structure.
But as we are here to learn from each other and to share good practices, we have the Italian IGF who can tell us a bit about how they went about it and then we can have a question and answer session afterwards.
>> AUDIENCE: Thank you very much. I have been asked by the Italian IGF to work on the legal structure. Because the IGF in Italy exists since many years, since 2008 and has never been formalized. Every year is struggling to go through the existing organization.
So it means that, for instance, like this year was made by the university about the Polytechnical and then all of the money has to go through the Polytechnical, and this create all of the problems that you can imagine. And then next year we have to start again from scratch.
So we have four years that the problem could be solved by the government. We asked many times through the various potential institutional partners to take over and take the leadership. As you know, Italy, unfortunately is a very divided country and governments are not very stable all of the time.
So we have discussed at least we have done 12 IGF, Italian IGF, and I think that we have discussed with at least 20 ministers. And we are not get out from the problem.
You go to the next, yes. So last year at the IGF in Rome and even before at the IGF in Bologna, the university have the certain autonomy and the infrastructure so they are the easiest to deal with that. We started to work on the idea to have an association bottom up to be created. And we started to work on some states that look for us interesting.
And we put together the Brazil CGI, the SEEMO -- SEEDIG status, the EuroDIG status, et cetera. The SEEDIG was complicated. We looked for something simpler than that.
The CGI difficulty, it is easier because this is something that has been accredited through the parliament.
And this is not our case. So we are looking for something that is in the middle. The main problem in the Italian the multi-stakeholder doesn't exist. If you to fit into the legal framework of Italy, this is not recognized. Normally governments or governmental body cannot have the same weight than individuals or association or companies, et cetera. So we have to invent something that could feed into the Italian regulation without infringing the law but respecting the multi-stakeholder principle.
We worked on a number of association bottom-up created where in any case we try to respect the multi-stakeholder. So each will vote for its own representative. And each will have a set certain number of seats in the final executive body of the association. So the status has been approved.
There has been conference calls over the last year to discuss about the status. A public assembly in Turin discussing the final outcome and there was still modification and hopefully before the end of the year we will go to the notary to formalize that. And we will start to be operational next year.
So hopefully in the next -- the next IGF 2020 in Italy will be organized directly by the association even if we will, of course, piggyback on some national entity that can support and host the initiative.
Because one of the other decisions was that because Italy is a decentralized country every year we try to go in a different place. If you do all in Rome then people from Milan doesn't feel represented and people from the south. In fact, next year we hope to go to south if it will work, we go there. So in this new body we will be a representative, the representation.
And we -- it has been made in a way that in case then the government or parliament want to transform this into a stable organization, the status is already there. The principle of separation and representation are there. So it will be possible to do it easily.
And the last problem, of course, that has to be self-financed association until there will be stable funding from some other sources.
What we expect is that this association would be important because could be pulling for IGF global and for EuroDIG. That the moment it doesn't exist.
The parliament some years ago worked on the charter of the internet rights that was very important but remained a case and even the parliament does not follow up with that. They approved but there is no implementation and no body in charge of that.
It will be a place where all stakeholders on equal footing could discuss and take decision to convey the Italian position to the internet governance bodies. And we tried to do this in association with the -- all of the bodies and the governmental representatives that are already involved in the process.
The next will be to contribute to the EuroDIG. The first edition hosted in Italy. Thank you.
(Applause)
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much. And your slide and your presentation also showed how you looked at the different models. So we were learning from each other, you are learning from the other NRIs which is also very good.
Does anybody have any questions on how this was done? Yes, please.
>>
>> AUDIENCE: Thank you very much. (?), a member of the committee Ukranian IGF. Thank you very much for this very important presentation.
In Ukraine, we also are thinking about the appropriation of legal structure. I have question regarding youth initiatives. What do you think how to formalize such initiatives and the very important issue about financing or for youth initiatives?
We support the decision of IGF to allocate money to main or national IGF with advice to share some friends with the national co-youth IGF initiative. Unfortunately, you have examples when money for youth IGF processes initiatives are used in improper way by different platforms or any initiatives.
Do you have any advice? It is very important to have the demand to include financial issues in the official report to IGF Secretariat.
Do you have any advice for reporting about youth IGFs? Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Does anybody have any other questions? And going once -- this is your chance.
(Laughter)
>> MODERATOR: Okay.
>> AUDIENCE: Oxana, you touch a point that is the weak point of multi-stakeholders when you start to discuss who represents who we all know this is the hardest point of the multi-stakeholder.
So what is important is that the process is done in good faith by all of the parties. And then by approximation you try to find the best solution. Italy is a very polarized country and we like to dispute each other. This is our characteristic.
I don't take care of that. So it will be complicated. We have to do through discussions and I hope that we will be successful.
What happened, just to answer the specific question about the youth representation is that because it has been done in many cases with the universities, we have been lucky that, for instance, this year bring the whole course of internet studies to Turin and attend one day about the young people. Other communities were supposed to participate but didn't show up for various reasons.
But every year the problem is the challenge you need to renew the funding and alliances and link with the professor that bring the students and you need to find the money. This is why we want to have a tool that will allow more long-term thinking. That was the struggle at the IGF global is that for years and never ended, as you know. So it will be a continued renewed process.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you. Mary, please.
>> MARY DUMA: Thank you very much. I'm from Nigeria. Coordinator for Nigerian IGF as well as the West african IGF. I'm also involved in the African IGF.
To answer her question concerning youth. When we are putting up -- putting out our budget for the year, we include the youth IGF, youth IGF.
So we form from whoever we are sending request for sponsorship. If we are requesting for sponsorship we include the fact that we are going to conduct youth IGF and we share most of the -- we do most for the youth. And in West Africa as well, it is what we are also doing.
At African level, African Union has even taken it up to the point of launching the African youth IGF. So generally we just have to budget for the youth IGF and support the youth IGF as they hold their program. But most time we ask them to bring reports from their program and that we include it in our report. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you very much., Mary, for sharing your experiences. Do we have any -- yes? Yes, please do.
>> AUDIENCE: Just a comment around the youth initiatives that are taking place around the world.
It is true that they sometimes face the issue that they are not being supported in terms of funding because they are not included as part of the national or the regional IGFs. But I have to say even when they are not, these young people find a way to get it and then they are part of the national and the regional IGF organizing also those NRIs.
So it's a pity that sometimes we are not seeing that they are not just others, they are included in the NRIs. If we support them from the beginning, as our colleague just said, they are part of it and they will be more motivated to actually feel that they are part of the game.
So I think it is a -- it is an opportunity that we have now and we cannot miss this opportunity. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: Thank you, well said. Yes. And we have to wrap up very soon. But yes, please.
>> AUDIENCE: Thank you very much. My name is (?), I'm from Ghana. I'm the president and CEO of (?) Research Foundation,
I just want to find out from Anja what is the Secretariat doing. We have a lot of youth out there who are doing work that are related to internet.
Example is my organization now we are very much into internet governance and capacity building and training innovation and all that and we are currently number 11 African countries. We had a conference on Africa and internet conference. And we brought together NASA and all of those other big organizations including the FA and the world bank and others.
They have a lot of funding for this kind of community programs. So, I just want to see how can we also or how can the IGF recognize such youths and bring them on board to support this on the way that you -- an example, we had funding and we were able to have 150 Africans to the conference that we had in Acura and then this conference is Uganda and we are looking at doing the same.
I just want to see how we can work -- how you can recognize some of this end use to also have in the process.
>> ANJA GENGO: Thank you very much for a very good question. It is true the more you work in the community the more you realize how many stakeholders are doing excellent job in challenging conditions. And Ghana is one of the examples.
I was in Africa for the west African IGF and he kind of practically told me what they are doing which is fascinating. And like I think on a global level it is more difficult to see but on the local level then you see actually how the application of technology is changing lives of people. The wisdom how the agriculture has been completely changed in Ghana and the health sector and so on.
The IGF is such a broad concept and allows for the involvement of individual stakeholders. So whether it is through the national IGF, which I think is one of the effective ways, or through the set of Dynamic Coalition that are working on a particular subject and are receiving a lot of attention through the best practice forums.
The IGFs key objective is, first of all, networking. And I think that is very beneficial for all of the stakeholders. So those NGOs through the IGF can engage with similar organizations around the world that are doing similar projects and have similar objectives. And hopefully with joint efforts to achieve more than they are achieving now.
That wisdom, I think if you have any ideas or a concept, as you know, our office is more than welcome to sit with you and rethink those ideas and see whether they fit under the project mandate and objectives and take it from there to implement.
And a quick note on the youth IGFs before I sign out from here. My takeaway from the meeting is that we have to write more. And I also had a couple of meetings with some NRIs. So, for examples, colleagues from South Sudan are here. They also told me we need more material that presents the good practices from other NRIs.
So I guess the 2020 could be in light of writing and recognizing good practices and sharing with other NRIs and beyond with the community.
So this campaign is actually an idea that came from our director, is probably the very first starting point that is going to show the key policy areas that NRIs are discussing but also the impact on the community and the outcome.
The youth IGFs are also explained well in a publication from two years ago. It is time to update because the network grew. But we recognize four models just to bring clarity on the field and the integration of the youth in the national IGFs and the regional IGFs and other networks is important.
Youth is important to have, but having them discussing in their own silos doesn't benefit everyone, especially not them. Thank you.
>> MODERATOR: All right. Thank you very much. We have to wrap up now. We will hang around for a few more minutes afterwards. We can meet outside if you want to talk. Let's find out if they have any final words from our director or the chair.
>> AUDIENCE: No, it is an inspiring and very informative experience forum for me personally and for the IGF team and I can assure that what you have said and shared certainly reinforce our determination to enhance the national regional IGF cause. Thank you.
(Applause)
>> AUDIENCE: Just thank you. And as Vint would say, see you on the net. A sincere thank you.
>> MODERATOR: All right. Thank you very much.