| APrIGF 2025 Session Proposal Submission Form | |||||||||||||
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| Part 1 - Lead Organizer | |||||||||||||
| Contact Person | |||||||||||||
| Ms. Nirjana Sharma | |||||||||||||
| Organization / Affiliation (Please state "Individual" if appropriate) * | |||||||||||||
| UNESCO | |||||||||||||
| Designation | |||||||||||||
| Programme Officer | |||||||||||||
| Gender | |||||||||||||
| Female | |||||||||||||
| Economy of Residence | |||||||||||||
| Nepal | |||||||||||||
| Stakeholder Group | |||||||||||||
| Intergovernmental Organizations | |||||||||||||
| List Your Organizing Partners (if any) | |||||||||||||
| Ministry of Communication and Information Technology | |||||||||||||
| Part 2 - Session Proposal | |||||||||||||
| Session Title | |||||||||||||
| Inclusive Digital Policies in Asia-Pacific | |||||||||||||
| Thematic Track of Your Session | |||||||||||||
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| Description of Session Formats | |||||||||||||
| Panel Discussion (60 minutes) | |||||||||||||
| Where do you plan to organize your session? | |||||||||||||
| Onsite at the venue (with online moderator for questions and comments from remote participants) | |||||||||||||
| Specific Issues for Discussion | |||||||||||||
| Nepal’s journey toward digital transformation, like many nations in the Asia-Pacific, highlights the urgent need for inclusive digital policies that guarantee equitable access, protect digital rights, and foster innovation. UNESCO’s ROAM-X (Rights-based, Open, Accessible, Multi-stakeholder) Indicators provide a robust framework for assessing inclusiveness, while UNDP’s Principles for Digital Development emphasize human-centered, inclusive approaches. The government representative will anchor the discussion in real policy priorities, legislative and implementation challenges, digital public infrastructure choices, and the question of sustaining digital reforms across changing administrations. At the same time, Huawei, as a major private-sector technology actor, brings practical insights on infrastructure, innovation, and skills development, while civil society voices are critical for holding governments and corporations accountable, advocating for marginalized communities, and ensuring that digital transformations are not only top-down but people-driven. The panel will begin with Nepal’s experience, its Digital Nepal Framework and the Internet Universality Indicators assessment before moving to South Asia and the wider Asia-Pacific. The discussion will capture regional dynamics, directly addressing the issues of the design and implementation of inclusive digital policies, making multi-stakeholder cooperation even more urgent. |
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| Describe the Relevance of Your Session to APrIGF | |||||||||||||
| This session speaks directly to APrIGF’s 2025 overarching theme "The Future of Multistakeholder Digital Governance in Asia-Pacific" by spotlighting inclusive digital policies as both a national and regional priority. The conversation will: • Anchor in Nepal’s context but broaden to South Asia (regional challenges like connectivity gaps, gender digital divides, rural-urban disparities, and political instability) and the Asia-Pacific (cross-border collaboration, technology competition, regulatory diversity). • Explore how UNESCO’s ROAM-X, UNDP’s digital principles, Huawei’s innovations, and civil society’s advocacy can converge to ensure inclusive, rights-based, and resilient digital policies. • Demonstrate multi-stakeholder digital governance in action by combining intergovernmental frameworks, private-sector initiatives, government policies, and civil society’s on-the-ground perspective. |
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| Methodology / Agenda (Please add rows by clicking "+" on the right) | |||||||||||||
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| Moderators & Speakers Info (Please complete where possible) - (Required) | |||||||||||||
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| Please explain the rationale for choosing each of the above contributors to the session. | |||||||||||||
| The panel is designed to represent all pillars of the multistakeholder model. A comprehensive dialogue has been designed starting with Nepal but scaling up to South Asia and Asia-Pacific, addressing both local realities and regional/global interconnections. • Government (Nepal): Brings national policymaking and implementation perspective. • UNESCO & UNDP (IGOs): Provide global frameworks and developmental strategies. Normative frameworks and technical support for rights-based and people-centered policies. • Private sector (Huawei): Demonstrates applied innovation and infrastructure for inclusion. Practical delivery, infrastructure, and skills initiatives to close access gaps • Civil society (GDIP): Ensures accountability, grassroots advocacy, and a voice for marginalized communities, making digital inclusion efforts more people-centered and equitable. |
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| If you need assistance to find a suitable speaker to contribute to your session, or an onsite facilitator for your online-only session, please specify your request with details of what you are looking for. | |||||||||||||
| NA | |||||||||||||
| Please declare if you have any potential conflict of interest with the Program Committee 2025. | |||||||||||||
| No | |||||||||||||
| Are you or other session contributors planning to apply for the APrIGF Fellowship Program 2025? | |||||||||||||
| No | |||||||||||||
| Upon evaluation by the Program Committee, your session proposal may only be selected under the condition that you will accept the suggestion of merging with another proposal with similar topics. Please state your preference below: | |||||||||||||
| Yes, I am willing to work with another session proposer on a suggested merger. | |||||||||||||
| APrIGF offers live transcript in English for all sessions. Do you need any other translation support or any disability related requests for your session? APrIGF makes every effort to be a fully inclusive and accessible event, and will do the best to fulfill your needs. | |||||||||||||
| Yes for sign language. | |||||||||||||
| Brief Summary of Your Session | |||||||||||||
| The session, organized by UNESCO and MoCIT Nepal, explored how to ensure the region's digital transformation is inclusive, equitable, and rights-based. A multi-stakeholder panel addressed key barriers and frameworks for people-centered digital governance. Panelists highlighted significant hurdles, particularly in Nepal: Policy & Governance: Affordability is constrained by fiscal policies, taxes, and spectrum issues. Nepal's shift to federalism has caused administrative hassles, slowing service delivery at local levels. Access & Divide: Challenges include difficult geography hindering last-mile connectivity in rural areas, severe digital literacy deficits, lack of services in local languages, and widening gender and age-based divisions. Meaningful Connectivity: The most critical oversight is focusing solely on coverage rather than meaningful connectivity. The focus must shift to ensuring citizens have the skills, devices, and affordability to effectively use the internet. Global principles must be locally adapted: UNDP Principles: These are necessary as adaptive scaffolds. They mandate a culture of "learn by doing and iterate responsibly" and require the "design with the user" principle. This involves using tools like service design blueprints to map the actual citizen experience and pinpoint where exclusion occurs. UNESCO ROMX: This framework, assessing Rights, Openness, Accessibility, and Multi-stakeholder participation, shows that policy translation requires strong political commitment and the institutionalization of multi-stakeholder advisory boards for effective follow-up. Success relies on shared effort and coordination: Government Focus: Amidst political changes, Nepal's government deemed multi-stakeholder engagement even more critical. It is pursuing a DPI (Digital Public Infrastructure)-based transformation and leveraging AI to improve service delivery and good governance. Private Sector: The private sector views partnerships as a "shared responsibility journey" based on co-creation. Models go beyond connectivity, focusing on capacity building and ensuring technology aligns with national strategies, built on privacy by design principles. Civil Society Role: CSOs must enhance their role through evidence-based advocacy that speaks to policymakers in terms of impact and numbers. Active participation in policy development is key to building trusted communication channels. The overarching conclusion was that inclusivity must be embedded by design, not treated as an afterthought, to ensure a sustainable and people-centered digital future. |
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| Substantive Summary of the Key Issues Raised and the Discussion | |||||||||||||
| Persistent Barriers to Digital Inclusion Panelists highlighted significant hurdles impeding truly inclusive growth: Policy and Affordability: MoCIT noted that fiscal policies, taxes, and spectrum issues directly impact the affordability of services. Access and Geography: Geographical challenges and infrastructure deficits lead to uneven service delivery, deepening the divide between urban and rural areas, and constraining last-mile connectivity. Human-Centred Gaps: Persistent issues include low digital literacy, lack of public services available in local languages, and the perpetuation of existing gender and age-based divisions. Governance Structure: Nepal's transition to a federal structure has caused institutional governance hurdles in administrative systems, affecting service delivery at the local level. Meaningful Connectivity: Civil society stressed that the most overlooked barrier is the lack of meaningful connectivity. Stakeholders often focus on coverage (quantitative) rather than the citizens' actual ability (skills, affordability, and devices) to effectively use the internet (qualitative). Guiding Frameworks and Adaptation The discussion stressed that global principles must be locally adapted and operationalized: UNDP Principles: These must be seen as adaptive scaffolds that move from mere documents to daily practice. UNDP champions "design with the user," which involves using service design blueprints to map the actual citizen experience and identify points of exclusion, ensuring policy intent translates into positive experience. The framework also advocates for institutional memory and stewardship to ensure continuity amid frequent political turnovers, supporting a culture of "learn by doing and iterate responsibly". UNESCO ROAM-X: The framework, which assesses Rights, Openness, Accessibility, and Multi-stakeholder participation, is used to gather evidence. Its success in translating diagnostics into policy relies on strong political commitment and the institutionalization of multi-stakeholder advisory boards to ensure implementation is followed up. The core strategies for action across stakeholders were detailed as follows: The Government (MoCIT) is currently moving towards a DPI-based transformation and leveraging AI to improve public service delivery; amidst political fluidity, the Ministry deems multi-stakeholder engagement critical to maintaining policy continuity. The Private Sector (Huawei) views Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) as a "shared responsibility journey" built on co-creation, focusing strongly on capacity building (e.g., Seeds for the Future) while ensuring technological innovation adheres to privacy by design and data sovereignty principles. Finally, Civil Society must shift to evidence-based advocacy, utilizing data and numbers to demonstrate impact to policymakers, and active, positive participation in government policy development processes is essential for building trust. |
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| Conclusions and Suggestions of Way Forward | |||||||||||||
| The session concluded with key takeaways and a clear vision for the path forward, emphasizing that inclusivity must be a foundational principle in digital transformation efforts. Key Conclusions The discussion yielded the following principal conclusions: Inclusivity by Design: Digital transformation efforts must embed inclusivity by design, rather than treating it as an afterthought. This ensures progress truly serves people, enabling participation, protecting rights, and promoting inclusion at every societal level. National Efforts & Regional Cooperation: Nepal's experience with the Digital Nepal framework highlights how national efforts both benefit from and contribute to regional cooperation. The regional context is vital for learning and sharing best practices. Guiding Frameworks: Global frameworks like UNESCO's ROMX principles (Rights, Openness, Accessibility, Multi-stakeholder participation) and the UNDP Principles for Digital Development offer common ground, guiding countries toward evidence-based, people-centered, and accountable digital governance. The Power of PPPs and Civil Society: Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) are powerful vehicles for inclusion only when they are guided by transparency and rights-based principles. Concurrently, Civil Society engagement remains essential for ensuring accountability and amplifying the voices of marginalized communities. Way Forward The way forward requires a continued focus on multi-stakeholder collaboration and acting on the recommendations derived from evidence-based frameworks: Sustain Multi-stakeholder Engagement: The multi-stakeholder model involving government, international organizations, technology providers, and civil society is the essential ingredient for making digital transformation inclusive and sustainable. Forums and advisory boards must continue to be institutionalized to ensure dialogue and follow-through. Actionable and Sustainable Policies: The gathered evidence, such as the ROAM-X findings, must be translated into concrete, actionable, and sustainable national digital policies and reforms. This involves matching framework recommendations with national digital strategies and dedicating necessary capacity and resources for implementation. Continuing the Conversation: The session concluded with an acknowledgment of questions and concerns regarding marginalized groups, such as persons with disabilities, indicating that the conversation on full inclusive participation is ongoing and must be addressed. |
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| Number of Attendees (Please fill in numbers) | |||||||||||||
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| Gender Balance in Moderators/Speakers (Please fill in numbers) | |||||||||||||
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| How were gender perspectives, equality, inclusion or empowerment discussed? Please provide details and context. | |||||||||||||
| Gender perspectives were primarily discussed as a cross-cutting issue within the context of digital exclusion and the principles guiding inclusive policy. The initial challenge raised was the issue of widening gender-based division regarding digital access and services. To counteract this, UNESCO's ROAM-X framework explicitly includes gender as a crosscutting issue alongside sustainability and digital inclusion, which must be reflected in the assessment of national internet environments. The global digital inclusion partnership's representative also emphasized promoting gender-responsive and inclusive digital policies as part of their advocacy work across the Asia-Pacific. The overall goal is to ensure digital transformation does not deepen existing gender divides but actively works towards empowerment and equality by making technology accessible and responsive to diverse needs. |
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| Consent | |||||||||||||
 I agree that my data can be submitted to forms.for.asia and processed by APrIGF organizers for the program selection of APrIGF 2025. |
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