The Innovation Dividend: Recent Episodes
Regional Innovation Centre UNDP Asia-Pacific
The Innovation Dividend explores how innovation in society and government are paying off. Over the coming weeks, we’ll be exploring how ‘policy frontliners’ are innovating in real-time and asking which of these changes and “raw learnings” might become part of our new normal. Brought to you by UNDP’s Regional Innovation Centre for the Asia-Pacific.
In this conversation with Anir Chowdhury, we hear about how court hearings in Bangladesh are being digitized and how that happened in less than two weeks. We also get into where those gains in speed and agility of government are coming from — and it turns out they don't just come from longer work hours. Lastly, we hear about what the policy frontliner experience feels like in the midst of the COVID response. Anir is part of the Prime Minister's National Digital Task Force and for the last 13 years, he has been leading the formation of an innovation ecosystem in Bangladesh and institutional reform. This interview was recorded on May 16th, 2020 in the early stages of the COVID-19 response.
While so much of the global conversation about climate change supposes slowing economic growth, Pakistan is showing us how investing in the environment isn't just a source of economic growth — it can provide employment to those who have lost jobs during COVID-19. We speak with Naheed Shah Durrani, the Federal Secretary for the Ministry of Climate Change in Pakistan on the country's ambitious programme to plant 10 billion trees. We’ll also hear about how making such a large investment in climate change became politically feasible and how Pakistan’s “debt for nature” swaps that reduce national debt in favour of investments in the environment might work. This interview was recorded on June 8, 2020.
Freetown, Sierra Leone has put in place an ambitious transformation plan that increases property tax revenues five-fold while reducing the tax burden on the poor, increases vegetation coverage by 50%, and much more. We hear from Mayor Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr about how these ambitious goals were set, how the tough political decisions behind them were made, and what COVID-19 pandemic has done to the city's transformation plan.
Togo built a fully digital cash transfer programme serving over 12% of the population from scratch in just 10 days in response to COVID-19. The programme pays out more to women than to men and it has successfully reached out to vulnerable populations by doing some very non-digital things. We speak with Cina Lawson, Minister of Postal Affairs and Digital Economy in the Togo Government and Shegun Bakari, the senior adviser to the Togo President about Novissi, a fully digital cash transfer scheme aimed at workers in the informal sector.
Lawson has held her post since 2013. She was featured twice in Forbes’ top 20 “Youngest power women in Africa”. She received the Harvard Kennedy School Alumni Public Service Award last year and she is the first African woman political figure to receive the award.
This interview was recorded on June 9, 2020.
COVID-19 has prevented or delayed legislators from meeting in a number of countries at a time when they have been most urgently needed. Ilana Trombka, the Director General for the Federal Senate of the Brazilian Congress had the Senate ready to work digitally a mere 8 days after COVID-19 was declared a global pandemic. Brazil became the first country to legislate fully digitally.
To date, Brazil’s virtual Senate has passed over 30 pieces of legislation online, including a constitutional amendment. We hear from Ilana how the Senate was prepared to act so quickly, how the conduct of the Senate has been adapted for the digital medium, and what impact this has had on the legislative process. This interview was recorded on May 29, 2020.
Pakistan's Ehsaas programme is providing cash transfers to 9 million families. We get a behind-the-scenes look at putting together the Pakistan government's largest operation from Dr. Sania Nishtar, founder of the programme and special assistant to the Prime Minister of Pakistan on poverty alleviation and social protection. Dr. Nishtar speaks about managing a whole-of-government response with multiple federal ministries, provincial governments, telcos, and banks; the challenges that come with the scale and reach of Ehsaas; and the prospects for universal basic income in Pakistan. This interview was recorded May 20, 2020.
Daniel Gomez Gaviria, Vice Minister of Planning in Colombia, tells us about the unprecedented expansion of Colombia's social welfare programmes (powered by the SISBEN information system), and how it is reaching out to the hardest-to-reach — including those without bank accounts. We also hear an uncommon perspective on global trade and supply chains that runs counter to what many other countries are doing and how the pandemic might affect Colombia’s meeting culture long after it has subsided. This conversation was recorded May 15, 2020.
San Pedro Garza García was the first municipality in Mexico hit by COVID-19 and the first to declare an emergency. In this interview with Mayor Miguel Treviño and Dino Cantú-Pedraza (Secretary for Innovation and Public Engagement), we hear about what it's like as a person to run a city and make decisions during a pandemic with a heavy human toll, how Mayors around the world and their teams are trading notes, and some of the major transformations cities are thinking about following the immediate crisis. This interview was recorded May 6, 2020.
This week, we dive into how the Bangladesh government is adapting to serve millions of children who are suddenly out of school. Also: why coming out of lockdown is so much harder than going into it and why we need a more nuanced view of a “health-first” lockdown in a country where many people are at risk of going hungry. This interview with Anir Chowdhury was recorded May 1, 2020.
How do you get essential goods to people through e-commerce when the majority of your country isn’t online? Introducing p-commerce. Also: updates on the effort to build a social safety net for 5 million people and how getting intra-government buy-in for projects has changed in the age of coronavirus. This interview with Anir Chowdhury was recorded on April 24, 2020.
Anir Chowdhury, who is at the frontlines of Bangladesh’s COVID-19 response, tells us how government gets things done fast, how some pre-COVID investments by government are turning out to be a lifeline for deploying national programmes, and how the Bangladesh government is assembling a safety net for 5 million people in two weeks.
In this episode, we interview Anir Chowdhury, policy advisor with UNDP and the Government of Bangladesh and Member of the Prime Minister’s National Digital Task Force, about the work that is happening to serve millions of people in Bangladesh in the first weeks of the COVID-19 outbreak. This interview was recorded on April 10, 2020.