Advance Info: UN Innovation Cluster formation and 151515 implementation activities 2013
(Message sent by IAAI secgen Miroslav Polzer to UNCSD Major Group ‘NGOs’ and ‘Children and Youth’ colleagues, members of Rio+20 Issues Cluster on Innovation, Rio+20 Global Youth Music Contest team members and participants of the workshop “Building The Resource Base for Civil Society Participation in post Rio+20 UN System” (NY, 25 Sept 2012) Tuesday 22nd January 2013)
Dear all,
as you know the year 2012 has been a special year for all of us who deal with global civil society participation in UN system and Rio+20 conference has left us with a lot of work to be accomplished in order to bring global community on a sustainable development path.
Our organization ‘International Association for the Advancement of Innovative Approaches to Global Challenges (IAAI) www.glocha.info’ has adopted in Rio – based on deliberations of Rio+20 Issues Cluster on Innovation and energized by the enthusiasm of our Rio+20 Global Youth Music Contest partner network around the world – a very ambitious voluntary commitment – the 15/15/15 UN Civil Society Resource Mobilization Partnership Voluntary Commitment which states that Global Civil society on the one hand commits at Rio+20 conference to mobilize 15 billion Euros and 15 million volunteers by the year 2015 for UN led sustainable development efforts and on the other hand requests new forms of participation in exchange.
After two 15/15/15 Implementation exploratory workshops in New York http://www.glocha.info/index.php/latest-news/203-wsresourcescsoparticipationunny and Vienna http://www.glocha.info/index.php/latest-news/204-wsremaandgfirmesvienna23oct2012 we at IAAI are convinced that global civil society can achieve implementation of 15/15/15 vision if we all are determined, strategic and cooperative enough.
A first necessary step towards 15/15/15 implementation is to strengthen the knowledge base for civil society resource mobilization and participation in UN system in order to design our resource mobilization and allocation governance mechanisms in a way that is coherent and complementary to the functioning of the UN system and in line with the needs and priorities of global civil society and especially the Future Young people and Future Generations want.
At ACUNS Vienna UN conference 2013 (note: IAAI has been partner of the conference) we have had discussions with representatives of Vienna based UN agencies, global governance experts from Austria and neighboring Central European countries and global youth representatives that we should explore the possibility of forming a “United Nations Innovation Cluster” in the context of ACUNS Annual Meeting 2013 “Leadership in Global Governance” http://acuns.org/am2013/ (17-19 June 2013, Lund/Sweden).
Attached you can find some first draft ideas that I have put together on what such an Innovation Cluster could be and how we all could cooperate on getting it formed.
Draft United Nations Innovation Cluster (UNI) Mission Statement:
The United Nations Innovation Cluster (UNI) is a civil society led global multi-stakeholder coordination platform aiming at global governance systemic innovation, (based on applied systems analysis research, focusing on cross-institutional knowledge management integrating across governance levels based on social media and resource mobilization from global civil society sources complementing and nurturing existing UN programs) with the vision of a more participatory, coherent and effective global challenges response mechanism architecture under the leadership of modernized United Nations system delivering sustainable development that safeguards the world’s natural, economic and social resources for future generations.
In order to get global youth involved and in order to deliver the 15/15/15 Voluntary Commitment deliverables for the year 2013 we are planning to organize a UNI Global Youth Music Contest which we hope to connect also with ECOSOC youth innovation and culture related activities http://www.un.org/en/ecosoc/youth2013/#
Ad funding: I have had talks with regional authorities of Carinthia/Kärnten the Austrian province where IAAI has its headquarter and there is a good chance to receive a 50 % local cofounding for our activities. So this is quite good news and a strong leverage for our global fund raising with foundations, etc. over coming months.
Attached to this email I am sending you some preliminary information on envisaged UNI formation meetings in Vienna (26 February), New York (26 March), Lund (17 June) so you can save the date in case you would be interested to participate in the cluster and the preparatory meetings.
Please let me know (by sending an email to polzer (at) glocha.info) if you are interested to get involved in UNI or/and UNI Global Youth Music Contest and please inform me also if you are aware of any similar activities planned by other global civil society institutions or UN entities so we can design our efforts in an utmost synergetic way.
Hope to see you as members of UN Innovation cluster in the coming year
Yours faithfully
miro
