LocationsCo_llaboration Champions Three Years in a Row
17 de Marzo de 2023
There are three stars on the jersey of the Argentine football team, one for each World Cup won. In 2022, this achievement caused a national outburst of joy, and we felt the same way ending our third year of life. Each year, the influence of the Co_Lab, the UNDP Argentina Accelerator Lab, grows. Along the way, it enhances what works and learns from the ideas people use every day to solve complex problems. These ideas are as innovative as simple. Based on this evidence, the Lab works to influence development strategies.
The founding year of the Lab was a “roller coaster” amid the pandemic, and the second year we were able to extend our network and consolidate our work through several strategic partnerships. Today the scope of the Lab goes beyond UNDP and governments to make tools available to the public innovation ecosystem of the country.
In 2022, the institutionalization of the Co_Lab was the result of the systematization of our methodology and our success in scaling what works. We published the first guide to study the country’s possible futures, which is now available for anyone who wants to use it for foresight and prospective study. We published the results of two solutions mappings: The first one was focused on the socio-economic and financial recovery strategies of women from low-income populations during the pandemic, and the second was the first Argentine National Mapping of Citizen Science Initiatives.
We scale what works when we bring innovations to local governments where we carry out our actions and experiments, such as a crowdsourcing experience using an app to monitor aquatic ecosystems. We also do it when we scale the solutions that work by taking them from their original settings to other places in the country, such as the second edition of the Con Vos Network. This solution consists of digital points in nearby stores, where residents can do online transactions near their homes. It was mapped in José León Suárez, Buenos Aires in 2019, it was replicated in Concepción del Uruguay, Entre Ríos, in 2021, and, it arrived in Fray Mamerto Esquiú, Catamarca, in 2022. In just 8 weeks, Con Vos Fray reached more than 30 businesses where neighbors saved time and money and were encouraged to do more things online.
In 2022, we also began a Renewable Energy Solutions Mapping where some of the solutions we identified were featured in the People Powered campaign of the Accelerator Lab Network. The best solutions mapped will contribute to the goal of the UNDP Energy Compact, which seeks to make energy accessible to billions of people. In 2023, we will continue with the exploration of future signals and with experimentation activities as well.
Last year we also developed visual aids and inputs to promote vaccination. Using a survey experiment, we will shortly assess how the audience received these materials.
At the Co_Lab, we approach new issues in a humble way as rookies. We carve out our own place among those who have been researching and working on different development challenges and we seek, through several strategies, to immerse ourselves in each one of them.
From gamification to the publication of knowledge products, we use all kinds of tools to adapt to diverse audiences, always seeking to communicate in a simple and didactic fashion. Our results were also shared at academic and top events in the country and abroad, such as in Athens and Sussex, or at the United Nations Headquarters in New York.
This was not a solo effort. Action-oriented research translates into collaborations with organizations and policies, such as the National Citizen Science Program, that we helped put on the agenda, along with the Argentine Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation (MINCYT). We fostered public innovation with the governments of San Antonio de Areco, Mercedes, and Balcarce in the province of Buenos Aires, Argentina, together with the AppEAR’s team of scientists from the Universidad de la Plata. We took the Con Vos Network to Fray Mamerto Esquiú, province of Catamarca with the municipality and the Under Secretariat for Administrative Innovation of the Chief of Cabinet of Ministers of Argentina. In addition to working side by side with different ministries and local governments, we had other new UNDP partner allies: AppEAR, Lab Ciudadano, El Gato y La Caja, or CENIT at the National University of San Martín (UNSAM). Together with the Bunge y Born Foundation, we are in the final step of a vaccination promotion strategy we have been collaborating on since 2019. Additionally, the United Nations ecosystem allowed us to reach the strategies of women in vulnerable conditions as part of the United Nations Inter-Agency Project.
We Co_llaborate, literally. Collective intelligence nurtures our projects from their design to their implementation and evaluation. Thus, the things we do are enriched by different points of view and are more accurately adapted to the needs of the different partners who summon us to undertake challenges together. What's yours? Are you interested in collaborations? 2023 has just begun and we have the boost of being three times champions!⭐⭐⭐
