Celebrating the First Anniversary of socialprotection.org

By IPC-IG

                                                      

 

 

 Brasilia, 12 September, 2016 -  One year ago today, socialprotection.org arose as an innovative, member-based online platform dedicated to issues of social protection that affect millions of people worldwide. The goal of the platform is to foster knowledge-sharing and capacity-building on efficient social protection policies and programmes, by drawing on the experiences of low-income (LICs) and middle-income (MICs) countries.

 

“The platform is a collaborative tool that is in constant development in order to bring together all the issues that are of interest for the community of social protection practitioners”, said Mariana Balboni, the senior project officer responsible for socialprotecion.org.  “One of our main challenges is to remain a meaningful knowledge resource to support the follow up of the 2030 agenda for sustainable development”, she added.

 

 

The free, user-friendly platform has its features divided into four sections: ‘Discover’, ‘Connect’, ‘Learn’ and ‘Share’, which are designed to provide an overview of options of active engagement with the content. It is an unbranded, interactive online hub hosting contributions from individuals, bilateral and multilateral cooperation agencies, non-governmental organisations, researcher centres, academia and government bodies to foster South-South learning on social protection. It is supported by the Development Working Group of the G20, financed by the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) and the German Cooperation Agency (GIZ). socialprotection.org hosted by the IPC-IG. 

 

                                                             

 

This first anniversary is an opportunity to reflect back on the collaborative achievements with partners, members, colleagues, and funders. Over the last year, socialprotection.org gathered more than 1400 members, 600 stakeholders and amassed over 2000 publications on a myriad of topics that support knowledge-sharing and capacity building in the field of social protection

 

From gender issues to income inequality and redistribution, the platform hosted 12 webinars in cooperation with a wide range of partners dedicated to the leading edge of social protection discussions. socialprotection.org’s ‘Online Community’ feature allows members to create and manage private or public communities dedicated to a particular are of interest for focused virtual engagement. Education, food and nutrition security, poverty and social inclusion were the most discussed topics across the 26 multi-language online communities hosted by the platform over the past year. 

 

Yet, the numbers only tell part of the story. The content featured in the platform’s extensive database and collaborative activities highlights the potential for social protection to improve the lives of the poor and vulnerable populations worldwide. Become a member of socialprotection.org!

 

Article by Denise Marinho dos Santos and Ashleigh Kate Slingsby