Newsletter – July 2025
Welcome to our quarterly newsletter! Inside, you’ll learn about recent events, upcoming events and opportunities from the Digital Convergence Initiative.
Subscribe to continue receiving updates from us.
Contents
Upcoming events
- October 2, 2025 – Webinar on employment interfaces
- November 2025 – Webinar on interoperability of social protection and employment systems
More information will follow via our mailing list and on our website under events.
Recent highlights
2024 GIZ Integrated Company Report
DCI has been featured in the 2024 GIZ Integrated Company Report. The report highlights the DCI and its growing role in digitalizing social protection systems around the world, and recognizes DCI’s global interoperability standards, and the advisory and technical assistance provided to countries through the DCI Helpdesk. Read the full report here.
Recent events
Webinar – Data exchange platforms for interoperability: country approaches
The webinar examined the role of data exchange platforms/middleware technologies – such as Enterprise Service Bus and API gateways – in building interoperable systems that connect and share data. These platforms facilitate secure messaging, access control, and service orchestration between platforms. The session also highlighted real-world country experiences from Chile, Uganda and Karnataka, India.
The recording is available in English, French, Portuguese and Spanish, and two learning briefs are available – access the content here.
Webinar – Advancing the integration of social assistance and labour market policies – Türkiye and South Africa
The presentations in this webinar highlighted the approaches and implementation experiences from two countries that are at varying stages of integrating delivery mechanisms across social assistance and labor market programs – Türkiye and South Africa.
Reflections on the experiences of similar efforts in Romania and Brazil provided additional insights on the pathways that can be adopted across a diverse range of country contexts to advance integration of delivery mechanisms across various pillars of social protection.
The recording is available in English, French, Portuguese and Spanish. Download the webinar materials here.
Recent blog posts
Interoperability – A key to scalable and sustainable social protection
The blog highlights the interoperability challenges facing countries with fragmented social protection information systems. The gaps result in unnecessary paperwork, slow processing times, and errors which can exclude vulnerable populations from accessing the support they need.
In this blog, we explore:
▪️ Why interoperability matters
▪️ How to move from fragmentation to integration
▪️ Benefits for both applicants and service providers
▪️ A path to more accessible and inclusive social protection
Read the full blog post here.
Expanding access in social protection delivery: the promise of digital transformation
The Digital Convergence Initiative (DCI) has contributed to a five-part blog series highlighting how universal social protection is essential for inclusive, sustainable social development.
Titled “Expanding access in social protection delivery: the promise of digital transformation”, the blog emphasizes that legislation and financing alone do not guarantee that people receive the benefits they are entitled to. It examines the barriers along the delivery chain and highlights people-centered approaches, success stories from 9 countries, and practical guidelines for inclusive digital transformation.
Read the full blog here.
DCI supports successful study visit to Nepal
The Digital Convergence Initiative (DCI) and other partners organized a capacity building study visit to Nepal in January 2025 to explore the application of the open-source software openIMIS in the digital transformation of the country’s social protection programs. Currently, the software is used in the management of Nepal’s social protection and health insurance programs.
Read the full blog post here.
Learn more about DCI capacity development and training.
Standards development
ID systems standards committee launched
The 5th DCI standards committee focuses on interoperability standards between identification systems and social protection systems and works to align existing interoperability standards between these two systems, fostering consensus among stakeholders. This initiative highlights the commitment of various parties to enhance interoperability in social protection systems, ultimately leading to a more efficient delivery of social protection services through their work on these standards.
Why are ID systems important?
ID systems are essential for effective social protection, as they enable accurate identification of individuals, ensuring that benefits reach the right people while preventing duplication and fraud. A strong ID system helps connect data across different sectors like health, education, and payments, making delivery more efficient and transparent. It ensures benefits are portable, even when people move, and plays a big role in reaching vulnerable groups who might otherwise be left out.
In times of crisis, robust ID systems allow rapid targeting and response. Ultimately, they promote inclusion, accountability, and the realization of rights by serving as a gateway to access social protection and related services.
Committee members
The standards committee for the interoperability of the ID systems and social protection systems brings together experts from 20 different organizations including government agencies, international organizations, digital public infrastructure (DPI) initiatives, digital public goods (DPGs), the private sector, and individual specialists.
Why are interoperability standards important?
DCI Interoperability standards aim to enhance the efficiency of social protection delivery systems by promoting smooth communication and data exchange among different components within the social protection ecosystem. This ultimately leads to improved social protection outcomes. By allowing programs and countries to integrate components from various institutions, interoperability significantly reduces the time and costs associated with developing solutions at the country or program level, while also minimizing data duplication across different systems.
Next steps under the standards action area:
DCI is working on interoperability of employment, early warning systems and payment systems.
For any questions on the application of the standards or to get involved, reach us at contact@spdci.org.
DCI coordinating partners assist selected countries in digitally transforming their social protection systems to enhance the delivery of benefits and services.
The DCI supports a wide range of measures, including but not limited to:
- implementing global interoperability standards
- integrating social protection information systems
- improving grievance redressal mechanisms
- leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) to improve efficiency
Supported countries:
- Cambodia
- Costa Rica
- Chile
- Pakistan (Khyber Pakhtunkhwa)
- Peru
- Rwanda
- Senegal
- Uzbekistan
- Zambia
Learn more about country support here.
In focus: country implementation work in Costa Rica and Uzbekistan
DCI, through FIAP, is supporting Costa Rica’s efforts to strengthen the governance and strategic planning of the national information system and the single registry of state beneficiaries (SINIRUBE). This support includes the development of an interoperability master plan for enhancing data exchange with local institutions and improving SINIRUBE’s technological and security infrastructure.
DCI, through GIZ, is supporting Uzbekistan to scale a Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) chatbot to enhance social protection delivery and build institutional capacity for artificial intelligence adoption with an overall objective to enhance the efficiency and responsiveness of social protection programming.
DCI Helpdesk
The technical support facility launched to provide targeted and timely expert support to countries to guide decision-making, explore digital solutions, and ensure strategic, informed actions that drive inclusive and effective digital transformation of social protection systems. The DCI Helpdesk focuses on enhancing the effectiveness, efficiency, and transparency of social protection information systems.
The helpdesk provides a range of services, including:
- Interoperability: Addressing challenges and providing support related to the implementation of digital standards for interoperability.
- Technical advice: Provide technical advisory and/or implementation support for digital solutions across the social protection delivery chain e.g. grievance redressal mechanisms.
- Strategic guidance: Supporting policymakers and practitioners on the development of digital transformation strategies for social protection sector.
The Helpdesk prioritizes support based on:
- Requests from governments: Prioritize requests from governments to ensure alignment with social protection policies and foster ownership and accountability.
- Presence of DCI partners and members in countries: Leveraging existing partnerships from funders, implementing partners at country level for enhanced impact.
Example Helpdesk case – Indonesia:
Indonesia is advancing adaptive social protection (ASP) to increase resilience to climate and disaster risks. Despite existing initiatives, data fragmentation across social protection (SP), disaster risk management (DRM), and climate change (CC) systems poses implementation challenges.
The DCI Helpdesk is providing international technical backstopping to:
- Support a baseline study on adaptive social protection data and information systems
- Share global best practices on data governance, interoperability, and APIs
- Advise national and subnational stakeholders, including the National Disaster Management Agency and GIZ to provide data and information systems with a focus on data interoperability for social protection systems
Note on scope of support: Support is offered exclusively in the form of technical expertise and advisory time (10-50 Days), facilitated by a pool of experts specializing in digital social protection systems and AI. Direct financial support and financing of IT/digital hardware and infrastructure cannot be provided.
To access support from DCI Helpdesk, country governments can reach out to the DCI Team at contact@spdci.org.
Subscribe to our mailing list to receive updates on DCI’s work and events.