Dear colleagues, first let me thank you for the very commendable initiative, which, in my opinion, comes at the right time. I value the opportunity to contribute to the set up of the International Digital Council. My inputs are below. I look forward to interacting more with the community in the near future. Daniele Manzella (FAO, CBDT)
Question 1.
I think that the global challenges that the concept note puts forward, are comprehensive. However, I suggest strengthening the data ownership section by including policy and legal analysis of data ownership from the angle of access and use. Property is an important component but access and usability are equally fundamental. In this regard, open data vs. negotiated access is a dichotomy that is emerging in several sectors (e.g. plant sequence data) and the division between "data rich" and "data poor" is sharp. My suggestion is to connect this area of work to the 'digital divide", by adopting a capability approach, i.e. by strengthening not only the capacity to generate data, but also the analytical capacity of developing countries.
Question 2.
I suggest adding:
Being responsive to scientific evidence: the action of the Digital Council shall be informed by scientific evidence, including from social sciences, regarding e.g. responsible innovation pathways, technology absorption capacity. The Digital Council will produce a reflexive process whereby scientific evidence is generated and acted upon, and experience with implementation is then reviewed.
Question 3.
I suggest that the table insert into the innovator gap, the digital divide challenge.
Mr. Daniele Manzella