1.1.1 Central Asia
Kazakhstan showcased good examples of SIPs supported by the government, international donors and CSOs in Central Asia. For instance, government-affiliated Astana Hub in collaboration with UNICEF in Kazakhstan launched the Social Innovation Lab (SIL)1 in 2019 to solve childrenâs social problems. Earlier in 2015â2016, the Partnership for Innovations (P4I) Program of the ARGO and Eurasian Foundation of Central Asia had been supporting social innovations in the civic sector that were subsequently funded also by the USAID Civil Society Support Program in Central Asia (now USAID Social Innovation in Central Asia). Hence, SIPs were spread across governmental and civic sectors in Kazakhstan, serving different needs of those domains.
For instance, one of the projects of the SIL was âAccessible Kazakhstanâ aimed at making information about the accessibility of urban facilities and services available to the public. By using open-source data, this service allows people with limited mobility to navigate in urban space. In case the object is missing on the map, it is possible to share information about it with everyone.2 Another project that has been supported by the Eurasia Foundation of Central Asia is Impact Hub Almaty, a platform for cooperation and innovations in entrepreneurship âbeing the first such platform in Central Asia. The platform helped to develop social and creative entrepreneurship, carried out mentoring programs and offered networking opportunities.
In Kyrgyzstan, social innovations have received their momentum quite recently, after a Social Innovation Lab Kyrgyzstan (SILK) within the American University of Central Asia (AUCA) was established on an initiative of its Division of Social Sciences faculty. SILKâs aim is to focus on the socially significant projects in Kyrgyzstan, generating solutions to the existing social problems. SILK applies a purely research and civic approach and is open to researchers from Central Asia interested to contribute to the solution of regional social problems.
In Tajikistan, social innovations have been launched in 2017 through the Media and SIL event held in Dushanbe. The Lab was organized in the framework of ARGOâs âPartnership for Innovations â P4Iâ and Internewsâ âAccess to Informationâ Programs with the support of the USAID and Innovation for Change.3 The event has gathered 80 experts, representatives of media, CSOs and IT specialists from Tajikistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.4
In Uzbekistan, the UNDP/UNV âSocial Innovation and Volunteerism in Uzbekistanâ Project led by the UNDP and by the UNV was the first âsocial innovationâ supporting umbrella project. The UNDP applied two modalities for the implementation of development projects: Direct Implementation Modality (DIM) and National Implementation Modality (NIM). The UNDP/UNV âSocial Innovation and Volunteerism in Uzbekistanâ Project fell under the modality of Direct Implementation, meaning that it was implemented by the UNDP alone, without involving a national partner (ministry or local organization in Uzbekistan): the Project was implemented by the UNDP Good Governance Unit jointly with the UNV Program in Uzbekistan while cooperation with national partner organizations was based on memorandums of understanding. The project managed 33 small-scale SIPs implemented locally.
Among them was, for example, a SIP âInfoboxâ, a mobile app containing the information about Bukhara City, available for both tourists and locals. The primary goal of the project was to offer assistance to local residents to map Bukharaâs tourist destinations and provide information on how local authorities and agencies can be accessed by tourists and locals. The project was designed by a team of individuals from Bukharaâs local community, introducing a new interaction opportunity between citizens and government authorities, as well as developing user-friendly services through crowdsourcing and mapping.
Other small-scale SIPs supported by the UNDP and the UNDP/UNV projects in Uzbekistan included information and communications technology (ICT) projects, engineering/infrastructure projects, education/training and workshops, filming and other art projects.
In 2019, âYuksalishâ Nationwide Movement and the ARGO agreed to launch a P4I Program supporting CSOs in Uzbekistan to encourage cooperation between them, the private sector and the government to enhance the role of civil society. The Program focused on the areas of human rights, gender issues, youth affairs, rights of the people with disabilities and environment.5 Due to the launch of the P4I Program, SIPs have been again prioritized in Uzbekistan after a five-year break: for instance, within the P4I Program local civic councils throughout Uzbekistan were supported and CSO âNiholâ launched a Chat bot to provide psychological support to people amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
1.1.2 Caucasus
In Azerbaijan, the government and private sectors support social innovations. In 2021, the State Agency for Public Service and Social Innovations under the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan (ASAN) was created6 to facilitate an efficient delivery of public electronic services to the citizens through ASAN service centers.7
An SIL was set up as a startup generating studio with a goal to reach an annual capacity of 50 tech startups by 2025.8 SIL has a clear business-oriented approach aimed at nurturing tech entrepreneurs and serving as a pipeline for startups. The Lab offers mentoring services and encourages its mentees to participate in a variety of events9 and accelerators.10
In 2019, the UNDP with its partners initiated a network on sustainable development that now has expanded to 91 Acceleration Labs across 115 countries.11 The Labs are designed to run UNDPâs vision on innovations within the wider UNDPâs d...
