"Development in the Age of Digital Platforms" Conference
In this joint conference, the Münchner Kreis, the World Bank and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) will bring together leading academics, policy makers, development practitioners, and industry representatives on the topic of digital platforms. These experts will discuss how development projects can influence, use, and support digital platforms in the spirit of the Sustainable Development Goals. The conference focuses particularly on Africa but also includes examples from other developing countries. The main goals of the conference are to promote dialogue and knowledge sharing about platforms and to generate recommendations for a policy paper on designing and implementing platforms in a sustainable, equitable way.
Through a unique combination of online workshops, keynote videos from African policy makers, online discussions, and a one-day face-to-face event in 2021, the conference will address the following questions:
- How can platforms be designed and leveraged to support economic growth in developing countries, especially in Africa?
- What are some existing examples of platforms that have been successfully leveraged for development?
- How can platform business models be developed in a sustainable way?
- What framework conditions and policies are needed to make sure platforms support the Sustainable Development Goals and work to close the digital divide?
Due to the COVID-19 crisis and travel restrictions, the workshops, which were originally planned as face-to-face events, will be held as online workshops during the second half of 2020. The organizers will notify participants who already registered for the face-to-face workshops in advance. If you are not yet registered but interested in attending the online workshops, please send an email to plattformkonferenz@giz.de.
Upcoming events: The next workshop will deal with the topic of Manufacturing. Date is to be decided.
Please also note the podcasts with international platform experts and further resources at the end of this page